During our photography week we were shown a massive selection of different photographers each with their own unique styles and influences. One of these photographers that I particularly liked and decided to do some further research into is american photographer, Gregory Crewdson. Crewdson is known for his staged scene and landscape photography which share a small story which is open for a lot of interpretation. This helps to establish a bond with the viewer and allow them to make up their own mind about the piece instead of forcing the perception of the photographer.
The thing that attracted me to Crewdson's work was the fantasy sort of style he gave every photo. The pictures look like concept art and paintings rather than photos, almost looking too nice to be realistic. It feels as a viewer that we have been lost in a completely unique and beautiful world which is in fact our back garden reshaped and presented in a way we mostly never see. It is obvious that that crewdson shoots with long shutter speeds because of the way light is captured in his photos, and the flat focus. All of the photos show the entire shot in focus allowing the viewer to explore the photograph which hints at using a long shutter speed. Secondly the way that light rays and trails are captured in some of the photos which is extremely difficult without using a long exposure. He has shot many different scenes all seem to based in the late 1900's style of american, in showing fashion and the landmarks in the photos. All have at least one character involved in sort of posy body stance to give some sort of indication to the atmosphere. The way the weather and choice of scenery has also been manipulated to show this as well.
My favourite photo that I have seen by Crewdson is the one below of a man walking a baby stroller down the centre of a neighbourhood street as the sun is breaking dawn. This photo is such an elegant piece of work. It is open to debate what is the focus of the piece as the man is in fact so small in comparison to the frame, despite being centred. We get a rough clash of dirt and mud in the bottom left corner to the freshly cut green lawn next to it showing the different lives people can live yet right next to each other. The mood of the photo overall appears extremely cinematic and surreal, the bouncing of the light and the quality of the photograph.
Today we were working with light and how it effects different objects. We were given access to a number of different studio light equipment, from dodo lights to reflectors with a number of different diffusion wraps and materials. Luckily I had also brought in my small mount camera light that I use for filming and portrait photography. It comes with a few different diffusers from tungsten to a stern white.
We were then given an egg and had to come up with the most inventive and different way of using light well and correctly from all this equipment to produce a high quality unique photo.
Throughout the whole after noon we experimented with different lights and angles to create different shots and my final images are on my fruit photography post. We then handed in one photo to show everyone else. We played a lot with the lights experimenting with styles such having my small light under neath a piece of clothe that the egg was placed on to give it a sort of angelic holy look. The swapping it to putting the egg head on into the ray of the dodo lights catching the silhouette and creating a small sort of halo of the egg surrounded by light.
We ended using a black white photo of the egg on a spoon because of it simplicity and the minimalistic style the egg is shown.
For one of the tasks this week we were set to go out and make a timeline with ten photos which are somehow relatable to ourselves since we have started this course. The photos don't have to be ones we have taken but must be relatable to ourselves in some way since we started the foundation diploma. This could be different places we have been to different people we had met, but then this had to be shown in a unique timeline somewhere in the college.
I decided to choose the ten most important and influential experiences/materials I have used or come into contact to since starting the school. This is included simple things like films I had watched several times for research (Blade Runner) ,to places I had been and photos I had taken since starting. Once I had my ten photos I didn't want to just lay them in a straight line like a predictable timeline I wanted to create a 3D object that showed a different perspective from each angle. I printed and stuck all my photos to a plastic bottle, with the things I had interacted with most recently at the top and the oldest at the bottom. This was my way of showing how these things have built me up to where I am now in the present.
One of the main and probably the second most influential video personally for me was a video by the Foals called Inhaler. I have taken a lot of ideas from some of the music videos that the Foals have produced but the main reason I have chose this for analysis is because of the structural relevance and relationship it has with our video. The video inhaler is actually about smoking and how we abuse our gift of a healthy body. This won Best Track at the 2013 NME Awards and was actually written in the tour van during one of their tours
Lyrics
Sticks n stones
Don’t break my bones
They’re make believe
It’s lock n load
It’s a dead end road
for you & me
I’m rusted gold
I’m striped and sold
I’m make believe
I’m up for rent
my head is spend
I guarantee
So can you not go away?
If just for one day?
Impossible possible
how d’you feel now?
& throw yr fortune away
cause
I can’t get enough space
space
space
I’m pale n coy
a momma’s boy
I’m make believe
I shimmy shake
I wake n bake
I’m over me
My lungs defeat
I cannot breathe
don’t follow me
& you push & shove
I’ve had enough
you best believe
So can you not go away?
If just for one day?
The impossible possible
how d’you feel now?
How d’you feel in a war?
War sends out for you
throw
yr fortune away
cause
I can’t get enough space
space
space
Quick overview of the video watching it head to toe it is a both a performance and narrative base video, and the narrative is made up of multiple groups of different people in diverse settings. Individually the shots should not relate and fit into the same video but for some reason through the convergence of a band performance and the drive of the editing the video runs extremely fluently and after watching multiple times I've come to realise how good the music video actually is.
The music video opens with a group of people sitting in an empty car park, and then lying down and breathing in. This is a visual relation to the name of the song "inhaler" which is then re-visited at the end of the song. The video then quickly cuts to the band playing in a graffiti covered skatepark and then proceeds to cut to a number of the other narrative scenes. This early introduction the viewers get to the different scenes, helps the video to appear a lot more natural when it cuts to them later on. The shots are extremely short and quick lasting no longer than a second or two, with all mixing all different close ups and camera angles. The first narrative properly addressed in the video is a man dancing in a park, and comes into shot after the first line of the song is sung "Sticks and stones, will break my bones". So once the lyrics come into the song the video starts to have a little bit of continuity to it. The shots quickly cut between close up and long shots with no real mid shots during the narrative. Also after every few shots of the narrative it makes a single cut back to the band to reinforce the fact that it is in fact a music video. The performance is placed with times to fit into the narrative.
The director however does use small subtle influences in the narrative to relate it back to the song of the artist. For example there is a shot of a lady being tattooed with a design of a pair of lungs, relating to inhale. Also amongst the shots of the skate boarders there are a few shots of them smoking a homemade bong also relating to the word "inhaler". Finally there is also a shot of a person putting in a retro music tape with the words "inhale" labelled on it.
The video starts off extremely calm and then as the video and song progresses the visuals becomes a lot more erratic to match the video. The director creates different build ups through out the song. The verses are a lot more peaceful and act as settings for the chorus' where everything goes a little bit manic. He uses effects like slo-motion and soft movement in the camera during the verses but then as the chorus kicks in all the cuts shorten representing more of a montage of clips and the camera and actors behave a lot more violently. In fact in the final third of the music video there are several close ups of characters that are appear to be "straining" and in a lot of pain. Im not quite sure the meaning for this but they are edited in just as the music is at its loudest so match visually to the sound. They wouldn't have worked if they were placed earlier in the video when the music was a lot more mild.
The video suits its target audience, the indie group, through a number of things. The activities that the people are doing like the skateboarding and BMX bikes are very relatable to that group of people along with more simple things like way the actors are dressed. This is something we are making sure we control heavily that the things the characters are dressed in and what they are doing are realistically relatable to its watchers. The final scene cuts back to the group of people sitting in the car park that we saw at the start of the video. However if you look closely you can recognise some of the narrative characters involved. They are waving while on the ground in time with each other as if they are "beating". This is meant to symbolise the heart and lungs breathing in and out, relating back to the song and also acting as a way of connecting all the narrative characters together. They then start doing a group dance that is slightly on the weird style when it comes to dancing. However some of the hand movements and the way is shot reminds us a little to Michael Jacksons' "Thriller" and Geri Halliwells song "Its Raining Men" which I have also analysed in another post.
Overall this video is very creative and plays on the viewers mind. There is a underlining moral behind the story, even though it is barely noticeable to anyone without the lyrics, to respect your body and health. Personally I think that the director has done very well with combining the different narrative compositions in a video that works together to tell a similar story even though the separate scenes are polar to one another. And this is why I like the video so much.
We found love is a song written by Calvin Harris but song and filmed with Rihanna. The music vide is directed by Melina Matsoukas, who describes the singers as a "drug-abusing thrill-seeker in a relationship that quickly spirals downward into addiction and violence". The music video won the Grammy Award for Best Short Form Music Video.The song reached number one in the charts for a total of three weeks. The main character is played by Rihanna, and there was a lot of scepticism on whether the video was relating to a past relationship she had. I personally really like this music video because it is a prime example of how good narrative music videos can be when performed correctly. It provided a lot of inspiration for our video.
Lyrics
It's like you're screaming, and no one can hear
You almost feel ashamed
That someone could be that important
That without them, you feel like nothing
No one will ever understand how much it hurts
You feel hopeless; like nothing can save you
And when it's over, and it's gone
You almost wish that you could have all that bad stuff back
So that you could have the good
Yellow diamonds in the light
Now we’re standing side by side
As your shadow crosses mine
What it takes to come alive
It’s the way
I’m feeling I just can’t deny
But I’ve gotta let it go
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
Shine a light through an open door
Love a life I will divide
Turn away 'cause I need you more
Feel the heartbeat in my mind
It’s the way
I’m feeling I just can’t deny
But I’ve gotta let it go
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
Yellow diamonds in the light
Now we’re standing side by side
As your shadow crosses mine
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
We found love in a hopeless place
The video starts off with an extremely long intro to the video, nothing to do with the song, as it is narratively commentated over by a lady. What this does it is set the scene for the video and help explain to the audience what is going on between the characters. The director uses quick cuts and fast paced editing, of the same two characters, in lots of different places to imply how quickly time has flown bye together.
The atmosphere seems very depressing and dark with the shots showing the two characters in broken down scenes. From shots of the two of them sitting in a bathtub in a grotty smashed up apartment to a shot of them smoking curb-side to a road at night-time looking slightly under the influence of a substance. These visuals are connoting a sort of "Live Fast Die Young" attitude with the drugs and the carefree attitude. There is one particularly disturbing close up of Rihanna with her hair all wet and looking general dirty that just summarises the intro.
Then as the music kicks in the "temperature" and mood of the song changes dramatically. The overall appearance of the characters improves and they look a lot more taken care of or "refined". The facial expressions have also changed from the serious stares during the intro to fun, clearly enjoyable, happiness. A massive contrast change in atmosphere.
In the build up to the chorus the viewers are met with a montage of drug related shots and sexual scenes, giving a real sex drugs and rock & roll theme. Creating a sort of euphoric look to drugs with the multi-coloured cigarettes and pills and relating it to sex by cutting scenes of the two characters in between. Then as the beat drops for the main riff cutting to a music gig outside.
As the video progresses it carries on into madness. The upbeat happy atmosphere that we were seeing at the start of the video eventually breaks down into fighting, with the final scene being her leaving him passed out on the floor. The whole video represents how relationships can turn out. Although they may seem amazing at first its so easy how they things can turn around to be the complete opposite. In this case love.
Although the video seems very simple when watching it there are many small things that i picked up on throughout that influence the mood and story to the video. Colour has been massively edited with during the video. There are several different scenes that have been colour graded to have a completely different tone to it. Looking below you can see the differences and this tone can reflect on the way the audience can perceive the shot. For example the shot far left makes her look very innocent and shy due to the calming blue tone to the shot. However if you were to replace that with red then it makes her look fierce, the complete opposite.
Camera wise the video is shot not steady but not hand held, its sort of in between. There is movement in the shots have this is not smooth which works cleverly because it helps the audience connect with the video and fill more emerged visually. The camera angles are relatively horizontal as well with 9/10 being eye to eye contact level. There are a few high angle shots but this is during the mud gig scene where high shots help to show the amount of people involved in the gig and not connote dominance to a specific character etc.
Overall I think the video works really well. The story is based around love and how rollercoaster the relationship can be, and I think that visually it fits perfectly. Honestly I can find almost nothing to fault or that I could improve upon.
During our photography week we were shown a massive selection of different photographers each with their own unique styles and influences. One of these photographers that I particularly liked and decided to do some further research into is american photographer, Gregory Crewdson. 
