Central London Westminster; Shoot 3 Work Diary

Central London Westminster; Shoot 3 Work Diary

Shoot Ideas

My ideas for documenting this shoot comes from the idea of wanting to investigate British Culture. Documenting central London will help investigate this topic because we associate Britain with central London and famous landmarks. In Westminster there are several famous landmarks that I can document, within London there are various symbols that I can document as they show objects related with London. I want to make London look inviting and beautiful because there are some aspects that are not as pretty, I will still document these places because the show how not everything is always inviting. 

Research


I have decided to incorporate Martin Parr's work with my shoot because his documentation of different places links to the idea that I am trying to show. 

In this image we can see a man and a woman wearing sailors hats taking a selfie in front of a bridge. This image is called Selfie Stick which indicates to us that the selfie stick is the main focus in the image. Parr's comedic values are visible in this image as it is almost like he is mocking the people taking a "selfie". The fact that older people are using modern technology is ironic because stereotypically we would not assume they would buy it. The message that Martin Parr is trying to portray is that they prefer to take pictures with the bridge rather than admire what is in front of them. 

This image links to my shoot because when in London there are people who take pictures with the famous landmarks and do not enjoy the view. Some of Martin Parr's other work has influenced me in this shoot, I like his work because it has a comedic effect alongside a documentation effect. The majority of Martin Parr's work contains saturated images which I am not entirely sure if I am going to use in this shoot because the feel that I want to create isn't associated with bright, saturated colours. 

Image Bank

As well as carrying out research of photographers I also carried out some visual research. The following images I have found relate to the way I want to photograph within my shoot. 

 

These images are the types of images that I would like to capture within my shoot. 

AO1: You must ensure that several of the visual ideas/inspirations within the image bank are pursued. 

Contact Sheet

These are all the images that I have taken within this shoot. The images highlighted in red show that they need improvement, some of them are over exposed and not in focus, next time I will try to capture all my images correctly.

Best Images

I took this image because it is similar to one that I took in my Waltham Abbey shoot. The difference between this image and the other one is that this is more brighter and the trees look more inviting. This is located in front of the London Eye so it is a more inviting location compared to the graveyard from the last shoot. This represents the other parts of London because usually we wouldn't associate London with being this peaceful and beautiful. This image is extremely aesthetically pleasing where the colour changes from darker to lighter. I am grateful I captured these trees when I did because when the leaves fall off it will not be this beautiful. 

Although, we normally associate seagulls with the beach we still tend to see them around London because there is always people with food. I took this image because it links to Martin Parr and his images of the beach, he took similar close-up images of seagulls but at a different location. I like the background of this image because it shows the other side of the Thames and the water in the Thames. It was not easy to capture this image because the seagull could've flown away but I am glad that I was able to capture it at this point. 

This is an image I took of Big Ben, it is similar to the image I took of the Church in Waltham Abbey as it is from a lower angle. Although this isn't a aesthetically pleasing picture of Big Ben because of the construction that is going on around it, it still represents the idea of London to us, there is always some kind of building work present around and in London so this image serves as some importance. It also represents that not everything is always beautiful it does go through stages of being ugly. This is similar to William Eggleston's work because he photographs the ugly, Eggleston photographs elements that aren't exactly appealing to the eye but the details he picks up are significant. This is similar to this image because the scaffolding can be considered as ugly but the details that I have picked up relate to the building work that is present around London.

I took this image because it has great representation of London within it. This shows the underground symbol which is extremely famous around London and it is an iconic symbol because everyone recognises it. Also, the fact this is Westminster Station shows symbolism of London because Westminster is famous in the UK. I like how there is trees in the image but also elements of the sky because it gives a positive in the image. This image is aesthetically pleasing because the rule of thirds is present, the sky, the trees and the station sign. 

 

In this image there is also a lot of symbolism because it shows a sign that we see in different places around London. I chose to take this image at this angle so that we could see the London Eye in the background because this serves as some symbolism as it is a famous landmark. This also shows the beauty of London because of the effect that the sky gives it, the brightness of the sky makes the image appear brighter. When editing this image I think cropping it will make it a better image because we will then be able to focus on the main elements of the image. 

Images that require improvement

This image I have taken requires improvement because it is shot too bright which does add an effect and can be worked with but personally I don't like it. If I had worked with the camera settings I would've been able to capture this image better but because the bird kept moving it was extremely hard. I eventually captured a good image with this bird, it is present above in my best images.

Unlike the image before which was over exposed this image is under exposed. It was extremely hard to capture this image well because of the sky light and the colour of the lamp post. To achieve a better image I have researched how to photograph in camera raw which may help me in my forth coming shoots. I will experiment in photographing in camera raw to try and improve my under exposed images.

AO3: Record ideas, observations and insights relevant to intentions, reflecting critically on work and progress.

My main idea with this shoot was to capture the different aspects of London life, this links to my illustrated proposal where I talk about British Culture. I believe that I have displayed British Culture well in this shoot because I have shown different symbols of this throughout this shoot. By documenting Central London it shows the main aspects of British Culture because this is extremely famous in Britain. Within my shoot Martin Parr has influenced me because of his documentation of British people, the images that he takes of seagulls at the beach also influence my image of the seagull in my best images. I will experiment with both colour and black and white when editing these images in photoshop. 

Within this shoot I have captured all the images that I have expected to take. In my next shoot I am going to go back to Waltham Abbey and shoot again. Regarding the techniques I will use I want to photograph in camera raw to improve my under exposed images.

With regards to my best images...

The images I have taken are different but they show the different scenes we see around this one place in London. All of my images are aesthetically pleasing to an extent because it shows the beauty of the London and the symbols we think of. Like my shoot before this majority of my images were central, I think I have improved from this because my images all have different structures. 

AO2: Explore and select appropriate resources, media, materials, techniques and processes, reviewing and refining ideas as work develops.

I took these images on a Nikon D3300 in aperture priority mode. My camera settings for this shoot were shutter speed at 1/500s, f/11 and ISO at 320. I haven't really been focusing on my camera settings within my shoots which I need to start focusing on because it will produce me with better images. The f stop can work for landscape images but I need to use a higher one to capture a landscape image with a wide depth of field. In my next shoot I need to focus more on the camera settings and this will provide me with better images. At this stage I am not really sure of the actual route I want to take which is why my camera settings vary so much.

Next I took my images into photoshop to improve them. Screenshots of the processes are visible below. 

 

To edit this image I took it into the camera raw filter setting in Photoshop. The screenshot of the filter process is visible above in which you can see the settings I used to create a brighter and more saturated image. I chose to saturate the image in this way because it links more to the photographer I am looking at, Martin Parr. I also cropped this image slightly to focus more on the bird rather than anything else. 

To edit this image I cropped the image first to have more focus on the central part of the image. Then using the camera raw filter, screenshot above is visible, I lightened the top areas of the trees by increasing the whites in the image, I also darkened the bottom areas of the trees to create more of a shadow. I also saturated and increased the vibration of the image to link it back to Martin Parr. 

To edit this image I also cropped it to allow there to be more focus on the sign rather than what is around the sign. Then like all the other images I took the image into the camera raw filter, screenshot visible above, I made the image seem lighter than it originally was and increased the saturation and vibrance of the image to link it to Martin Parr.

AO1: Develop ideas through sustained and focused investigations informed by contextual and other sources, demonstrating analytical and critical understanding.

The research I carried out on Martin Parr enabled me to be able to document people around Britain in different ways and be able to include symbolism within my work to show symbols of the area. I chose to research Martin Parr for this shoot because I am documenting the happier and famous parts of London so his use of saturation will help within this shoot. I have experimented with saturating and making my images more vibrant above in Photoshop which links to Martin Parr's work. 

   

The image that I have taken is similar to that of Martin Par's because it contains a seagull. The way I have edited my image relates to Martin Parr's because I have increased the saturation and vibrance of the image similar to the way that Martin Parr does. The seagull's are symbols of Britain in both of these and the brightness of the image gives a positive effect even though British people hate seagulls. Also, both of these images have the location of blurred in the background which adds importance to the seagulls because they are part of the main focus. 

AO4: Present a personal and meaningful response that realises intentions and, where appropriate, makes connections between visual and other elements.

I have chosen those four pictures as my final outcome from this shoot because they all have elements of symbolism within them. The first image displays to us the nature elements of Britain and the parts of it we don't think of when Central London comes to our minds. The second picture represents the animals we associate with Britain. The third picture shows symbols of London with the skyline, the black cab and bus. Finally, the last picture displays symbolism with the underground symbol. I have chosen to edit all these images in similar ways by increasing the saturation because I was going for a more positive effect because it is a happy place. I linked all of these images with Martin Parr because he uses extreme saturation in his images. These images I have taken are very different compared to the images I presented in my last shoot of Waltham Abbey because I presented those image in black and white. When the images are stripped of their editing I believe all my current shoots link because they all express British Culture which is the main idea behind all of my shoots.