Fern Disney A2 Photography Component 1: Project Proposal

My personal investigation will be to form a visual portfolio of the stereotypical youth subculture in today's society/ their "anti-social" behavior through the technique of portraiture. I will be exploring different parts of behaviors for example the disruptive side- causing fires/ being out late on the streets, vandalising the streets- through the use of street art/ graffiti and other aspects such as drinking and smoking.

Background:
This idea has been inspired to me through the local news, with teenagers being labelled through their stereotypes in a negative way, I thought this would be an interesting topic to explore, as personally I do not see myself fitting the "stereotypical way". I hope to focus mainly on silhouette photography, so even though it will be through portraiture, my investigation will be around the outline of teenagers- not their whole faces- this way people what be distracted about how the subject looks but how they are being a stereotypical juvenile. Most my shoots will be set up, however for certain shoots if I am able to, I hope to include certain documentary shoots to link in- for example in using street photography and the technique of blur. I really hope to exaggerate the "life of a teen" through the way certain medias form the teenage definition of.
For example the news portrays Britain's teenagers "among the heaviest drug users and drinkers of Europe" as shown in a news article called "News about Britain teenagers and drugs". This news article shows how teenagers are being stereotyped for being drug takers, drinkers and smokers- thus showing my inspiration for this photography project.

Id like to begin my shoot through a simple shoot of teenage behavior of a group in a park drinking. I will not be using alcohol, but just beer bottle as props- to give a connotation to make the audience believe they are drinking. Ways I would do this with out revealing their faces would be...

Having a close up of one of their lips nears the top of a bottle.
having a close up of lots of bottles on the floor with a group distorted in the background- the silhouettes( this shoots would be at dusk time).
Having a full body portrait of of their their backs facing the rest of the group.
Using shallow depth of field, having my camera placed on the park equipment then revealing the gang in the background.
using negative lighting of my subjects all in black to create a contrast between the sun set behind them.

Another shoot I hope to do is to go into London and go places such as...

Brick Lane (Scalter Street)...

Leake Street (Graffiti Tunnel)...

Additionally I hope to take photos of my subjects merged in the rush in the underground...

Southbank Skate-park...

Photographers research:

I have researched different styles of this technique and have found photographers whom I have never researched before for example...

Robert Hendrick, Darren Johnson. Furthermore, another source which influenced me for my chosen personal investigation of teenagers was of the social media app- Instagram. This includes the account "ldn.photos" and "Brooklyn Beckam". There's also the work of photographers Gavin Watson and Simon Wheatley which I like the theme of. I did look at other photographers such as Larry Clark however I didn't really like the nature of his work as I believe this was too far out of my style of photography, although I did like how "real" his photos appear to be. Another photographer I have researched for this project is the work of William Klein- this research is shown in my blur techniques post, I think his work of documentary work work in certain aspects of my shoots.

Illustrations...

When researching photographers I have found a numerous number of photographers which I really like and help portray my intentions.

To start this is a photo found on the Instagram account ldn.photos. The use of the dark silhouette- like hooded figures are really interesting because the viewer cannot see their faces giving these subjects no identity- which is an example of how I intend certain shoots of mine to go. Alongside this they are doing a careless action- sitting on a goal post, even though I will not be making my subjects do this, I still believe this is a very good example of a stereotypical subculture of teenagers in today's society.

Again this is an image I found on Instagram taken by Brooklyn Beckam. Much like the image above, you are unable to identify the person which is why this image is really intriguing- it shows a rebellious attitude. The graffiti in the background is both the puctum and the studium in this image because without the graffiti in the background the effect of a hooded, rebellious-like figure may not be the same effect on the audience. This is because the graffiti gives this image context, (the connotation) the subject have just done this graffiti and as it is a crime, see the camera and made this rude gesture as if to say "I don't care!". This leads to how this image is intriguing because it further supports the rebellious attitude alongside the swearing through body language. I may use this in my shoots and I feel like this body language of swearing is very clear on what they are saying/ thinking.

This photo was taken by Brooklyn Beckam again. Even though I will not take photos of my subjects skateboarding I do think this is a really good image to help my research- showing a careless attitude of skateboarding in the middle of a road which appears to be very run down by the look of the background. This has created an idea that I may use documentary photos by taking photos of people skateboarding if I am able to- with their consent.

This image was taken by Robert Hendrick. The use of the editing through black and white gives a really intriguing effect of this image because gives it an unknown atmosphere- the whole body is a silhouette, blocking out the identity of this subject. It also looks like this image is physically edited- it looks scratched out which I also really like and may choose to use in one of my shoots.

This photograph is by Darren Johnson shows the rebellious side of teenagers- smoking- and again cannot see his face, shielding the identity. As you can see from all these photos, the filter put on them is black and white which I believe work really well and on certain/ majority of my shoots I hope to use this. Even without the cigarette, it would show the youth subculture due to the hoodie, this shows how the photographer used the cigarette and smoke as a punctum, giving them more to look into the image, forming the studium. Without the punctum, the audience/viewer may read into this photo that its a hooded teen out looking for trouble, yet with the punctum, it shows a rebellious and careless minded side to the youth subculture.

This image was also taken by Darren Johnson which is really intriguing because unlike all these other photos the face of the subject is actually shown giving her a small sense of an identity, yet due to the makeup (black eye contacts) and hairstyle of a fringe covering half her face and then the props of a mug, the subject still isn't completely clear and parts are still hidden- this photograph has a rebellious side yet almost a feminine aspect of it as well due to the make up and the nail varnish. The photographer would have formed the same effect with just the subject smoking, however unlike the image above, the punctum is no longer the cigarette but is the mug and black eyes. This is because it gives this image a studium- gives it the reason for being intriguing, due to the punctum, the audience may be able to form the connotation that this youth subject is looking deep into the camera, but as we cannot see who she really is, it doesn't matter- she still has no identity.

This is a photograph by Gavin Watson which intriguing and illustrates my ideas for taking photographs on the tube/ at the station. Obviously my subjects wouldn't be smoking on the trains because unlike the time where this must have taken, that is now illegal, however I do like the idea of showing the anti-social subculture on a busy/ or even an empty train, I think it would work very well.

This is a photo taken by the photographer Simon Wheatley, I liked this image because as you can see, unlike all the other photos, this one is in colour and I like how this has a similar effect as the black and white because of the lack of bright colours anyway. This image shows two different types of teenagers, who both could fit under the label of "anti-social" sitting opposite each other at opposite sides of the frame. This holds a denotation of different teenagers being near each other- but maybe they share different interests but still stay in the same room together. Another important factor in this image is the lockers in the middle of the photo- they have numbers on not names, this could be symbolic as if they lack an identity- conforming with the stereotype of "all teenagers are the same".

Techniques

As shown from my research, I hope to use mainly black and white images because I believe this highlights a rebellious side. I also would like to use techniques such as Close ups, Extreme close ups, wide angles. Furthermore, as shown from my research of different technique of shoots within and out of class, I have came across more techniques which I would like to include. These include animated GIFs, which I could use to capture someone smoking in the use of making a short boomerang type clip- for example the image shown on my illustrations part of a female subject smoking whilst drinking out of a mug- I could use a GIF to make her lower the mug then smoke.
Additionally, using the work of William Klein, I hope to use the technique of blur as I am quite happy with the way one of my images came out as it fits really well with my proposal (image shown below).

Furthermore, For a few of my shoots, I hope to edit them in a style to make it look like they were taken on a film camera. To do this there a different ways I can do this...

For starters, I can take a photo, print it out and then scan it, this way it gives it a older looking film photo- This is an example of a photo which I have done before and scanned it.