Lira's Photography E-Journal

  University of Westminster Photography Student   

[liranamoni]

Project Synopsis

[liranamoni]

Layout for final images

I have chosen to use a simple layout in order to create an intimate feel between viewer and image. I believe it is important for an image to make an impact and allow one to feel what is before their eyes.

Size: A2

Paper: Semigloss

[liranamoni]

Final Images

When deciding which images would best suit my title ‘I Hide’, I felt a strong attraction towards these two individuals. This was due to many factors, one being when looking at them instantly a sense of entrapment is felt which best explains how I and both my subject had felt in the past. To bring in a positive outlook of mental health I positioned my subject beneath a plastic sheet where she then begins to rip through which emphasises a sense of hope for those who need help. 

Photography has always helped me calm down my inner thoughts, it has allowed me to use it as a way of therapy, as a way to tackle my problems and make sure I would find the strength in me to exclaim my worries and ask for HELP. 

[liranamoni]

Possibilities for my final images

[liranamoni]

Possibilities for my final images

[liranamoni]

Possibilities for my final images

[liranamoni]

Daniel Regan

Fragmentary is a project which was completed as a part of an artists residence at the Free Space Project, Kentish Town Health Centre, London. It allowed the photographer to revise times of his life. He had always turned to photography to express the feelings of a fragmented identity.

Daniel Regan is another photographer in which I gather inspiration from and believe uses photography in the same way as I tend to use it. It is a tool made to help our own selves and those around.

[liranamoni]

Black and white images inspiration

[liranamoni]

Experimenting with images

Adjusting settings

Merging words onto my images

Adding words onto images has always been a technique which I felt worked effectively well. It allows the images to speak for itself whilst also then giving a little more insight into the narrative.

To do so I had to carefully use the select tool which allowed me to outline around my words which I then placed around my images (zoomed in) to help me easily remove extras I did not want using the rubber and magic tool.

[liranamoni]

Editing on Lightroom

When beginning to edit my images on Lightroom I particularly wanted to keep them as natural as I could. This was mainly due to the idea of not wanting to enhance the raw emotions one feels when coming face to face with our minds battles. The originality of how the body wraps around the fabric allows numerous shadows both window and body to form, emphasising the motion within one. How our body reacts to an impulse thought, the struggle, the chronological order, it's  a structured pattern, each time increasing more and more to then eventually exploding.

The process of editing simply included adjusting exposure, contrast whites and blacks mainly. Alongside this I would then adjust clarity bringing the whole image to have a slight fade which would further bring out emphasise on the body struggle.

[liranamoni]

Shoot

[liranamoni]

Shoot

[liranamoni]

Shoot

[liranamoni]

Research

Depression has life-changing effects on individuals. The isolation, worry, and fear that comes with this invisible affliction can stall and even prevent forward progress. it is often that one feels alone in their struggles. An estimated 350 million people suffer from one sort of metal illness. From the stigma that is attached individuals shy away from the problem and are less inclined to discuss or more importantly ask for help.

The form of poignant depression photography is often autobiographical. It’s the starting step towards imagery that highlights darkness, bringing about the loss of a sense of self.

Conceptual photographer Janelia Mould of Cheeky Ingelosi Fine Art Photography specialises in shooting conceptual images that tell a story. Throughout my three years of studying photography I have always felt passionate towards creating images which have always told a story, helped someone of simply raised awareness. Photographer Janelia Mould does this perfectly. In her series Melancholy - a girl called depression is a moving account of mental illness. The portrait photographs reveal the raw emotions felt by sufferers of depression.

‘Withering Away’ “It’s feeling like you’ve lost something but having no clue when or where you last had it. Then one day you realise what you lost is yourself.”

‘Barren’ Some days, “I feel everything at once. Other days, I feel nothing at all. I don’t know what’s worse - drowning beneath the waves, or dying from the thirst.”

‘Uninhabited’ “Maybe we feel empty because we leave pieces of ourselves in everything we used to love.”

[liranamoni]

Shoot

[liranamoni]

Shoot

[liranamoni]

Lucey Keast

The simplicity of this black and white photograph is all that is needed to explore the powerful, raw emotions felt. It clearly illustrates the overwhelming feelings felt whilst also suggesting that it may be an ongoing situation, where the individual may still get outbursts of thoughts. This is further implied through the use of the image being taken in a shower, a shower is known to be a routine an individual participates in. This can metaphorically be suggested that the feelings are indeed ongoing. A shower often starts of slow and then intensifies as u turn the handle. Feelings, thoughts and worries tend to also start off small and then eventually burst causing an individual to feel useless and like they cannot carry on.

Bathroom shoots have always had an intimate connotation when it comes to photography for me. It is a technique I will try to portray in my final piece of work.