several documentary shots taken on my summer holiday

Good Morning

Back up to Cheltenham

It's not home but it could be

Quarr Abbey

Moving on

It's been a while..

so I have had a packed summer and have not yet documented the slightest bit on my blog yet so better starting late than never right?  In photo-graphical sense, I've made some great discoveries this summer, new possible job opportunities, some great work in the local photography museum 'Dimbola lodge' and met some amazing people, been to a few music festivals oh and jumped off a cliff attached to a parachute, but I haven't really felt motivated to get on with some projects I have in mind which is a real shame. I have however recently bought a new (and HUGE) book called 'Blink' by Phaidon press demonstrating 100 of the worlds most incredible contemporary photographers and a few empty sketch books to hopefully get the ball rolling. Here's a few snaps of the summer anyway:

Only in England - Tony Ray Jones & Martin Parr

This london exhibition really inspired me being that these two photographers are favourites of mine. I also noticed upon walking around the exhibition of Tony Ray Jones work, that he did a lot of shoots on the isl of wight which was so great! I could see where the shots were taken even though they were a good 40 years ago. Their photography was exquisite and the whole day itself was fab to get away from uni and home and go somewhere different.

Me, Myself and I project

Bleurgh, this project didn't seem at all fun especially when one of the requirements was to take a selfie. Tried my best though, here 'tis:

Here's the crappy little selfie.

So I thought this as a still life piece tells a lot about me because I'm heavily involved in music. I love the stuff and I'm a bit of a festival go'er. Isle of Wight festival, Bestival, and Reading Festival pretty much every year along with gigs like this one to my favourite singer, Frank Turner. Took this in a studio style set up with a little spot light hitting the objects and a macro setting to get them nice and close up. 

Here is another shot which tells a lot about me, Here is on of my dream diary's, I ma encouraged by the doctor to keep these to note down every nightmare I have and to try and determine why  I get them every night.

As I have mentioned before, I used this kind of portrait to increase awareness of a disease I feel very strongly about. My other half suffers from Cystic Fibrosis and I have made it a part of my life as well as his. 

The inclusion of a place which represented myself clearly rang in my head as the place I live, the Isle of Wight. These are some shots I have taken both visiting from Cheltenham and around the time I left to come here.

Assignment 1 - Emma Powell

I met Emma on the first day we moved in at the university but had begun speaking to her months beforehand over the internet. Emma comes from Birmingham and came here to study advertisement. Upon interviewing Emma, she explained how she always wanted to be a bin man when she was little but turned to advertisement last minute when she applied to university. Emma is an only child living with her mum and dad. She explained that the best time of her life was attending Reading music festival being a huge fan of music she is constantly playing ska and 60's music. Emma's life has been filled with anxiety and panic attacks that she battled throughout her whole school life. Her panic attacks fluctuate and her last one was when starting university. She is a firm believer that herbal medicines will cure her panic attacks and so takes them repeatedly. She is also convinced that the problem she has is genetic and explained "My Nan was a bit weird back in the day and my auntie ran off to Blackpool and left her kids with my mum and turned lesbian" But she feels she will be able to stop her anxiety by baking and cooking as "it's scientifically proven to help!" She said this as she made me gluten free oatcakes with cinnamon and honey. She also explained how she loves to travel visiting spain, portugal, cyprus, germany, france and turkey. I took all this information down to create her online story profile here on my blog, when asking her permission to put up this information she replied with "yeah, don't give a shit." These series of images tell you what shes like, how she copes with stress and tell her story.

Assignment 1 - Stories from Cheltenham - Nicola Barz

To begin this story, I made contacts with Nicola via the internet. This shoot to begin with was quite difficult to nail down to a date as it was clear Nicola was quite apprehensive to allow me into her home to take photos. This is incredibly understandable as it's not everyday you allow a random teenager you have never met come to your home to take photos of you. Nicola was shot, petite build and was a stay at home mum with a baby. her house was bright and held perfect ambient light to get some good portraits. For this shoot I decided to really take control and ask her where to stand, for the portraits and tell her that through out the day I will be following her and taking photos of her as she goes. Our most communications came through her daughter Betsy and in this story it was clear how close the two of them were. Although there were pictures of the father about the house mostly of their wedding, he was barely spoken of. She was careful not to divulge too much information about her life but I knew from her decor and attitude that she was a happy and lively lady. 'I don't know if I am that interesting' she explained. 'I just look after Betsy really.' Here is her daily routine:

This is Nicola Barz

her lively cushions and clothes complimented her bubbly personality

As she spoke of her daughters sleeping patterns, she looked out of the window into her large garden.

It is clear how close the two are.

This shot of her wedding ring whilst she made a cake stood out to me as she barely spoke of any partner the whole time I was there. Her help came entirely from her mother who took little Betsy for a walk when I arrived. It left me wondering that perhaps there was more to her than what meets the eye.