Group Crit, Thursday 27th April

I am disappointed with myself but I'm not surprised. Again I have not used my time of responsibly and completed no where near enough work than I should have done, especially with the three weeks off as an advantage. I turned up to my group crit with nothing new apart from a website which I'd updated recently from my previous one I had created back in year 1. I remember Katie telling me to always turn up to a group crit even if I have nothing to show because I may have help for another students work or I may be able to receive help with my own which may motivate me. Therefore I turned up with the very minimal but came away with feedback that has helped. 

James flicked through my visual logbook and noticed a treatment I had put together in aid of my style of photographs I wanted to take. To encourage the warmth and comfort I want to project within my images I felt a soft focus would be perfect. Going back to a comment made during show and tell one student said how a soft focus connotes memory for her. This was really helpful and something I will consider when making my work. 

However the treatment that I had made didn't actually fit the style of images I had started to take for the project. I was comparing Richard Learoyd's work with my contrasting white against gold rings. Not only that but the comparison of what the image is supposed to represent is also totally different. Therefore I need to go back and think about the treatment more carefully including tones, use of colour and concept. 

Looking at the images I had taken of the wedding rings he also said the saturation of the gold needs to look more subtle as it was making the image look cold. There was a few images that I had taken against a Veil which didn't look so contrasting which he preferred and noticed how much warmer they looked in comparison to the rings photographed against a white dress. He also noticed too much detail in images where I'd photographed the rings against the details of the dress which after being told and seeing for myself didn't look right and was rather distracting. 

James had mentioned before that I should photograph with a longer lens such as the tilt shift or 200mm because the longer the lens will give me a shallow depth of field which is what I want in my images for this project to help create that soft focus. 

Lastly I was advised to research into jewellery photographers. This will help me re-think my composition and set up of the images that include jewellery.

Overall considering I went in with next to nothing to show I came out feeling confident with a few things to go back and adjust.