Making a Gwon Osang a-like. 3D Sculpture and Photography combination

http://www.listofphotographers.blogspot.co.uk/

So this link here assumes that you've Identified the parameters and requirements of the assignment and done your research at this stage and that you've rejected all the other options and having made a David Hockney Joiner. You're now ready to move on to develop the idea and start working with images in the context of a 3D problem. If you haven't completed these stages you do need to go back to them and complete them. (See here).

On your own blog you should have reflected on your research and the process of making the Hockney Joiner. At the end of the Hockney work you would then need to have started to plan this stage in section 6 of your reflection of the Hockney work.

So at the end of the Hockeny work, where you're then looking to develop the idea and the practical work, you should have finished with something along the lines of...


(6). Action Plan

Now having completed my research and reflected on it I was able to make a decision about which of the artists I was going to respond to and base my work on. The decision was Gwon Osang. Having produced the 2D David Hockney-esque joiner I'm now ready to move on and work out how to make a simple "Gwon Osang-a-like". Having made 'Day of the Dead' models at school I do have some basic knowledge of what to. In addition I searched out a Gwon Osang video where he explains what he does and there's some indication of how he makes his models.

 So over the weekend I'm going to shoot a load of digital images of 'Joe' photographing his head in different positions moving in and out, closer and further away. I'm hoping to use soft diffuse light. Looking at the Gwon Osang work it looks as though he uses techniques that I may not be able to work out given the tight deadline we have. I'm aware that prints from labs and shops usually have fairly rigid backing paper, so I'm expecting that the prints if used full size wont bend and adhere to the surface of my 3D model that easily? So I'm going to shoot each of the sections of Joes head slightly off-set and then cut these 4"x5" prints into much smaller sections which I hope might allow a better adherence/fixing to the 3D head shape?

 I'm going to need...

• Cardboard and newspaper for the head structure.
• PVA Glue, flour, toilet paper, filler and Linseed oil to shape the head.
• 36-50 images of Joes head (Estimation).
• Tougher/stickier glue to fix the prints to the head

Plan - Shoot Saturday morning; I'm going to use a Canon 450D, set the white balance to the appropriate setting (Diffuse daylight) and use a F3.5  -18mm - 55mm lens. Then get the SD card into Tesco's or wherever by Saturday PM and have the prints made in the next 24 hours or so. In the meantime I'm going to start on the head and record what I do as I go along as a visual diary in my blog here. At the end of each day I'll then reflect on my progress using the Gibbs process.

Time spent on project so far & production costs
10 minutes Action planning.
£0.00 Production costs .

This demonstrates a number of things a. You've already started analyse the problems you might face and that you've started to plan. Both of these are aspects of your work you're assessed against.

Saturday 31st Jan

(1) What Happened?

 Saturday 31^st. It’s been pretty much a day of reconnaissance, research and preparation. I’ve been out and priced up a lot of the stuff that I’ll need and I’ve found where I can get my prints made cheaply. I’ve done two shoots and done some short term analysis that then led me to conduct the 2^nd shoot and develop the work further. I’ve already placed an order for the 1^st batch of prints.

 (2) How do I feel?

 At the moment I’m feeling okay about things as everything is coming together okay, the only foreseeable problem is the turn around time for my prints, so that a little concerning. I’m unsure about whether to put in the extra effort to make the 3D support, or buy a skull or look at one of the other options?

 (3) Evaluation (what was good & bad)?

 Everything was good today even the mishap with the ratios and sizes of the prints (see in analysis) because off the back of thinking it through I’ll end up with more options. At the moment there’s no real bad aspects, other than perhaps I might have been more decisive with regards how I’m going to approach the 3D head support.

(4) Analysis

 Went to the shops and cased the joint checking out options. Gave the project some thought and at the moment the thing I’m most concerned about is gluing the prints to the 3D structure. Talking to people it sounds as though one solution may be to use ‘Mo more nails’ type glues as they’re thicker and more likely to stick the prints to the rounded or rough surface of the base structure? Later in the day at B&Q’s I had a look at these glues and they differ. With the prints having a plastic-like, paper backing I will have to check to see if the glue sticks smooth to smooth as the prints will be over-lapped a la’ Hockney. One of the Evostick brands seemed to be suitable but was £6.00 plus. There was a similar product in a tin that might be okay and looked as though I’d be able use and re-use and nearly half that price.

 What I did see at ‘Hobby craft’ was pre-made polystyrene heads, but these were £16.00 each, but we also noticed cardboard skulls which looked useful and were only £3.49.

This now leaves me with the dilemma of whether I want to use the skulls as the template or still go ahead and make my own? The other thing I did was check out the prices of quick turn around prints off of SD cards in Tesco’s and these were 36p each. My estimation of how many shots I’ll do was 50, so the prints on their own are going to cost.

 50p

36 x

 300

1500

£18.00

 Thinking that through and knowing that we’ve also got to do a basic 2D Hockney, I could use the same prints to form the 2D Hockney, maybe sticking it down using masking tape or similar? Then photograph that using Flat-Copying techniques and present that as an A3 image in my folio. Then re-use the same images to create the 3D model?

 1^st Shoot. The first shoot I used a Canon 450D using the automatic ‘macro’ function which shoots with in-camera flash. The light was from above in a room that is predominantly white, but poor as it was cloudy and overcast and it’s mid-winter. As a result I was shooting in the 1/30 – 1/50 shutter speed which was variable in response to the auto reading using the camera TTL metering. Having checked the initial exposures I was happy with what I was getting as the images are to be used in an unusual way and wont be looked at in isolation. In fact if you look at Osang’ work you can see that his exposures are variable.

 Having downloaded the images off of the SD card onto my hard-drive I had a quick look at them. Having realised there was a serious cost implication if I’d opted for Tesco’s as my printing source, I looked around on the internet and found that Snapfish do good deals. Looking on the Snapfish site I then saw you could order composite prints where 5 or 6 images could be nested onto one small print for a good price and then I realised that I had a potential issue. I realised that the size of the details in the prints needs to be relative to the size of the 3D model. It would be no good to order prints where the eyes were tiny and then trying paste them onto a full size head, unless of course I mixed up the sizes and made the image more ‘Picasso-esque’ with loads of distortion? I opted to stick with these potentially large prints and shoot a second series of images framing the subject in a different way so that the proportions would be nearer to reality.

 I uploaded the images to snapfish and ordered them which was dead easy and then thought about what I needed to consider with regards to the composition of the images in the 2^nd shoot. I need to establish a couple of things…

(1). How big is my 3D head going to be?

(2). How close do I need to be to take the images so that they are a 1:1 ratio when printed, if I make a life-size head, assuming the prints are going to be 6”x4”.

 Thinking that through and analysing the situation I’ve realised that when the prints come through at 6x4 inch in size I’m not going to be able to get the ratio/proportion right if I shoot so close up. I need to take another set of images from much further away. What I did was cut a 6x4 hole in a piece of paper and shoot through the hole with the lens set at 45mm on the camera to get a sense of how big the proportions of the face are going to be in the print. See the reference image below. If I shoot from this kind of distance working around the head that is going to enable me to get the size ratio I require? I’ve already ordered the first batch of print from snapfish which only cost me £4.79 for around 40 prints. I now realise these are definitely going to be too big unless of course I make a much larger head or go down a ‘Picasso-esque’ route and have larger and smaller sections of the face and head combined?

 At this stage I’ve still not decided whether I’m going to go for the DIY 3D head shape or buy a cardboard skull from Hobby Craft. I may also look at the option of other materials such as polystyrene as used by Gwon Osang, so I might go to B&Q’s and look at polystyrene insulation boards and the ‘No nails’ type glues? I looked again at a couple of Gwon Osang videos on Youtube, looking for clues about his work processes. In the video he discusses the way that he shoots the people (see below) and I was correct in my assumption that it’s probably better to shoot from a consistent distance. In addition he identifies his construction processes and he identifies that he uses a dense type of polystyrene, the type you see on building sites used in flooring insulation.

 The second shoot using the principles as described by Gwon Osang where shot using this approach as much as possible. So in the 2^nd shoot I tried to stay a consistent distance from the model and shoot as much as I could, ensuring that all the angles were covered. The light was pretty poor, but I used the camera on auto iso and was again shooting hand held at around 1/50^th at F4.5.

 B&Q’s visit enabled me to look at some prices and options. Most of the stuff I need is reasonable in price and easily sourced. Having looked at the Gwon Osang video and seeing the materials he uses for the larger models, I’ve researched into that as an option and found it’s relatively tricky to get hold of. The best result so far is from this model making supplier http://www.ema-models.co.uk/index.php/materials/foam-polystyrene/styrofoam-lb-x-extruded/165mm-styrofoam-lb-x-3594.html which sells blocks it seems 2’ x 2’ although the website is pretty vague about the exact dimensions.

The up-shot of this research is that I now know the product is called Extruded Styrofoam. It’s still likely that I’m going to go with a low-tech approach.

(5).  Conclusion

 I need to get on with it and plan tomorrow. I will need to make a decision in the next 12 hours or so about whether I’ll use the cardboard skull head or make my own 3D support. I’m definitely not going to be able to source the Styrofoam by tomorrow afternoon and I’m not going to pay £16.00 for a polystyrene head from Hobbycraft.

Things that are still not pinned down or resolved are…

(1). What glue is going to be best for sticking the prints to the head and to each other.

(2). How I’m going to seal and fix the images in the way that Osang does.

(6).  Action Plan

 

• Source some cardboard
• Make a decision about the size of the head
• Decide whether the shoulders are going to be in the image
• Upload the 2^nd set of images.
• Buy the production materials to make the head
• Keep a record of my working hours and costs of the materials
• Reflect at the end of the day

Today’s work time and costs…

4 hours 45  minutes – research/reconnaissance/preparation

£4.79 – prints and postage (test shoot 1).

1st Feb (Sunday)

(1). What happened.

 I’ve ordered the second set of images from Shoot 2. I then got together the equipment I needed to make the 3D head...

 

Made a late start and had to go to Tesco's to buy flour. All the other items were around the house or in the garage. I watched another video (see below) to check out the correct way to mix the paper mache clay...

 I got all the gear together and made a start with intention that I'd get the mix made and form the shape of the head and then reflect on the day’s progress. Got going later in the afternoon and photographed the process as I went along. Got so far and then it all went wrong…

(2). Feelings.

 Initially I thought it was going okay, there was an element of concern and it didn’t feel like my approach the best way, but overall I think I felt quite optimistic about it up till the point where it did go wrong. Once it did go wrong I felt quite deflated and as though I’d put a lot of effort into something that hadn’t come off.

 (3). Evaluation (What was good and bad).

 Good, is the fact that I’ve got off to a flying start despite the fact that what I thought was going to be the solution has ended up not being the solution! But I’ve still got the best part of three weeks still to complete this and look for another solution.

 

Bad, is the fact that it didn’t work.

 

(4). Analysis

So this is what happened and this is the process...

 

I used basic cardboard box card and drew a rough shape/size for my model head first.

 I then drew a darker version with a marker pen.

 Using a Stanley knife and a scalpel I cut the shape out for my head.

 The face on template was sized up using the side profile as a template.

 That was then cut out in the same way.

 I marked up the slots and cut a slot from the bottom and one in the top so that the two sections could be slotted into each other.

 Slotted together there was some good stability and it all looked like it was going well.

 To give some more stability I taped the sections together. The idea now was to somehow fill in the quarter sections and build up the shape of the face. Initially I thought I'd do this with paper. But I remembered when I did this a few years ago, the wet newspaper weighed a ton and took ages to dry out.

 Toilet paper was torn up and shredded and put into luke warm water. I used a whole roll

 The paper was then squished and mushed up in the bucket.

 Using a cooking sieve the water was drained from the wet pulp. I think this is where it started to go wrong - really wrong. We drained the pulp and squeezed some of the water out of the pulp, but I wasn't sure how dry it needed to be and I still needed to mix the other powders into the mix realising that these would dry and absorb the water to some extent. But this seemed like an in-exact science. I guess retrospectively I may have looked again at the video to get some sense of how wrung out the pulp needed to be...

 During a break I realised that I might be able to get round the wet paper situation by using old packing polystyrene.

 The polystyrene was cut up into smaller sizes and then haphazardly glued into the quarters using PVA glue which again as I was doing it, I was thinking this doesn't feel gluey enough to stick the polystyrene to the cardboard, but it worked a little bit and I thought it might dry okay.

 The bits of polystyrene were cut using a mini hacksaw and the shaping was done with the use of a 'Rasp'.

So this is as far as I got with things going fairly well. From here on in it all started to go wrong. I mixed up the glue, flour and filler as per the descriptions in the video and the resulting paste looked promising. I did think the fixing of the polystyrene to the cardboard was a bit flimsy with the PVA glue being used, but I thought that once the paper mache paste was applied it might bind all of the stuff together?

 

Unfortunately and seemingly because the paste was so wet, once it was applied to the head structure which initially worked well, I noticed that the wetness was being absorbed by the cardboard. I got one quarter completed and then stood the head up to leave and dry. Soon though the cardboard became soggy and the whole thing fell over never to recover again. Within another 5 minutes or so it was in the bin, having realised that the cardboard was totally inadequate.

 

Over the next 24 hours I left the glue to see if it would dry out, but it didn't, pretty much confirming that it was far too wet.

(5). Conclusion

In the video the lady who makes models using this paste uses aluminium mesh to form her animal shapes. I think what I've done here is (a)I hadn't cast my mind back to previous experiences with this process which were slightly problematic with the use of cardboard and the long drying out process. (b) I was trying to be a skinflint and not pay for anything. (c) and my research might be have been flawed, as I was clueless about how wet the paste needed to be.

(6). Action Plan

I need to use the time that I've got waiting for the prints and decide the next move. Giving it some thought over-night the cardboard skull looks like an option using a dryer stickier glue. But a part of me wants to do it in another ways where I shape the head. Looking yesterday I found blue Styrofoam which is similar to what Gwon Osang calls 'Iso Pink'. So tomorrow I'm going to see if anyone at college knows where I can access this stuff or something similar...

http://shop.panelsystems.co.uk/panel-cores/styrofoam-blocks.html

What is apparent is that it's not cheap and comes in sheets rather than blocks. I'll have a look around and see what info I can gather and take it from there with the 'Hobby craft' skulls as back-up plan.

The other thing I've done is - I've left the glue for 24 hours and this didn't dry at all.

I'll research and explore plaster of paris and see if there's any potential with using that as that's fairly cheap. What I don't know is how much you get from a bag of 2.5kg of the stuff. I know I can borrow a polystyrene head and it seems as though I may be able to cast a head and then use cast to make a template for another head, but I'd have to think that through and consider the viability of idea. I realise I'd have to cut the cast off the head and then re-form the cast in a way that I'd be able to pour the new plaster into the 'Cast' to make the plaster head.

I know I can access the poly heads via college, but I don't want to end up damaging one by sawing it up in the cutting process, so I still need to think this through and visualise ways of getting around the problems that may arise. One way might be to put a thin but rigid divider in and around the head along the dotted lines in section 3, so that once the plaster of paris dries, the two halves just simply fall apart? One thing I can for-see is that the box needs to be narrower at the base than the top other-wise removing the block of plaster may be an issue?

8 Hours

£4.79 - Prints from shoot 1

£6.49 - Prints from shoot 2

£0.79 - Flour

£12.07 - Total

So you can see that bit by bit I've been working through this project working things out by trial and error. I've got contingency plans in the event that the next idea doesn't come through. So at this point I've got a few options.

One of the things that you need to do is record the time as I have here that you take to do this work, this includes, the time taken to research and buy, to travel and to write up your reflections. All creative work takes time in the planning and execution of the project and the final price of the product has to take in account the material costs and the time costs. So say for this instance - how much do you think that your level 3 education by the time you leave would enable you to charge per hour? £40-£50 per hour?

Look at the time already spent on getting this together 8 hours at £50 per hour + costs and my break even figure is already  £412.07. Do the same costing exercise with your project.

 

Thursday 5th Feb

 What happened.

 Since the failure I’ve considered a couple of ideas and I’m now contemplating a couple of back-up plans.

 Feelings.

 Yep, still optimistic and confident that I can meet the deadlines and still produce good final outcomes.

Evaluation.

Good – The prints have arrived and I think I know where I can source a polystyrene head. Bad – my main ideas have not come through and in part some of what I’m doing is a compromise.

 Analysis.

 For the moment I’m still on-board with the head idea, but I am thinking about boxes and rooms for some of the other ideas as a back-up if this goes really wrong. At the moment I’m in a situation where I have the prints but no head shape to fix them to. I can spend £16.00 and go and buy one from Hobby Craft, but I think I can source one from college for free today, but I will have to return it as it is. Asking around someone suggested that instead of gluing the prints to the head and possibly ruining it, I could use dress-makers pins and pin the prints to the head? So at the moment that seems like the better idea and the one that I’m running with.

 I think if I can get one layer of prints onto the head, I can then combine glue and pins as a fixing method, but I’m not sure that I will need both?

Having now received the two batches of prints which took 4 days to arrive since ordering them, I can now see that it is going to look pretty weird, but the combination of the two sizes hopefully will work.

 

Conclusion –

 

Work with the head idea and spend the next 3 days getting that sorted.

 Action Plan –

 Friday – try and source the head and some pins. Friday night or Saturday, cut the prints up into smaller sections eliminating the background elements in the images and try pinning them to the head and judge whether it works or.

 Saturday – shoot a basic 2D joiner of Joe digitally and start to work on that in photoshop and work to get  that completed over the weekend.

 

9 Hours

£4.79 - Prints from shoot 1
£6.49 - Prints from shoot 2
£0.79 - Flour

£12.07 - Total

6th Feb

What happened?

 

Continued to monitor the paper mache stuff and by today have given up on that as an idea as it’s still nowhere near dry. Discussed what I was doing with as many people as I could to see if someone else might come up with an idea. I continued to think about other options whilst waiting for the prints, which did eventually arrive on Wednesday and Thursday.

 

I Managed to get myself (borrowed) a polystyrene head and some pins with the intention that I might pin the images to the head. Later in the day looking at another students work I noticed that she had taped together a weaved image together to secure it and I noticed it looked a bit Gwon Osang-ish with the sellotape.

 

Feelings –

 

Going into week 2, with still 11 days to go it’s looking very manageable. So much so I may have a go at some of the other ideas. So I’m currently very optimistic.

 

Evaluation – (Good and Bad) –

 

Good stuff; I’ve got the head shape, I’ve got idea about what I’m going to do and I don’t need to buy any more materials except perhaps a 2” wide roll of sellotape. Bad – Stuff? I don’t think there is any!

 

Analysis –

 

I’ve got a number or potential ways of doing this. One is that I could bulk out the head shape using gaffer tape and then sellotape the prints onto the head in little strips. Or I could go straight for the tape method directly onto the head. I think I may need to cut the prints up into fairly small bits, but I’ll have a look at the Osang images and see what he does. I think also mine may be more Hockney-esque as I’ve got far fewer prints than Osang uses.

 

Conclusion –

 

None really at this stage other than further experimentation is required and to be bold and have a secondary back-up plan (Contingency plan).

 

Action Plan –

 

Saturday – be bold and go for it, cut the prints up into small sections and start to stick the images of Joe onto the head with selleotape. Start with the back of the head in case it goes really wrong and allow myself a get-out plan if I have to re-evaluate the situation and try something else.

 

Photograph the process as a record for the blog. Aim to get the whole thing finished and photographed by the end of the day.

 

Back – up plan; Get all of the cereal boxes we’ve got take the bags out flatten the boxes and take them apart and photograph them (Might need blu-tac to hold them flat)?

 

Shoot bog standard Joiners of Joe and someone else perhaps? Work on them in photoshop and make an A3 joiner for my folio.

 

Shoot one of the rooms in our house as a joiner with the idea that I’ll then apply those to a box and make my interpretation of a Rachel Whitereade.

 

9.5 Hours of work

£4.79 - Prints from shoot 1
£6.49 - Prints from shoot 2
£0.79 - Flour

£12.07 - Total

 

Saturday 7th Feb

 

What Happened -

 

Well I got on with it as planned. I got all the cereal boxes took them apart and shot those, then repaired them and put them back (one of my contingency plans). I had a feeling that the head needed a nose and jaw so I made that and then got on with the task at hand, taking pictures as I went along.

 

Feelings -

 

I was optimistic and as it went along I grew in confidence as it came together as it did so in a way that I was expecting and planned for. At the end with the 3D product I was more than pleased with the outcome.

 

Evaluation (What was good/Bad) -

 

I was all good, I got a lot of work done here, with a number of options put in place in the event that it went wrong again. I made some useful observations with regards to light and lenses and if there was anything bad about the situation it's only that I've been doing this instead of playing cricket!

 

Analysis -

 

First I dealt with the back-up plan/idea of the 3D boxes a la' Andy Warhol. You'll see below that I've recorded the process as I've gone along. This in itself demonstrates organisation skills and a level of camera skills. Being indoors the light levels are quite poor so I've had to use the camera at this stage in a way that is conducive with the situation and requirements. Because these images are only to be used for the blog as evidence of my work they do only need to be shot at a low res or converted at a later point. I've therefore set the camera to fine JPEG mode and shot at either 400 or 800 iso to enable me to shoot indoors in the poor light. The aperture in this case has  been wide open at f3.8 and much of the time I was shoot at shutter speeds higher than 1/125. The final shots were done around 4pm and here in the UK this means the light is very poor (winter) and the final images were shot at around 1/50. All the shots were shot around 18mm lens focal length. The white balance was set to shade and all the exposures were done manually to avoid subject failure and generally gave a reading that indicated that they were over-exposed.

 

I got all of the cereal boxes I could find and then carefully took them apart so that I could re-seal the boxes and re-use them.

Making sure the boxes were all flat I laid the first one on table and standing on a chair photographed the box and then viewed it as I expected that there would be specular reflections and sure enough there was. This is due to the fact that our house has over-head windows and the light was coming from above.

 

 

The solution was the tape the boxes against a wall in the house with low tack masking tape, used in places on the box that wont appear in the 3D version.

The other thing I noticed was that I had to be careful of the converging verticals using the wide angle lens, so I had to be lined up so that I took the image of the box looking directly at the box centrally, otherwise the edges converge and the box becomes distorted and therefore no longer square, which once I start to re-configure the box as a 3D photo it would be problematic.

 

 

 So these are the shots, I can now take the original larger files that I have saved on a USB key to CRU at college or somewhere else and get them printed A3 size on card and then re-configure the boxes so that the images become 3D art. Thinking about why I might do this and how I could turn this into a longer term project with something interesting about it, I though there is the potential that the boxes could be some kind of indicator of peoples socio-economic status and/or how important breakfast or the intake of sugar or carbohydrates are to different people. Does everyone eat cereal for breakfast, how many varieties do they have, why and is it important? Might it give us an insight into people eating habits and priorities in life? Currently there's a lot of stuff on the tele about the importance of eating before learning and that kids that don't have breakfast, are less likely to learn.  But for the moment this is a back-up plan, so on to the real deal...

 

So here’s the head and the pictures that I’m to stick on it. The decision was to go with sellotape, but looking at the head I decided that I needed a bit of a nose and a jaw. I contemplated cardboard and trying gaffer tape it on, but in the end decided that I’d go for polystyrene as it was easily to cut and manipulate, knowing that I could easily tape it onto the main head…

I laid all the images on the floor so that I could see what I had and see if I had the whole head covered, I did start to arrange them so that they were laid in the relevant positions in order of placement on the poly head, but that was taking too much time. I was kind of concerned that I’d left a few parts of the head seemingly short in images, if you look; there are not many images of the jaw line looking from below. But thinking of it in terms of the Hockney influence and the fact that I’m not looking to make a proportionately accurate rendition of Joe, I realised that this wasn’t that much of an issue.

 

The polystyrene was easily cut using a sharp knife and I was able to make the head more life like in shape. Gaffer tape was useful and allowed me to form the additional face features easily and I realised that as the sellotape was added the whole thing was be easily constructed and remain sturdy.

 

Using the prints I now simply cut up small sections, trying to keep them a uniform size. I looked at Gwon Osangs images once more and noted that for the most part he does use very uniform sized pieces of prints, but then his sculptures are much larger in size and potentially easier to work with?

I soon realised that with the smaller size model the contours and shape of the head were tighter and more limited with regards to the way that you work with the prints and taping them on. It did mean that sometime I had to cut nicks in the paper and fold them in, so they would wrap around more readily. The other compromise I had to make was to use very different sizes, but again – I’m mixing two ideas here – Hockney and Gwon Osang and I’m not looking to make something that is a total replica of Gwon Osangs work, influenced by – yes, but not an absolute copy.

 

Below - The finished product (yet to be photographed and re-touched properly). So the shots below are the final product. Generally I'm very pleased with it and looking at it, I reckon is the idea was worked on some more this could be the basis of a good longer term project. There's some definite tweaks that could be made, the proportions of the face can obviously be massively improved, but in the short term I've made a 3D product combining photography as specified in the assignment. All I need to do now is photograph it in a way where I can somehow reduce the specular reflections, but looking at it and with all the different angle formed by the use of the paper and tape I'm not convinced there is a way of doing it.

 

 

 

 

 

Conclusion –

 

I’m very happy with the product and it fulfils the brief and it has encouraged me to look at and explore alternative approaches as to how photography can be used. It’s been interesting to look at how, if we look at the work of non-photographic art, we can use their approaches and ideas to inform out own work. It does seems that if we merged the ideas from a number of different influences, there is the potential to come up with something fairly unique. In the process were learn about contemporary and historical art and photography.

 

Action Plan –

Tomorrow I’m going to shoot a basic joiner using the same bloke in the 3D sculpture. I’ll get these sent off the same day which’ll mean that via snapfish they will probably be here by Thursday. I’ll also shoot an interior of one of the rooms in our house to give me the option of doing a Rachel Whitereade 3D. The same Hocknet Joiner I might try and do it in Photoshop too and consider whether to do the snapfish print version?

 

9.5 Hours of work +

5 hours today

14.5 hours £4.79 - Prints from shoot 1
£6.49 - Prints from shoot 2
£0.79 - Flour

£12.07 - Total

 

So in terms of the real world when you're working at £50.00 an hour -

14.5 hours at £50.00 an hour  is now £725.oo in hours worked. That added to the running total...

 

£737.07 would be my break even price. So this head would have to be sold for a lot more than this.

sUNDAY - 8th Feb

What Happened? -

As per the action plan above I've done two shoots (a) The Rachel Whitereade idea and (b) the Hockney joiner. I've also re-shot the 3D head on a home made infinity curve testing that out to find a solution for my final A3 for my folio.

Feelings -

Good at the moment, I've done loads of work and I've done a number of shoots, so I reckon I'm on track to complete this work well before the deadline. The main thing - the 3D head has been a success and needs very little in the way of work to finish off as an A3 image.

Evaluation -

Good stuff - lots of photography, with some realisations that I'll discuss later. As mentioned previously the fact that the majority of the work - the key things are all done and dusted. The final three assessment criteria I needed to complete after the research and the identification of parameters and requirements...

Unit 6 - 2:1 Demonstrate the ability to plan, organise and prepare solutions to a 3 dimensional problem in A&D

Unit 6 - 2.2 Apply Practical skills, understanding and methods to solve 3 dimensional problems in A&D
Unit 6 - 3.1 Analyse the effectiveness of solutions to 3 dimensional problems in A&D

I reckon they've all been easily met through the work that I've produced here on my blog. I've definitely demonstrated planning, organisation and preparing solutions. I've definitely applied practical skills and shown an understanding of methods to solve the 3D problem. And, I definitely analysed the effectiveness of the solutions and methods and I've still yet to produce a final evaluation!

Analysis -

 I needed to make a white background so I taped 6 pieces of A4 paper together and then placed the sculpture on the paper. See below, with the 6 bits of taped together A4 sellotaped to the wall to make a mini infinity cove.

 I noticed that the reflections from the sky light created a highlight on the top of the 3D model, so I got someone to hold a light baffle (Cushion) over the top to reduce the specular reflections.

 This reduced the highlights from the specular reflections, making it so that the sellotape wasn't so reflective.

In Photoshop I then played around with some layers quickly and got rid of all the joins and made the BG whiter. I created a fake shadow affect, but I'm not entirely happy with it as the work was done on the small up-load JPEGs instead of the original large JPEG's. I'll need to go back to this before the deadline and get this done and make a decision about how I'm going to do this. I may go on to Youtube and look at some editing tutorials that may have some better ways of doing this?

 

The Rachel Whitereade back-up plan.

 

Moving on while the light was still reasonable I then went to two other back up plans. I shot Ben's room to give me the option of doing the Rachel Whitereade idea. This was trickier than I imagined, because of the inverse square law factor the light falls off rapidly as it comes into the room. At the windows and near the windows the light is fairly bright, but then other parts of the room away from the window are much darker as the light falls away. You can see this in the images below. The images again because I'm shooting indoors have been shot at iso 800. Despite this, I was still shooting in the darker areas of the room at 1/10th at f3.5.

 

If the 3D head wasn't my main idea, I'd have to develop this idea further and look at ways of improving it. I'm guessing that because of the 1/10th second shutter speeds, these images being hand held are not going to be that sharp, so in a 'Main idea' scenario I would have had to take far more care in the shooting of these images and they'd take a lot longer to do. This batch here took me about 10 minutes to shoot at the most and I rushed it. If this was my main idea I would have had to use a self timer and a tripod for this kind of speed or wait until there was far more light, but being winter this isn't realistic. Despite that, I may still knock up a 'Development stage 1' style proto-type to hand in for assessment if I get time. I may keep this really simple and only print this on basic photo-copy paper and stick it on a shoe box or similar and just see how it goes?

Hockney Joiner (Compulsory)

 

 

The other piece of work we've had to do (below) and will be useful in our folios is a Hockney joiner. So I've shot Joe outside our garage with a bike with some of his other 'Sport' stuff indicated in the background to add some narrative to the image. I like these images because there's a load of visual language stuff going on in the images. So this afternoon I'll make a start with getting these images into Photoshop and using layers make a basic Hockney joiner.

 So I reduced all of the files to small sizes as I have been so far using MS office. Then opened them all up in Photoshop. Using the first image I then went into 'Image' and selected 'Canvas' size and set the canvas size to A3 size (approx. 29cm x 42cm). Then one by one brought the images into the layered file - leaving them in their layers but reducing the size of the individual images as I went along using the 'Free transform' command and the 'Constrain proportions' before resizing them to 30% of their original file sizes.

Gradually bit by bit I built up the image a la' Hockney, but I must admit it does feel as though if this had been using hard-copy prints this would have been a far easier process and far more fun to some extent because if I was to have used actual prints I'd be able to move them around a flat surface tweaking the idea and have a far more hands-on fluid experience. This in Photo-shop seems really difficult in that you can't play with the idea that easily, so I may still yet order the prints and do it for real.

 

 

 

 

So this the final product as such, but I'm not sure if I like it. As I said I think it might be far better to lay the prints out for real and work with them on flat surface organising the way they look. But as this isn't the actual product that I have to make and this is just an additional part of the work I think I'm going to leave this as it is unless I get more time. In the short term I'm more concerned with evidencing it and getting it printed for my folio.

 

Because I found the images to be a bit strange, I thought 'What if I've got this wrong in some way'? So I checked out the Hockney images again that I've researched and I've inserted them here below and in fact I have either done something wrong or they're different to Hockney? But looking at them I might have another go and do another one in a more of Hockney style?

The Hockney versions are far more organised and look to have been shot in a sequence only just over-lapping, but shot working across the scene systematically. Looking at this I much prefer this approach. My approach although it is obviously Hockney influenced, it just isn't as aesthetically pleasing as my version, so I'm definitely going to do another shoot as I do want more images in my folio because I've only got about 25-30 finals from my projects so far! I might go for printing the prints this time so that is going to leave the deadline a bit tight so if I am going to shoot and send to Snapfish I'm going to have to do it on Monday or Tuesday (9th or 10th Feb).

 

 

Conclusion - 

 

• Joiners are not that easy to do and I need to do another.
• Joiners using prints might be the way to go.
• Trying to rush the photographs indoors in poor light is problematic and requires a slower more professional approach.
• I've almost hit all of the assessment criteria.
• I'm on track to complete all of the work by the deadline.
• I need to do more of this at college in the sessions and use my time more productively.

 

Action Plan -

1.  
2. Print the joiner I have A3.
3. Print the flat copies of the boxes on A3 card at CRU or elsewhere and make them up into 3D smaller versions of the original a la' Andy Warhol but small.
4. Photograph another person or Joe more in the Style of Hockney.
5. Do some research into photo-shopping a white background or shoot the 3D head again at college where the light might be better atrium using lager paper from the art dept.
6. Try and get the head A3 final print done before Wednesday and write up the final Gibbs evaluation.

3.5 hours today
18 hours total
£6.49 - Prints from shoot 2
£0.79 - Flour

£12.07 - Total

 



 

 

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