THE JOURNEY OF THE PHOTO ESSAY
1. Let's begin with what kind of photographers inspire me?
I looked for photographers that make me want to print their photo's on posters and put them on my wall. I found too many. I don't have enough walls in my studentroom. So i picked two.
Above you see photo's made by Paolo Raeli. A very tumblr famous teenage photographer. I really like his specific style. I like that he doesn't care about perfect sharp photos. It makes me feel like its the beginning of a long summer and i'm about to fall in love with one of my friends on an evening that ends in skinny dipping by sunset. And look at the pretty colors!!! These photo's inspire me to turn off my laptop, go out and DO stuff.
And here you see photos made by Byron Bay. This photographer also makes me dream! But this one takes me more to my future. A slowly but adventures family life. You feel that the subjects she captures are really at ease with her. The photo's also have something cinematic and natural. I find it soothing to look at them.
2. A mind map of things that inspire me
I also sketched this to navigate what kind of themes or mediums inspire me. Its really impressive if you can read my handwritings here (haha). So some of the words are: endurance, the stars, all things tasty, old people, minimalism, pretty words, singer-song-writer songs and so on.
3. Choosing the subject
After that i also wrote the names of people that came to mind who carried one of these themes. One of them was Laura. A girl i once met and who told me about how she was finally accepted into the dance academy. She said something like: "I needed allot of focus to get trough. I was the only one who could do it. If I wanted this I had the responsibility to go after it."
For some reason that quote sticked with me. The combination of my curiosity in how she was doing now that she "lived her dream", the strengt i saw in her and the creative possibilities to reflect the themes in dancing, made her my first choice in who i wanted to photograph for this essay. I asked her and she said immediately that she would love to participate! Yay!
4. Collecting inspiration for
(dance) photography
Laura her choices...
After our first call to talk things trough I asked her what kind of style she would like her photo's have. And then if she could send me photos of it. I also shared my dance inspiration photo's. The fun thing was that it really matched!
..and my choices
5. So what's the plan? What will I tell and how?
I want to know how she got where she is now. What drives her? How did she feel during the proces? I really want to hear and show what she has to tell and show. So i won't pick a specific theme beforehand.
I do have an idea about how i want to document it tho. After reading about the different photo documentation styles trough history i picked two different styles that i want to use for this project.
One is the "visual diary". Where (it looks like) you follow your subject during the day and capture everything that happens. You don't stage or plan it really. This fits more in the early, traditional way of photographing/modern photography (around 1930). I plan to shoot this serie in black and white.
The other way i want to tell her story is trough a more "post modern style". I want to take the important themes and create surrealistic or more creative photo's around them. All in full color. Maybe i will draw over the photographs, use confetti, smoke or mirrors. Just use what ever could work to dramatize and symbolize the important details of the story.
6. Getting to know each other
So after a few phone calls, we met on wednesday 23 of september. We talked about her life and the journey in how she got to find her passion in dancing. We wrote down the key point together and later on we chose the themes.
7. Putting the themes back into story
So the themes we chose where:
- Fear
- Perseverance
- Rejection
- Strength
- Passion
- Purpose
After i talked with Frank about my idea's i decided to combine the "day out of the live" with the more "symbolic" themes. I drew a storyboard to have a guideline in what to shoot. My plan was to start in her bed, dreaming, waking up. And then following her trough her day until she get accepted into the dance academic and lives out her dream in real life. To make full circle. So now the plan is to let "The visual diary" and more "postmodern styles" meet each other.
OPTIONS FOR OPENING SHOT
8. Selecting the best photo's
So here i present a selection of the photo's that i took. From now on i have to choose the ones who will make it to the final photo story...
O/1
O/2
O/3
O/3
THE JOURNEY
OF A "DREAM
COME TRUE"
O/4
O/5
THE JOURNEY OF
A DREAM THAT
CAME TRUE
O/6
OPTIONS FOR DREAMING/WAKING UP
OPTIONS FOR EXPLORATION
OPTIONS FOR ON HER WAY
OPTIONS FOR: REJECTED AUDITION
OPTIONS FOR: ACEPTED AUDITION
OPTIONS FOR: CELEBRATION WITH CLASS
OPTIONS FOR: FINAL SHOTS, LAURA IN HER ELEMENT
