Ideas and Inspiration
I spent numerous holiday seasons in Blackpool with my Grandparents as a child. Having very happy memories from that time, it felt natural to channel those special memories through my photographs, and produce a photo book that looks at the contrast between my memories of growing up and creating new memories for my daughter.
Deborah Parkin - A Diary of Growing Up.
Deborah Parkin became a serious photographer after the birth of her son. She found herself documenting her family members lives through pictures, and after the birth of her second child she found herself photographing as a means to explore her own childhood. She utilises a range of historic processes in her photography.
A diary of growing up is a collection of Parkin's images of her son and daughter. When I first looked at her work I was very impressed. The composition and use of blur had an immediate impact on the visual characteristics of her work and the desired effect of showing emotion. After spending time looking at the photographs, I started feeling a little different about how I felt. Her photographs feel very directed, posed, some can look a little subdued and still, not the way I envisage a childhood to be. In more than one of her photographs her daughter can be seen with what looks like a very visible bruise on her body. I am unsure if this is a birth mark or if this is to show that cuts and bruises are a part of growing up. In many of the photographs the children's eyes are closed, this confused me. I found myself struggling to link the title of this collection and the photographs in it together. I did some further research and eventually found Parkin's blogspot, where she explains the meaning behind some of her images. Once I read the words, I immediately understood and could empathise with the photographs. I could relate them to not just my daughters childhood, but my own as well.
I started thinking about whether words play an important part in a collection of photographs. Or should the photograph be able to tell you its meaning on its own without the support of words by their side?
The following two photographs and text are taken from; deborahparkinphotography.blogspot.co.uk.
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| Deborah Parkin |
June 2012
"Can I play out on my scooter" she asks.
"Yes, but be careful, don't rush, take your time" - empty words - she is so accident prone it takes every fibre of my being to let her have the freedom she craves.
Within five minutes, a knock on the door and I am greeted by a tear stained, dirty, bruised face.
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| Deborah Parkin |
June 2012
I am just about to take this photograph - we are sheltering under the cliff. About three feet away some of the cliff gives way and a mud & rock comes crumbling down - it's so solid and so fragile. Last year a lady died when the cliff gave way - erosion is a real problem.
When I peeled apart the film I was shocked at how grown up he looked - the man to be.
Alain Laboile - La famille
When I first starting looking through Alain Laboile's collection of photographs, 'La Famille', my first reaction was to get a full sense of happiness and a feeling of a carefree lifestyle. I immediately understood the meaning of every single one I looked at. Labolie captures everything in a childhood - Love, affection, laughing, crying, muddy feet, eating ice-cream, playing, freedom of expression, movement, the list goes on and on. Each image tells its own story in great detail.
Laboile is a French photographer. He is a father of 6 and says his work reflects their family way of life, which ultimately revolves around the children. The purpose of his collection is to document this reflection, so the viewer can enter his world and in turn reflect on their own childhoods. He feels that his work addresses human nature, and his approach can be "considered similar to one of an ethonolgist", comparing human cultures and social structure.
Some of Laboile's work has a slight resemblance to Sally Mann but in my opinion far more sincere. Mann's work of her children are posed and extremely unnatural. In today's society, children running around naked can be seen as dangerous, something that shouldn't be done because of the potential threats around us. Laboile reminds us that not all cultures share that fear.
Looking at his work in much more detail, it seems some of the photographs have been manipulated, but this has been done so subtlety it still looks very natural. I felt like I got much more of an emotional reaction from these photographs than I did when looking at Parkin's work.
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| Alain Laboile |
A photograph with all the innocence and inquisitiveness of a child. But on closer inspection I can see that he has edited this photograph. On the right arm Laboile has used the dodge and burn tool in Photoshop to, in my opinion give the impression of a dirty arm, when in fact she may have been very clean when he captured the image. Is this his way of enhancing the way they live their lives and to provoke a different reaction?
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| Alain Laboile |
Muddy feet. Although the thought of my child having feet this muddy horrifies me, I still feel this is how a childhood should be. It makes me think, maybe I should loosen up and allow my child to have the freedom to become this muddy during the sunny, warm months if she chooses too.
My own work - Seaside
The photographs were taken on a day trip to Blackpool with my daughter and sister. My aim was to capture mostly natural shots, with very few directed. The images are partly sequenced by the descriptor, my memories at the beginning of the book.
Looking back at my images, I feel there are limited contrasts to my childhood memories, this was partly due to the weather conditions and the area preparing to close for the season.
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| Nicola Pass 2014 |
Searching for seashells. This is clearly a directed image, but without having her look at the camera I could not have captured the happiness in her face of finding such a special treasure.
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| Nicola Pass 2014 |
Windy hair. Although it wasn't weather for sandcastles and swimming costumes, this photograph shows making the most of the time on the beach.
Sometimes, the meaning of a photograph isn't as obvious when it is taken from such a personal angle with limited activity. I find Laboile's work uncomplicated, each one showing strong emotion. After viewing the first few, the others flowed effortlessly, even if there was limited information in one photograph.
After reading Parkin's blog, her the photographs made more sense, I immediately empathised with emotions and experiences involved. I have decided to add a preface with adjectives of my own memories to my photo book, not only to provide a deeper understanding of the photographs but to allow the person looking at the pictures to become emotionally involved with my story and it some cases, reminisce with their own childhood memories.
When shooting my photographs I was constantly aware of composition, I kept my camera in manual so I had control over the whole image.
Overall I am happy with my photographs for the photo book, but I would of like a wider range of images. I feel a project like this will take more than one trip to the Seaside, capturing the summer months on the beach and the winter months spent walking down the promenade looking at the illuminations.
Ultimately, I believe that these types of photographs come from the heart and I hope that other people can get a sense of that and relate to them when they look at them.
I plan to expand on the project during the summer months.
Research and Planning the Finished Book.
Before starting to research a suitable company to print the book, I need to consider three main elements:
- Price
- Value for money
- Quality
All three are important so in this case it may be favorable to look at a company that can provide a special offer. If I choose price as a priority the quality may not be as good. In my experience you get what you pay for so although price is important sometimes spending slightly more can make all the difference.
I started by doing a general Google search and looked at the following companies:
Asda
- Soft cover
- A5
- 20 pages
- £14.00
This offers one photograph per page and has limited layout options. There are a range of design options although very basic.
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| www.asda-photo.co.uk |
Price very reasonable, initially appears to be good value for money.
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| www.reviewcentre.com |
2.3 out of 5 stars.
Most reviews complain about internet service. Comments about mistakes are being made by the company and complaints not being resolved.
I also received advice from a friend to say the photo quality was not of a good standard.
Vista Print
- Large landscape 28x21cm
- Current offer: Was 20.99 now £12.49
- 24 pages
*Special offer
With this offer you get double the size book for over £2 less than Asda.
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| www.vistaprint.co.uk |
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| www.trustpilot.co.uk |
Plenty of design options. Easy to create book with plenty of tips to help put the book together.
Very user friendly when creating.
Reviews are mixed, but over all more positive than negative reviews. 8.7 out of 10.
Blurb
Expensive
33x28cm landscape 20 pages £33.99
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| www.blurb.co.uk |
Plenty of different options to edit and create book.
This site seems to be aimed more at bulk buying as the more you buy the cheaper the price.
I don't feel it is very user friendly when putting book together
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| www.trustpilot.co.uk |
Similar to Vista Print, Blurb has very mixed reviews, and scoring 8.7 out of 10.
Looking at the feed back and prices of all three companies researched, I have decided to use Vista Print. It has overall good reviews and make the most of the offer it has at present.
Editing and book layout
There was very little editing done to my images. I made some basic changes in Photoshop, which includes, brightness, contrast and changing the photographs to black and white. I used the dodge tool to brighten up her eyes in some of the photographs.I added lens blur to some of the photographs for no other reason than effect.
I have included some landscapes as it is very much a part of the story.
After uploading the photographs I noticed there is a slight orange cast to some of the images. This could be due to the website or the editing, as on my screen this cast is not as obvious. The images with this cast are ones that I edited in Fotor. This has reminded me to be extra diligent when editing photographs. To ensure that I create an action in Photoshop so all the photographs have the same changes made to them. I don't believe this changes the atmosphere of the images, but could be a little distracting.
The Book: Words and Photographs
Front cover:
Preface:
The cool sea air. The distinctive aromas, constantly changing as you walk from one place to the next.
Donkey rides, sand castles, searching for weird and wonderful shells to take home as a memento, a memory.
The sound of the arcades, the bright flashing lights, luring you in as you clutch your purse full of pennies . Feeling like the richest person in the world when you hear the sound of the two pence pieces falling down from the machine and counting your winnings.
That new cuddly toy from the toy shop, what a treat.
The tower, still feeling so pleased you spotted it first in the distance. The seagulls, ready to grab any scrap you leave behind.
A family day, a day to remember, forever.
I dedicate this book to my Grandparents, for all the wonderful memories they gave me spending holidays by the seaside.
Some pleasures never change.
Conclusion
I felt extremely pleased with the finished book. As Vistaprint does not have the option to install a print profile there was a small risk in colour alteration from my PC to print, but I could predict confidently how the colours would look on the image due to my calibrated screen.
A print profile is a piece of software that can be downloaded onto the PC from the bigger, more professional print companies. Once installed and converted in Photoshop, this enables the PC to ‘talk’ to the printer and tell it what colour to print. Print profiles are usually available from the more commercial printers such as DS Colour Labs as opposed to Vistaprint, Asda or Tesco. Sometimes, even with a print profile installed, the printed image may not be exactly the same tones as what is on the screen, if possible, a test print is recommended before printing the final piece.
Although the pages of my book are considerably thick, I decided to place one image on each page to avoid the risk images showing through on previous page. Before uploading, I resized the photographs in Photoshop, altering the resolution to 300 PPI and set the longest side of the image to 29 cm. Vistaprint has a selection of layouts or the option of laying the book to suit. The layout could include a border or the image can fill the page.
The first image in the book is slightly out of focus, something I didn't notice on the screen. This could however, be interpreted as a dream like image, which ties in with the theme of a memory.
I am happy with the composition and tones of the pictures. I feel they do reflect my own memories, but looking through the book I feel there are too many that are similar. With only having a few hours to shoot, it was impossible to cover all aspects of my childhood memories. I plan to continue capturing images on future visits to the seaside, through the summer and winter seasons. I would also like to experiment with printing my own images using processes such as
bromoil to enhance the feeling of a memory. I decided that in the future, rather than having a preface at the beginning of the book, putting the separate quotes opposite the image it refers to would have a bigger impact on the person viewing the photographs. When editing the images in Photoshop I found it challenging and time consuming to ensure the images were exactly the same tone. In the future I will create an action so each image can be adjusted in the same manner, then make suitable changes from there.
Bibliography
Deborah Parkin. (2014). A Diary of Growing Up/Bio. Available: http://www.deborahparkin.com/. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Parkin, D. (2012). Deborah Parkin Photography. Available: http://deborahparkinphotography.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/after-i-had-written-my-last-blog-post-i.html. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Laboile, A. (2014). La Famille. Available: www.lensculture.com/articles/alain-laboile-la-famille#slide-26. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Blurb. (2014). Pricing. Available: http://www.blurb.co.uk/pricing. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Trust Pilot. (2014). Blurb Review. Available: http://www.trustpilot.co.uk/review/blurb.co.uk. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Asda. (2014). Asda Photo/Photobook. Available: http://www.asda-photo.co.uk/product-info/15-photobooks-/167-photobook-softcover--a5-landscape. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Review Centre. (2014). ASDA Photo Reviews. Available: http://www.reviewcentre.com/reviews74734.html. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Vista Print. (2014). Photo Book. Available: http://www.vistaprint.co.uk/photobook-offer.aspx?mk=photo+books&ad=e&crtv=32633832066&psite=mkwid%7cwhZHM4yP&device=c&GP=2%2f26%2f2014+4%3a13%3a08+PM&GPS=3115736547&GNF=1. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
Trust Pilot. (2014). Vistaprint Reviews. Available: http://www.trustpilot.co.uk/review/www.vistaprint.co.uk. Last accessed 24th Feb 2014.
