Evaluation

For this project I had to create a set of images for a client, so this meant me working for an outsider to achieve what they required of me. I had to listen to their needs and not my own. I had two clients to work with that both wanted different outcomes, I first thought this would make it more difficult for me, but in fact it just made it more interesting.

My first client Lauren, I was lucky with her because I knew her previous to this project; I knew her personality, I knew what her interests where and how she acted outside of college. When she spoke about shooting ideas, the advantage of knowing her really paid off. Our ideas matched perfectly and we worked really well together. I knew she was slightly gothic but loved bright colours. She is a walking contrast. Quickly I realised she wanted to incorporate both sides of her into the images. She wanted her dressed all in black with very dark make-up in front of a brightly coloured background. The location shoot worked the best out of the two shoots; it was what Lauren originally wanted and she had a clear idea of what she wanted to get out of it. The studio shoot was a bit more daunting for her as I feel she felt uncomfortable in front of all the lights and she seems a bit intimidated by the whole thing. However, we worked together to chose the images and in the end we had some fantastic imagery edited exactly how she wanted them. The images I showed Lauren of other female artist she really liked the style of them, in particular the image I found of Hayley Williams (who also happens to be her favourite female artist), she liked the simplisity of it and the pose. The example images I found for her location shoot she really liked because they are darker and a bit spooky which suited her perfectly.

My second client Joe, was more uncomfortable for me. I had a client drop out after I had spoken to him about ideas and had gathered research and ideas for him. I had to quickly rethink both my location and studio shoots to suit Joe and not the guy that dropped out. Luckily Joe liked all my ideas I had for my original client, and he was very adapting and sympathetic about what had happened. Joe had a lot of good ideas for his studio shoot and he came up with good examples for me to look at for the type of imagery he wanted.For his location shoot he didn't have a lot of ideas and gave me free reign over it, the only requirement he has was to not make it cheesy and to find an interesting wall for him to stand in front of. The pictures I found to show Joe were very simple which I think really worked for him. Joe is a drummer but didn't want any shots with his drum kit or sticks in so I had to find interesting images that would show him off as a person rather than his talent. He particularly liked the images I found for the editing style I wanted to use(dull/60's/old fashioned style). The lighting and creating shadows was a huge part of the photo shoot as Joe didn't like "well lit" photos and he wanted it to look a darker and more interesting.

When doing the location shoot for both Lauren and Joe, I had a lot of difficulties due to weather conditions; the first week we arranged to do it it rained so much we had to call the shoot off. Then the day we managed to do it, it snowed so it was very cold and we had to work extremely quickly so people didn't get too cold. However the snow gave a fantastic effect to the images and something we could have only got on that day. The studio shoots I also had some teething problems due to timings and lack of thought from Joe and Lauren's tutors, regardless of this I still managed to have very successful shoots.