Future Project Ideas

Now might be a good time to step back and do some thinking and note taking for future projects. I have been busy working through the exercises and thinking carefully about what my next assignment topic will be. I have some ideas, that I have mentioned previously on this blog. They are:

A selection of infinite views
Photographs all taken from one (small) location to emphasise the variety and scale and interesting viewpoints that can be achieved from just one geographical location. I had thought to entitle/label each image with the orientation it was taken in and time of day. 

I have already started taking photos for this project and have a couple that I like. I'm not sure it's interesting enough as a project, even though I find it interesting... This would be a monochrome project as I search for shapes and patterns. It is a possible contender for Assignment 3.

Houses/Self-Portrait
This project focusses on my reactions of having my house 'open for inspection' every week and what my house says about me. I am investigating this by photographing the front of other peoples houses, in a consistent manner, and then assuming that the people who live there, share similar 'characteristics' or labels as myself. I am going to title each image with a label that I have put on myself (e.g. Mother, Geophysicist, Photographer, Gardener). This comes back to the theme of 'we are all the same, yet all unique', and investigates how we present to the world through our possessions, in this case, our home.

I really like how this project is developing. This is a contender for Assignment 3. I think the houses look quite interesting in black and white, and the shapes and patterns are more dominant than in the colour versions. If it is to be a successful series, then I need to consider being very consistent in my processing. If the labels are to be such a big part of the image then I need to add them in using Photoshop as part of the border of the image. I will need to experiment with font and layout to get the best results. Not having done this sort of project before, it will take some time and careful planning.

In order for this project to be a success, I have to do some careful research and consider the important of other peoples work in this area. I don't want the project to be a 'what the???' and so need to make sure that the images match the text very well and that the project hangs together as a whole. If that means re-shooting or reprocessing at any point then that is what I have to do. I don't want the concept to become greater than the whole.

Gay Marriage
This is a hot topic in Australia. It is constantly being brought up in parliament, and then shot down again. I have some friends who are gay and I believe that everyone should have the same rights, which include getting married if they want to. I wondered about a photographic project of gay/lesbian couples in their own homes, or going about their daily lives, doing all the same things that heterosexual couples do. This would emphasise that they are just the same as us, and therefore should have the same rights as us (I realise this is quite simplistic). The problem with trying to depict people doing normal everyday things is that they look normal and everyday and thus might not make an interesting photography project! Nonetheless, it's on my list of possible future projects.

This project would require approaching people (possibly using some online tool like Gumtree) and going to their homes or a mutually agreeable location and photographing them. I think this is probably outside of my ability at the moment, given my responsibilities at home. I think this project will have to go on the backburner.

Road trip
We are planning a sizeable road trip next year, probably taking between 3 and 5 weeks. This will be a big challenge with a 3 year old and 6 month old, but we are both keen to see more of Australia and it seems like a good time for us. I would love to document this trip in detail, picking out all the little things that are not typically photographed by 'mums with camera'. That is, the good, the bad and the ugly side of things! I'd also love to do a Martin-Parr-esque style documentary of the people we meet in the little towns of Australia, as we would be focussing out travel in these towns. And to capture the scenes of life along the way. This would be quite a large project that ideally I would make into a book at the end, I also envision including our 'diary' which I hope to keep with our 3 year old - of pictures drawn along the way, and notes/stories about our adventures, which I would then scan or photograph when we are finished the journey.

I will need to do some more research for this project - look at other peoples work online, perhaps purchase a few photobooks with this theme to know what to look for, and read up about the towns that I will be visiting. This will be a once-off opportunity so I want to be prepared for it.

Architecture of Southbank
The Cultural precinct of Southbank is quite important to Brisbane's history - it was born after the Expo in 1988 and really has marked the city as a modern, cultural city in Australia, which it was not considered previously. As a result, there are many interesting modern buildings in Southbank, an area where I love to photograph. I have thought to go and try to capture the fascinating designs of some of these buildings and do some graphical edgy (monochrome?) images of this area.

I have already taken some photos of this area at night (for Assignment 1) and did some research at that point for architectural photography. I would need to revisit this prior to taking more photos of the area. I would need to make multiple visits (ideally) at multiple times of the day/night which may be slightly challenging.



In summary, I'm going to include the suggestions made by my tutor on well executed mini-projects, to remind myself of what I'm aiming for. I need to ask myself if the above projects can fulfil the brief.

It is succinct - easy and clearly able to be described in one or two sentences. This means you are unlikely to get unnecessarily involved in considering ways to develop your creative response to the brief you have set yourself.

It is expansive - allowing you to develop your core idea in a number of ways, each able to offer different directions and interpretations, so affording the possibility of returning to this subject matter.

It is manageable - planning and executing the assignment is not so great a task that you are unnecessarily distracted from your core aims, to practice your photography.

It is readily contextualised - you engage with accessible research material. This allows you to appreciate the creative and conceptual approaches available to you with the project, supporting a number of possible creative approaches to develop your project