Digital Photography 2011, Final Project: "Shame"

Erica Hardin
ARTO354
March 9, 2010

Final Project Reflection and Analysis

The theme I chose for my final project is “shame.” I feel that all of us either have, or have had, something we feel shame about in our lives. These tend to be things we hide from each other, things we would rather not remember. Making photographs about these issues is in opposition to their very nature, and therein lies the power of these images. Or at least I hope that I’ve begun to approach a place that makes the viewer think, or feel a little uncomfortable.

All the photos feature friends of mine, who will remain anonymous for obvious reasons. I brought some of my last project forward into this one, asking my friends to collaborate with me in the process. Some of the photos are based on their actual shame while others are staged. In each of the images the concept was created through a partnership between the subject and myself. I feel that having an intimate dialogue and relationship between the model and photographer really enhances the end result. In my (admittedly short) experience, I’ve found that when the model has a say in what is going on in the development of the project, they tend to relax and be more open to trying new things.

Ultimately I think I got some good shots. I had some bumps in the road- such as accidently leaving my tripod somewhere resulting in the last two shoots being hand-held, and having scheduling conflicts. I also had a difficult time with some of the formatting. It wasn’t the difficulty I suppose, I just kept losing a DNG file here and there and having to go back and re-edit and save my work. It was just tedious, but I’m sure as I get more used to the programs I’ll be able to maneuver them more effectively.

I’m pretty happy with the composition in all of the photos. I think I pretty much achieved the feeling I was hoping to evoke in most of the images. If I were to do this project over again, I would definitely replace my tripod. Unfortunately both the bar shoot and the romance novel-bathroom shoot ended up being quite shaky. I over compensated by taking a LOT of photos, and managed to get a couple good ones as a result. I would also use a semi-gloss paper. It seems like the blacks just don’t pop as much as I’d like them to on the matte paper. At this point in the term, however, I’m completely out of money, so I worked with what I had. Unfortunately, the paper I have isn’t listed in the paper profiles offered in the photo lab. That most likely has something to do with the color shift that I see from the screen to the prints as well. They just seem duller than I’d like. Shame is a kind of dark topic, so I think I can get away with the prints I’ve ended up with. My tendency is to have a preference for over-saturated images, so maybe this was a blessing in disguise!

I really enjoyed this project, and look forward to continuing to explore this medium. It’s been such a great change of pace for me, as I usually tend to work in acrylic paints and polymer clay. The instant results of digital photography are really satisfying for an impatient gal like myself. Hopefully next term I can afford to purchase a camera of my own and continue to pursue this artform.