My initial idea for Unit 12 was to do macro nature shots as I once again, wanted to somehow incorporate nature into my project. However, after doing some experimentations with macro I realised I wasn’t pleased with many of the outcomes.
I tried with a leaf, cactus and even with live bugs. None of the final images felt right, it seemed to be a lot of hassle and I started to think of other methods to get those final images for the project. I was also worried about time management as that was something I had struggled with a lot over previous units.
After plenty of brainstorming, I came up with the idea of microscopic photography but I first began to experiment with textiles – using my jacket, jeans or some random bits of fabric I managed to get.
Then, I realised how fascinating it was looking at the different types of materials. So, I scrapped my idea of including nature in this and decided to attempt to find as many different fabrics/materials I could and then I would hopefully be left with multiple images varying in colour, material and overall appearance.
When I first began shooting these various fabrics, I kept getting a blue ring around the image and a shimmering effect which – to me, ruined the image. After shooting many images, I was beginning to lose hope as I thought it wouldn’t work out too well. However, after a bit of playing around with the microscope I began to get the hang of it I managed to get the blue ring to disappear.
This gave me a bit more motivation to continue as I was beginning to think this was yet another idea down the drain, so I gathered more materials and tried again.
Once I had gathered enough images, I began editing them in order to make some of the lighting was right as some of the images were too bright or a had a bit of a blue ring to it.
My time management improved drastically this unit and I had everything prepared for hand-in almost a week before giving me plenty of time to edit and touch-up any of the photos before I sent them off to be printed.
I am incredibly happy with how the images turned out, although I believe the quality could have been much better but you do need to take into account that it was shot on an phone camera. Nevertheless, I think this unit was a big success compared to previous units.
Before I mounted my work on the wall, I spent a little while re-arranging the images printed in order to make sure the colours complimented each other rather than some of the colours feeling too clustered or too messy.
Personally, I am incredibly pleased with the final results. I also believe that this is the most successful unit by far; I did various different experimentations to help me figure out which method I preferred, documented it correctly and ensured all my blog posts were all up-to-date.
For the next project I aim to continue this level of productivity throughout unit 13 and I intend to maintain my time management just the same.
stevenson.snaps 