In this pat of the brief I was looking at how labour can affect the human body physicaloly and possibly mentally. At first I had a fiew challanges with being in lockdown meaning I can’t go find pople doing heavy labour so I was stuck doing small labour like cleaning walls etc which didn’t have a recognizable impact. This is until my family all came together to paint our fence and this was the perfect opportunity.
Below are some stills of how this labour effected the human both physicallly and mentally. I was also able to capture some downtime photos from after the labour.
As seen in the photos this labour is very messy and physically demanding, causing it to have many physical impacts on the human body. It is also a boring labour but hence the fact the whole family was chipping in it gave the task a sense of enjoyment and cohersion bringing the whole family together to complete the labour.
I decided to just use a sequence of stills in this peice of work because therefore it was easy to catch all the details and also all the individual members coming together as well as the impacts it had on labour and downtime.
Research
Paul Reas
Paul Reas is a British documentary photographer, I have chose him as someone I would research because throughout his career he has photographed the true reality of labour and the harsh environment. He has been an inspiration because he was able to fully capture the candid and portrature nature of the working labour.
Reflection
enjoyed the final part of this brief as I was able to capture my family in the core idea behind the brief through the everyday labour we have been partaking in. I have been able to capture the effects of the labour on the human body and mind. The inspiration and artists I have looked at help me gain inspiration to proceed and excel with this idea. I was also able to pinpoint my method of capturing my pieces which I chose to do stills in sequences as this is my strength and I was able to capture a wide range of images in an artistically pleasing way.
In this video I only used my phone camera because it was a very immediate thing so I didnt have time to set up a camera on a tripod. This just shows how useful phones have become and how easy it is to take it out anjd take a quick video or a quick photo.
For labour this is a very simple one but I wanted to capture it because it brought the whole family together and working together to get it done fast.
This week I am continuing with my idea of showing the aftermath of labour and the physical affects on the person doing the labour
The original concept was to focus on very physical and intensive labour but due to lockdown and time restrictions it would near impossible so therefore I am focusing on the ones I am able to do around my house and with my family.
My first experiment was with me cleaning the walls of the bathroom. Due to the fact that this was still a very simple labour and not very physically demanding there was very little impact on me so I will be attempting to capture some more labour intensive stills tomorrow and over the rest of the week.
Today I wanted to work more with sequence and angles within my labour and downtime work. I had the labour to gather all the leaves and left over debris from plants and put them in the garden bin. Therefore I decided to take a photo of every pile from a low angle to show the stature it holds as well as taking a photo of the bin every time a pile is added, this is allowing me to show time within the stills as well as the labour.
I also did some thinking and I want to work towards more how labour has an affect on the labourer, I would mainly focus on the physical outcomes of how labour can affect a person whether this is a big or a small impact.
Lewis Hine
I am looking into Lewis Hine due to the nature of his photography, Lewis was a photographer who worked for the National Child Labour Committee going around photographing the harsh reality of manual labour and child labour that was happening all around the US. The child labour industry was heavily influenced by capitalists who sometimes even used physical force to maintain the speed of the workers. I have gained inspiration from Lewis in the way he doesn’t hide the reality or romanticise the working class and labour in this situation.
This is something I want to achieve, I want to be able to show through my images the harsh physical requirements and punishments of physical labour.
Within these images I wanted to focus on again the mundain activities and labours we do everyday without fail or without realizing. I also wanted to capture the motion of the labour as the task was to take it in a single shot therefore I wanted to create some movement. The strategy I used for this was to lower the shutter speed on my camera and make the fast movement and it will give it motion blur and cause the effect I was after.
I also wanted to work with some light painting and low shutter speed as another experiment, as I have never done it before I would just attempt it and then later develop it into relation to labour and downtime
For these animations I wanted to continue with my typical uni life as well as the covid 19 situation that has took ahold of our everyday lives. These 2 animations are set in POV of my view of the outside world from my “bubble” and my home away from home.
Since this is a labour we had to partake on a daily basis I thought it would be a great one to make an animation from. As well as it being a labour it can also be some peoples downtimes after a long day at work or school. I couldn’t animate the whole cooking because that would be thousands of images to animate but I decided to do the important part of finishing the dish and serving it up.
https://youtu.be/ddo-IMfa36k
2. Taking Out The Trash
Once again this is a very basic job and active bit of labour we have to partake in our everyday lives. It is a very simple labour but I wanted to capture it in the dull and empty environment it is partaken in.
In this class we did an exercise where we documented ourselves and kept track of our emotions and feelings during this practice. For the exercise we had to gather lots of different random objects of different shapes and sizes and stack them up on top of each other.
In relation to the brief labour and Down Time. The physical labour was the time spent on building the structure which we did twice, this also had emotional labour involved when the tower and items wouldn’t react in the way we hoped for our tower. We also had our downtime during this exercise where we all took a 10 minute break to reflect and have something to drink and eat. As a group we shared our stories and experiences of labour and downtime within the workforce and our life’s.
We were instructed to document our exercise so for the 2 different stacks I focused on 2 different sources of video and photos for my documentation. I also worked on different angles of my photos and videos to create a different atmosphere and emotion within them. The video was taken from a low angle to show the true size and accomplishment of the tower as well as the failure within the video and creation.
First Tower
These images are from the first tower where we had to just build it as well as we could and stack them up to completion. I didn’t struggle with this one as I was able to stack it up the best way possible. The destruction of this tower wasn’t to satisfying because it was easy to construct and didn’t take to long.
This second task was to make the tower but in reverse so from smallest to biggest, this task was a bit more drawn out and irritating and I had to work my way around it but I slowly got there in the end. This second task was much more labour intensive as you can see above as the tower did not want to cooperate and kept falling over. Overall this experience with the second tower was difficult due to the objects I had to complete it with but that only made the knocking it down that much more satisfying. It also gave me emotional relief as it was slightly aggravating building the tower so it also gave me joy when it came to knocking it down.
The first task this week was partake in self directed tasks and document them, After looking at everyone elses pieces of work today I got inspired and wanted to focus mainly on the perspective and camera angles. Doing this it will make what would originally boring videos into something interesting.
3rd Person Washing Dishes
In this video I wanted to make the angle look like some sort of video game or cctv camera while I was just doing such a mundane task. To achieve this I set up my camera on a tripod and some chairs with my wide angle lens attached to it.
https://youtu.be/VjFUPUtR3J0
POV of Dishes Cubby
I then proceeded to use a different angle of the camera being in the cubby where the dishes go and have a perspective of maybe a cup or a glass. I also kept these videos raw and original to keep the realism within them, I also kept the original audio in as I thought it needed to stay in as it was apart of the work.
The first sculpture I am going to reflect on is my clay model. I have never worked with clay before so I was very nervous and did not have very high hopes in my ability. My model for the clay was my flat-mate Forester, as I believed I could capture his character and emotion through the sculpture because I know him well. At the start, I struggled with keeping the clay and gravity, over time the clay would fall and build up around the neck not allowing me to have enough structure on the head to mold the shape of my model. Over the weeks and lots of help from James and Ziggy, I was able to start constructing more detail and getting more accurate proportions. I believe this was a very good introduction to verisimilitude. Due to the nature of the model being a human we were tasked to create realism and emotion through the clay sculpture. We also had a zoom meeting with American figure sculptor Lisa Osborn where she ran us through ways to create emotion and give us constructive feedback. One of the main points relating to the models was to create an emotion on the face because the majority of our models were just straight faces making it extremely hard to create verisimilitude. Overall I believe I could have done better but for my first attempt at clay sculpting and a lot of help from others, I am happy with the near-final product of my sculpture.
Week #1Week #2Week #3
The second piece I am reflecting on is my 3d modeling. The main goal of this task was to get an item that had meaning and emotion behind it and 3d scan it using photogrammetry software and then put it into software to isolate the item from the background and create a 3d print or laser cut of the model. At first, I had 2 ideas a film camera and an NFL ball, both of these items had meaning to me but I decided to proceed with a film camera as there is a contrast between using photogrammetry to 3d model a camera was an interesting concept. The first 3d scan I did came out not too well so I went into the mesh mixer software and smoothed it out and caused it to turn into more of a blob shape than a camera. James instructed me to re-do my 3d scan and not clean it up in mesh mixer. He then showed me an artist Daniel Arsham who makes models of objects and specifically camera that push the expectations of a sculpture. I believe this helped me greatly within this task as I was very focused on literal and perfect recreations but by pushing the expectations it creates verisimilitude and emotion within my 3d scans and print.
First 3d ScansSecond 3d Scan – 3d Printed
The 3rd and final piece I am reflecting on is my lockdown work using the software Rhino 7 but specifically the use of the Grasshopper plugin. Both Rhino and Grasshopper are programs that allow you to make renders and mesh using both numbers and geometry. Specifically, I am going to be reflecting on my Grasshopper animation. One of the main basic functions in Grasshopper is Voronoi 3d and I thought this was a good starting point for me to start learning Grasshopper. This process was pretty simple and I didn’t struggle with it as all the nodes were doing was telling Rhino the population of the cube and how spaced out it was when the anchor point was going through the center. I was also able to have a look at some other simple nodes such as color changing. By learning this simple animation I was able to wrap my head around mainly 3d aspects and basic commands such as panels, number sliders, and basic mesh functions.
One artist I found who uses mesh software’s to make geometric 3d animations is Andreas Wannerstedt. Andreas focuses on geometric loops that an aesthetically pleasing, and although some of my works have been pushing expectations of perfect Andreas is still an artist I will continue to follow and gain inspiration from due to their extensive knowledge and creativity within and around using 3d software’s. One aspect of his work that has inspired me is the loops he focuses on in his works, this allows them to be eye-catching and engaging to the viewer. And although Andreas mainly uses a different software called Cinema 4d and I am learning Rhino they are both similar and do similar things meaning I am still able to learn and use Andreas as an inspiration to further works to come.
