Evaluation

The idea of extraordinary that has been included in Editorial photography could be seen as a number of subjects in the assignment that I had been given. To each individual person the word extraordinary means a different thing, this generally results in a range of ideas and concepts. As long as the photographers work supports the written work, whether it be in a book, magazine or newspaper it is seen as editorial. This assignment has been an enjoyable challenge from start to finish because of its difference to everything else I have experienced and produced before. At the beginning the thought of this project was quite overwhelming because I had a number of ideas that overall seemed too hard and confusing to go out and do. After a few discussions and help, my subject matter was decided and conclusive on focusing on my part time job that I have outside of University. This seemed extraordinary because no one else I know and who is also doing this assignment does not have access to photograph the place that is significant to me, making it a totally different subject matter than everyone else’s. Another reason is that the public and other audience's seem to think the store is unique in itself because there is no other clothing shop in Middlesbrough that is like Psyche because of its reputation of being quite overly priced and it stocks designer labels that no where else in the area does. During the seven weeks of this assignment I have explored the shop mostly in the stockrooms, which is what I would call behind the scenes rather than capturing more images on the shop floor. I have done this because my subject matter was to present the process of the clothes that Psyche sells, from the beginning of the items being delivered, to its journey of them being hung up and sold. I wanted to show this because this is what the public do not see, because most of the time people don't think about what goes on behind the walls of the shop that they identify with, they just look at this clothes and consider trying them on or buying them, which I find quite curious, as personally it is what I find most interesting to see the stories behind the clothes, rather than just hung up. Throughout this assignment I have used my own camera, a Canon DSLR 500D, also using a 60mm size lens. I used my own camera because I feel comfortable using it and I knew I wouldn't become confused when taking photographs. Looking through magazines and books helped me broaden my knowledge and understanding on editorial work and researching Photographers such as very successful famous photographers like Mario Testino and William Eggleston, but also photographers who I have came across by just researching for this assignment like Anthony Kwan and Rebecca Tate. If I was to start this assignment again and do things differently, I would definitely shoot and capture a lot more around or even outside the shop so that I would of had more choice of photographs to choose from for my final images. I would have also maybe explored the subject extraordinary and presented a contrast of different images, by shooting in different locations or including a different genre of photography such as portraits of the people I work with. Looking back I would have liked to use different cameras and maybe the use of film to create a different appearance to the images. Above all in my opinion my final prints do represent the term extraordinary and could be used in editorial work. My reason behind these images being the whole process of the clothing explains this and is clear to see in the photograph, although I do think could be more apparent if I had taken more photographs from different objects and areas.

Furthermore this assignment has been a challenge in how vast the subject matter could be, being able to choose my own concept was very difficult at the start because of being able to choose anything as their was no specific route to take as long as it was linked with the term extraordinary and presented Editorial photography. However overall this assignment has helped me progress in understanding what Editorial photography is and includes a lot more and has gave me experience in this genre of photography, which I did not have before. It is something that I did not think about previously to this project, but will continue to progress and want to learn more about in to the future by exploring different genre's surrounding photography that can be editorial work.