Note

During this module I have really gave it my best shot to grasp every opportunity to present in order to really develop my presentational skills. I feel that through work shops and seminars and other events at university, I have been able to progress massively in terms of my confidence and my ability to talk to other about my work and practice. 

Note

This is an old post that should have been posted around 4 weeks ago.

Below is a picture of my PDP before I had chance to refine it more. This is basically just to show how my PDP developed over the module, I thought hard about which areas I wanted to work on and then developed the PDP sheet according to that.

Note: Peer Exhibition

I decided to utilise an opportunity that was presented to me around a week ago, myself and a group of my peers were approached by a budding art director who offered ourselves a free exhibition space. As part of this module, I decided to accept this offer and thought that it would be a great point to blog about in terms of going above and beyond my 5 personal development points. To get vital practice into exhibiting was not on my PDP however I thought that it would give me some professional practice for later in my photographic career. The exhibition space is an old large shop which has been derelict for a year or so, it is right in the middle of manchester in the Corn Exchange building. I have chosen to print a series of my latest work on metalworkers. This experience has made me really think about what work goes into exhibitions and it is great experience for the future!

Model Release Form (OLD POST)

This is a post from several weeks ago.

I also wanted to make a model release form as part of this module, not to address my PDP points but just to assist myself in the photographic world. Below is a screenshot from my model release form.

Contextualising My Work

One of my PDP points of interest was to really try to contextualise my work and practice at the moment, in order to be more confident in talking about my work to others as well as creating more passion and drive.

This is something that I am constantly trying to develop and this assignment gave me the opportunity to do so. Through certain work shops during this module I have been given time to try and think about what it is my work is about and what I am trying to achieve. I am now able to narrow down my area of photography to anyone who is wanting to know!

Through a presentation for my final major project where I had to present what my final idea is going to be, I had to practice my speech about the set of photographs I am currently working on and how I intend to develop this and explore this in the future.

I am very happy with how much I have been able to bring to light my own individual approach and how I can now speak about my practice. I can now sum up my work by saying the following... Due to having worked in the metalwork industry for over 5 years on and off, I learnt to really appreciate the work of talented engineers and craftsmen within this industry. Metalwork Engineering is a declining industry and a lot of the work that our country needs doing is being sent abroad or being shipped over being made by machines. I am interested in the praise of these talented men, giving recognition to their hard work and skills which have been passed down through many generations. I am currently in the process of visiting a number of different metalwork forges and blacksmiths to talk to and eventually photograph these workers. I have chosen to branch out from photographing initially in the one forge where I have worked for the last 5 years, I want to meet other engineers and speak to them about where they think the industry is going and where they can see their small businesses in the future. Below is an example of how I see the final images looking, this being a starting point. Through use of different equipment I will experiment until I find my own unique way of photographing these men.

Although it is hard to show my new found ability to speak more confidently about my own work, I now feel very confident attending a portfolio review or an event where I can speak to other practitioners within the industry.

I am very satisfied that I can now tick this item off my PDP list, I will however continue to keep developing my individual style in the future and will be able to thank this assignment for starting me on my way.

 I have continued to keep contextualising my work throughout this assignment and reading books such as Camera Lucida and Susan Sontag "On Photography" I have been able to put further contextual references to my own work, making me think about the reasoning behind certain choices.

My PDP 8/12/13

Below is a copy of my newest and most up to date PDP, complete with dates of when I intend to overcome each objective and wether I have already. This plan will stay on my computer for the near future and I will continue to keep up to date in terms of sticking to my plan and working on the chosen personal development points.

I really feel that this module has helped me to progress in terms of a photographer, I feel much more confident not only in terms of technical issues but also as a photographer and being able to talk about my work confidently and to others. 

Post Production Skills & Techniques

Due to one of my professional development points was to develop my editing skills, I decided to take some time and practice this after a photo shoot that I did at the beginning of december. I was asked to take some photographs of a friend of mine who models part time. He is signing to a new modelling agency and needs some portfolio shots for the company. We arranged to meet in the centre of manchester and we walked around and took some really nice photographs!! Below are examples of the photographs I took. 

Note, the below 3 images were all RAW files which I edited in Photoshop, I looked at the levels and other basic corrections then I delved further into certain editing tools such as layer masks, adding subtle colours to the images. I then used VSCO CAM to add effects onto the images, as requested by the client for a unique look. I have attached the edited images lower down in this post. 

I am really happy with the final images and the client is also very happy with the photographs. I decided that this would be a great opportunity to address one of my PDP points for university, it was also great exercise and practice for future post production. One thing that I took from the editing session is that subtle changes are often more beautiful than bold changes to an image, I am a great believer that most of the editing of an image can be done behind the camera when taking the photograph. Saying this, the edits done on the following images have came out very well.

I chose to use VSCO CAM, an up and coming editing software which I was told about through a tutor, its a way or adding filters and vintage affects to images but in a professional way. It is basically a professional quality instagram. 

Below are the VSCO edited images.

Another set of work that I decided to practice my post production skills on was the "praise of engineers" brief which I am currently working on for my final major project. I really tried to use all of the editing software to its full capability, making sure that I gave the editing process more time than I do usually. Below is a quick screenshot of just one of the areas that I looked at whilst editing, I looked into many more areas of photoshop than I have before and it has really made me more confident in terms of editing. I did not screenshot each of the editing steps that I have taken. 

Although the above screen shot is just documenting the hue/saturation section, I did go into more in depth methods of editing.

Note

Today I had the opportunity to talk to an estate agents professional photographer. I told him that I was a photography student and told him about my interests, I thought that this would be a perfect chance to ask him about how he got to where he is and ask his questions about the industry. 

He basically told me that the job that he landed straight after coming out of university was for an estate agent, he was offered the job based on his portfolio and experience within the photographic industry. I then tried to get as much information out of him as I could, specifically about his income. He told me that he gets a basic salary and if he photographs more than 3/4 houses per day for the year, he receives bonus. It was great to talk to a graduate who has found such a steady and well paid job in the industry. Due to my interest in property, I may keep this kind of job in mind for after I graduate. 

I managed to get the photographers details and website, below is a link and some images of the website. 

I also noticed that Jack puts his work onto Alamy, the online stock image library that I talked about earlier in my blog. Again, I will look into creating an account with alamy and hope to upload many of my suitable images.

http://www.jackhindsphotography.com/

Portfolio: Review Feedback

As mentioned on a previous post, I decided to show just one series of work, I thought that this would give me a better more defined idea of how to edit down a portfolio using advice from tutors and peers. I chose to just use the metal work series due to my recent focus on this piece of work, I knew that I had a solid piece of work within the hundreds and hundreds of photographs that I have taken at the factory over a series of years. 

It was very hard to edit down to my favourite images, or the ones that would be most suitable for my idea. Due to my idea being based around the praise of this declining industrial subject, I needed to choose images which best portrayed that. I finally chose the final 7 or 8 images then went to the new printing company that I have been working with recently. The printer said that he may lighten up the images using photoshop if they came out over or under in terms of brightness. This was great because he was able to see how light a professional would like to view them, I had to trust him on this. 

The final prints came out really well, I chose to ask him to print them semi-gloss instead of high gloss or any other style. This was due to myself finding it hard to see images in exhibitions or portfolios which are printed in high gloss due to light shining on them.

I them had to mount the new prints into my old/current portfolio. I have had this portfolio for several years, since college and I didn't really know of any other styles of portfolios. This is where the portfolio feedback/ review session came in handy. The first thing that was mentioned to the group during the feedback session was the appropriateness off an individuals portfolio, it had to be suitable for the target audience together with a whole load of other factors. One thing that I would like to mention is that this exercise was set 1 week before we had to show the portfolio, giving not much time at all for editing, printing and buying a portfolio. I had to work with what I had and could do in the time scale, as I can imagine I will have to do in my future career. I was very open for others critique and advice to advance my interim portfolio.

There were a group of around 10 peers and 1 staff member and we were all putting ideas toward the person showing their portfolio, it really got the ideas flowing!

When it was my time to show my portfolio, I started by giving an overview of who I intended this pitch to be towards and also a short summary of what the project of work was about. I said that this pitch would be towards a gallery curator, possibly at a working history museum or a metal work museum. Something along those lines. This portfolio pitch also helped me to cover another point mentioned in my PDP, speaking and presenting myself in front of others. 

As soon as I opened my portfolio, someone mentioned about how shiny the individual sleeves are, this made it hard to see the images from certain lights. I have included a picture of the glare on my portfolio to illustrate this.

A tutor mentioned the possible use of polypropylene photo sleeves, these are a higher quality sleeve for photographic prints. I was then told about the London Graphics Centre, a great company for portfolio supplies and such. I have looked on their website and have found some of the sleeves mentioned, I will order some as soon as I can afford them.

The next thing that was mentioned about my portfolio was that the actual portfolio book/ holder wasn't of that expected in the photographic industry, I was then told that although it is accepted as a valid way to show photographs, a photo box would be more suitable for my work. I then looked online for the boxes and found some beautiful cardboard extra coated black boxes, also from the London Graphics Centre. There was an A3 one for around £50, I will be looking further into this at the end of university when I will be expected to have more of a professional looking portfolio. I may also consider the possibility of downsizing my portfolio to A4 as a tutor mentioned in the session. As long as the prints are of a high enough quality and the sleeves are decent then I would be prepared to use a smaller portfolio. The only reason why I chose to have a fairly large A3 portfolio is because I wanted to give the viewer a similar (larger scale) view of how I would like the images to be exhibited. By this I mean that I would want the images to be around size A1/A2 at an exhibition space, having a larger than usual portfolio gives this sense of large format to the work. Below is a screenshot from the London Graphics Centre website of a possible new portfolio for my work.

One other point that was raised when I presented my portfolio was that it was some what unorganised (due to it being turned around so quickly), it was apparently awkward to have to see an image in portrait then having another landscape image next to it. I now see that having the images all the same orientation would be better. 

The actual quality of the prints were perfect, I will be using the printing company again!

One very important thing that I took away from the session is that I need to use a very impacting image or one of the best images for the first and last images in my portfolio. This is because these are the pages that are looked at the most usually. 

Overall I learnt a lot about how to put a professional portfolio together, in terms of editing and aesthetics. One thing that people didn't mention was the choice of photographs, this shows me that they thought that the images worked well together and helped to portray my feelings. Below is an example of when the orientation is wrong and the viewer is forced to turn their head to view the image, I will consider this in the future.

All together, a great session!!

Portfolio: Peer Portfolio Review Day

During a personal professional development seminar where we talked about Susan Sontag On Photography, we were told that the next PDP session would be a peer portfolio review day where we brought along a set of work for discussion. Below is an email giving us an outline of what is needed.

"Just a quick reminder for those who attended today and an update for those who were absent:
Next weeks PDP session will focus on an interim portfolio. Please bring a portfolio of images (whether you bring a print or digital portfolio is your call - think about appropriateness). Please think about who you might be showing your work to. We will discuss image/print quality, presentation, amount of work, etc., you will be reviewing each others work, we will consider first impressions thus considering suitability of your selections. You can check this against your PDP goals - for example, if you want studio work and your work isn't strong enough we can consider how to raise standards...
This might be a good time to refine your PDP and bring it along to the session."- Taken from an email from a tutor.

Susan Sontag "On Photography" Seminar

Myself and my peers were given a week to read the first chapter of Susan Sontag's "On Photography". It was to be talked about and discussed during a seminar with myself, around 10 peers and a tutor. 

I had already read this text, or at least the first few chapters during travelling Europe over the summers of 2012 and 2013, therefore I had a bit of a head start. The session was great and we really took apart the text and talked about each major point that she made, as well as mentioning our personal views to what she said. It was a great way to learn about what the author is trying to put across, by this I mean that listening to other people views of what she had to say was really useful in making me see her points in a different light. I personally find Susan Sontag a very opinionated person, she has very strong views on everything and maybe she doesn't seem to change her views, i'm not saying this is a bad thing. Either way, this was the first seminar that I have been given the chance to attend and I will hopefully be attending many more in the future because I found the experience very worthwhile. This seminar also helped me to further bring into context my own work, one particular point in the text talked about how certain areas of social life are being destroyed in a brief span of time and how photography is a "device" which can record what is "disappearing". This quote really hit home with my are of work and it helped me to gain further enthusiasm into my own areas of interest! Below are some notes that I took down whilst reading the chapter, these are some of the points that I inputted into the seminar.

• "To collect photographs is to collect the world"
• "To photograph is to appropriate the thing photographed"
• The book has been the most influential way of arranging photographs.
• Brief view of how the photograph is seen to the public and how it is displayed or reproduced.
• The camera record incriminates and justifies depending on the subject and photographer.
• "The picture may distort; but there is always a presumption that something exists, or did exist which is like whats in the picture."
• Photographs will always be influenced by each persons taste and conscience.
• Link to The Farm Security Administration Project. (Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange etc...)
• There is an aggressive implicit in every use of the camera?
• The clash between paintings and photography, how photography become a way of mass producing.
• Photography is participation not observation.
• The photograph as " perverse"
• There is distance between the photographer and the subject.
• She talks about "Loading", "Aiming" and "Shooting".
• "To photograph people is to violate them"
• Constant talk about how the camera duplicates the world at the moment"
• The sentimental use of photography for example, "A cab drivers children clipped to the visor"
• Constantly talking about WHAT a photograph is.
• A photograph is a carefully selected moment in time, moving image is a stream of under-selected images, each of which cancels the previous.
• Link to the vietnamese child running down the road from the fighting.
• "Photography is extremely powerful, is has the ability to change the world"
• "The contribution of photography always follows the naming of the event" In other words, photographs can only reenforce a notion it cannot portray the 'realness' or 'truth' of an event.
• The shock of pornography wears off after repeated viewings.
• Ethical content of photographs is fragile.
• Photographs have become part of everyday life.
• Photographs are a way of giving information to people who do not take easily to reading. EVERYONE THEN?
• "Everything exists to end in a photograph.

Portfolio: Blurb Book

During an artist talk with David Oates, he mentioned a great way to show your work to clients, in other words a unique way of a portfolio. I decided to look into this and blog my findings/ ideas.

Blurb is an internet platform for designing printing and making books, with an emphasis of image based interiors. It is a great break through for anyone looking or dreaming of publishing their own books at an affordable price. 

During a module during first year, we were asked to design our own book based on a set of of our work, we had to design and create a book template which could be printed and process through Blurb. I chose to create a minimal looking design to put all of the emphasis on the dead pan portraits from a past series of images looking into the way that people react when confronted with a camera. 

I will continue creating book templates on Blurb in the future and hopefully one day I will be able to afford to get some work printed by the company. I am very interested in the idea of using Blurb as a portfolio, as David Oates mentioned. After looking into this idea, I believed that using a book as a portfolio wouldn't be practice because I find myself constantly wanting to add more and more current work to my every changing portfolio and with a book I would not be able to do this. I believe that due to this, a portfolio or portfolio box would be more suitable because of the detachable sleeves for individual images. 

Below are some examples of books that others have published, being designed by themselves.

I especially like the versatility of blurb and how it allows you to change most elements of the design. Overall, I am glad to have been told about this great website and I will defiantly be using this in the future. 

Portfolio: New Prints

One of my personal development points is to renew my portfolio with my new stronger images/ sets of work. I have been thinking about the best way to present my images and have recently found out about a printing company close to where I live in Warrington. I have previously used a company called BPD Photech which are a professional quality printing company who treat each image with due care and attention, they really produce beautiful quality images in stunning resolution. The only drawback of this business is that it is relatively expensive for the high quality prints and due to being a student on a budget, I needed to find a cheaper solution. The new printing company that I have found also offer a great level of customer service and the prints are of a great quality. 

I have chosen to get a full set of work printed using the company to see how the final print come out. I will then put the newly printed images into my old portfolio sleeves. I chose to go for A3 prints, the same as my previous portfolio images. Having said this, I would also like to experiment with the prints for my new portfolio, I want to try A2 paper with an A3 image on, this experimentation will be my next step in developing my new portfolio.

Below are some images of my newly updated portfolio prints.

Networking: Redeye

Redeye

I first got to know of redeye over 2 years ago from Lawrence George Giles, the programme leader on my photography course at Salford University. He said that he was once on the board committee and he told us what sort of things that the organisation does. 

Redeye is a photography network, a non-profit organisation to help and assist up and coming photographs and almost every level/ profession of photographer. It helps its members to see how things are moving photographically, in terms of what is happening through seminars, talks and other activities. The information and help is extremely useful and is hard to be found elsewhere. "Alongside this it works to bring photographic and other organisations together, to encourage ethical and best practice, and to build a voice for photography."- Red Eye Website. In other words, it is letting other people know about the world of professional photography. Below are some screenshots of the website, I particularly like the portfolio section of the website where each member of Red Eye get to showcase their series of work and each practitioner gets a brief bio and profile. This would be a great way for people in the industry to see my work, I intend to get a membership and attend more events that they organise, they do student discount too!! I signed up the the mailing list 2 years ago and receive occasional emails telling me about what is happening.

  

The director of Redeye, Paul Herrmann, held a lecture for our university course where he talked about our future and how best to find work after university as well as showing us the different possible routes to becoming a photographer. His talk was mostly aimed at freelance photography, something that I am interested in! This talk was a great way to learn about certain aspects within the industry which were unclear to me before. There had been the question of what I was going to do after university hanging over my head for many months, this talk put me some what at ease.

The first thing Paul spoke about was Red Eye, not only to promote it but to give us an essential guideline in the photographic world, a helping hand. He told us that the organisation regularly set up networking events where one is able to converse and talk to other photographers on the same level. At these events he said it was possible to gain contacts, share ideas and get feedback from other professionals. 

He then mentioned a event run by Red Eye called Hot House, "a day of photography and a showcase of creative talent."- Red Eye Website. This is a day where photographers can book a slot and come and present their work to the audience, gaining feedback and reviews of their project/ body of work. This would be a great event for myself to attend next year, I will have to keep the next dates in my diary. I think that I would benefit from presenting to other people than my peer group, the other visual artists there would be able to help me progress I imagine. At the hot house event there is also a table where you are able to leave your portfolio for others to look, a great idea!!!

Another thing that he mentioned during his talk was how important it is for us as students to carry on meeting up after university, he said it is a great way to share ideas with people that really know your work and style. This was a great point, he really put across some good ideas, I will hopefully be able to work on his advice and make a regular meet up after I finish uni with my peers.

He then mentioned lightbox another interesting event which... "Redeye’s Lightbox aims to launch the careers of some of the UK’s most promising photographers through workshops, networking, participation and presentation."

He was also telling us about relevant and important financial matters when setting up as a freelance photographer, he warned us about certain possible problems we may face and how to overcome them. He mentioned things about licensing and copyright.

He also mentioned a handful of photographers such as Ed Clarke and John Blackmore, I will research these two and the other that he talked about.

He mentioned some really useful websites such as Pinterest and Linked-In, social projection sights for the creatives. I will be setting up new Flickr Pinterest and Linked-In profiles when I have some spare time.

One of the last things that he mentioned was again about the business side of freelancing, he told us to look at Roger Ballen and Simon Roberts, who both have interesting business models which are worth a look at.  

I attended a Red Eye event in 2012, this was an artist talk by Ian Beesley who talked about his ongoing set of images called "The Drift", a set of photographs of Yorkshire mining communities. It was a great experience to see how another photographer had gone about producing such a beautiful body of work, greatly influential.

Red Eye is a great way for me to really fulfil my goal set out in my PDP, the one which says that I need to develop my networking skills and techniques. I will continue to follow Red Eyes posts and tweet on twitter and will get a membership when I can spare the money.

Fresh Faced & Wiled Eyed 13

As part of the module we were asked to look at different competitions, more specifically ones aimed at students. Below are some competitions that I have looked at and a brief summary about each of these.

Fresh Faced and Wiled Eyed

Ran by The Photographers Gallery in London and is only open to recent graduates of university who have a strong body of work. The great thing about this particular competition is that the winning photographer who's work is chosen by a carefully selected board of curators and photographers gets their work hung in a gallery as the prize. I think that this is a great opportunity as it is something that all graduates can only dream about, they work being funded to be made into an exhibition. FF&WE is all about showcasing the emerging talent coming out of the UK's photography courses.

The Photographers Gallery is an extremely respected gallery in London, a great chance for people to see fresh out of universitys' work!!!

"FreshFaced+WildEyed2012 is the fifth in our annual competition for recent graduates. Following an online submission process, a panel of judges have selected work for exhibition in our new gallery spaces and online.

The 2012 judges are Bridget Coaker, Picture Editor, The Guardian and co-founder of Troika Editions; Clare Grafik, Head of Exhibitions, The Photographers' Gallery; Anthony Luvera, artist, writer and lecturer and Karen Newman, Curator, Open Eye Gallery.

The Photographers' Gallery's FreshFaced+WildEyed Mentorship Programme

The programme started in January 2013 with an introductory session at the Gallery for the artists and their mentors.  A mid-year review of the programme will be undertaken by the Gallery along with a final assessment at the end of the year so as to ensure as positive an outcome as possible for current and future participants."- The Photographers Website.

Artist Talk/ Workshop: Karin Albinsson & David Oates

David Oates

The photographers Karin Albinsson and David Oates came in recently to give our class a talk. This was a really useful session that I got a lot out of, it really helped me to talk about my own work and how I promote myself technically/ digitally. David was really down to earth and he took a small group of us and asked us to give a brief overview of what our photographic style is and how we are currently advertising ourselves in terms of portfolio, website and social media. This really helped me to see where I needed to focus on the most after thinking about which social networking sites that I actually use other than my website. He told us that we would basically benefit greatly from using twitter most importantly and also other media to promote ourselves. I defiantly took on board what he said on that day and am currently setting up a twitter for myself as a photographer, separate from my personal account which I will now in the future watch what I post on there. This is basically because future employees can often check social media before employing a creative person such as a photographer because it gives them more of an insight into the person. Which is fair enough.

David also gave us some really useful reference points, websites, films and photographers for us to research and look at. Below is a list of my notes that I took during the talk:

• Preston is my Paris
• Ed Watts
• Alternative Camera Club
• Kiosk
• Blacklab
• Roast Beef
• www.davidoates.net
• Mancoralist (Twitter)
• Bill Cunningham- New York film

I have looked into the things that David said and there is some really useful stuff that he said, he was like a encyclopaedia of knowledge, a very interesting person. One particular point that David made was that of the Alternative Camera Club, an interesting group of people who get together regularly to talk photography... The website says the following "Get away from talk of focal lengths, megapixels and f-stops for a more considered, conceptual approach to photography. Join photo artists for talks and discussions with the chance to share your images and ideas with the group." Sounds great and I will be looking to attend an event soon!

Below are the points that I jotted down as soon as he asked our group to make notes about ourselves ready for the presentation where the full class of 30 sat around in a circle and said a little bit about ourselves. Which, although it was pressurised, it was great for building my confidence speaking to people about my work! This exercise was also perfect to tick off one of my PDP points which was to develop my presentational skills and techniques.  

• My work: Documentary, Travel, Fashion.
• I have a website with a 'journal' page which I regularly update with my latest photographic work.
• I need to work closely with a printing company to build up a new portfolio.
• My old portfolio is some what out dated.
• All my work is of a documentary style.
• Link to favourite photographer: Michael Mayren.
• Mayrens work is a unique blend between fashion and documentary.

Karin Albinsson

Karin also came to the talk however, all that she showed us in her presentation was her work that i had seen before at a previous talk, it was still interesting to take note of how she presented and was nice to look at her work. I find her a really nice woman and a very influential photographer. All in all, a great day and a great talk by two creative photographers.

Artist Talk: Layla Sailor & Anna White

I recently attended an artist talk from two practitioners, Layla Sailor and Anna White. They gave us a great inside view of how best to get into the photographic industry, in terms of how they got to where they are today. They talked about some great tricks of the trade, ways to be with certain people and who to be cheeky with. One thing that really made me laugh and feel at home with these two were that they told us to be ourselves and to be cheeky when asking for free things. They also mentioned something that has come up a number of different times before, from many different photographers, this is that it isn't always a bad thing for us to do some photographic work for free. They said that sometimes, free work can then lead to more paid work which is something that I have found out myself over the last few years.

Layla also mentioned some really interesting points of reference, especially in the fashion/ fine art area. One of the points she mentioned was that of studio and creative spaces, loft creative and the victoria baths in manchester. One of which gives student discount and both have day rates if I wanted to do a portfolio shoot or anything based in a studio.
She also told me about an interesting concept about a series of redevelopment that is happening for the Diesel clothing brand, called Diesel Reboot. I have heard about this all over the fashion scene at the moment and one of my favourite photographers features in the rebrand. A greatly influential contemporary set of work. She also mentioned about a New York company called "See Me" which is a great platform where creatives can showcase their work and be noticed by the industry. This is a great thing to note because I have plans to move to New York for a year or so after university to practice photography.

Overall, the talk was really influential, I got to learn about interesting ways of doing certain things on the cheap and some other nice ideas and concepts for my future career! Below is a short summary of both of the photographers.

Layla Sailor

Below is a brief overview of Layla and her work from the last few years, taken from her website.

• AFTER COMPLETING A DEGREE IN PHOTOGRAPHY AT MANCHESTER IN 2005, SHE HAS CONTINUED TO COMBINE COMMERCIAL FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY WITH FINE ART & FILMMAKING, RECEIVING AN HONOURABLE MENTION AT THE 2009 & 2013  IPA AWARDS, WAS A FINALIST IN THE 2013 SEE.ME EXPOSURE AWARDS, AND WON THE GRAND PRIZE AT 'ART TAKES PARIS' 2013. SHE HAS EXHIBITED IN NUMEROUS GROUP AND SOLO SHOWS INCLUDING PRINTEMPS PARIS, NOUVEL ORGANON, HARRIS MUSEUM, PRESTON ART GALLERY & 2022NQ. 

• INSPIRED BY CINEMATOGRAPHY AND LITERATURE, SHE CREATES HYPER-REALISTIC, DREAMLIKE WORKS FOCUSING ON COLOUR AND STYLING. SHE IS MAINLY INSPIRED BY RUSSIAN TRADITIONAL CRAFTS, RELIGIOUS ICONOGRAPHY AND POLITICS AND HAS PRODUCED NUMEROUS ARTWORKS IN SUPPORT OF PUSSY RIOT, COLLABORATING WITH PRINT DESIGNER LISA STANNARD.

• HER WORK ALSO INCLUDES LIGHTING DESIGN, ART DIRECTION AND PROP MAKING 

• LAYLA LIVES IN MANCHESTER, AND WORKS BETWEEN MANCHESTER AND LONDON

http://www.laylasailor.com/272881

Anna White

Below is a brief overview of Anna and her work from the last few years, taken from her website.

• Originally from Suffolk, I’m a freelance photographer and facilitator who studied photography and graduated with a Masters in 2010.

• I have completed a Scholarship collaborating with Bolton Museum and University, working with the wider community, creating an archive of work, documenting peoples everyday lives. As well as doing a long term project with elderly LGBT people recording their often hidden lives, as they concealed their true identity when homosexually was illegal. 

• I also carried out workshops with different community groups, including NEETS, young offenders and refugees. In 2006 completed a long term project with the elderly that has been widely exhibited including Tate Britain.

http://www.annawhite.net/

Networking: Creative Industries Networking Group

"The Creative Industries Networking Group (CING) was formed in 2008 with a mission to support and facilitate the success of its creative industries members. We do this by engaging and representing the sector; providing development, training and promotion; and by securing commercial opportunities."- The Creative Industries Website.

"The core of CING is its monthly networking events, held on the first Monday of every month. This is a chance to meet peers from across the sector, and to listen to inspirational speakers from the creative and business communities, as well as to find out about complementary support and development services that are available."- The Creative Industries Website.

This is a great organisation who don't just focus on one medium such as photography, they in fact have members practicing in every aspect of the creative world, from graphic designers to music and television. This is great way to get a foot in the door with many different industries and business, I have just gone through the registering and joining process and are now a member of this great community. I am glad that I have found this organisation and I will be informing my peers about it. I searched the website and found a platform where I can find other creatives in and around a given postcode, I chose manchester and began searching. It comes up with lots of photographers and I will no doubt start to converse with some of those to see when the next meet up is.
This is a great way to start networking with other professionals and this definitely starts to address one of my PDP points of developing my networking skills.  

"The majority of our members are therefore those working in creative fields such as design, photography, film, animation, music, fashion, art, crafts, digital, advertising, marketing, architecture, and television."- The Creative Industries Website.

http://www.c-i-n-g.org/

Presentation Practice

During a small peer session today at university, we were encouraged to talk about our own work as a way of building on our pitches to the industry. We were told to recreate a brief encounter with a future client for example a commissioner or a curator, we then had to pitch our own works in that brief encounter of a number of minutes.

We started by jotting down a brief overview of the series of work that we wanted to talk about during the brief encounter, or "Elevator Pitch" as we called it to emulate a short talk in an elevator. After we jotted down our initial notes and ideas, we started to pitch ourselves to a peer in a one-to-one situation. The person we pitched to then gave feedback of the timed 1 minute pitch and I then edited and modified my pitch to further develop it. We repeated the pitch and modify process 3 or 4 times to different people, all one-to-one. Finally we had to pitch our finally modified pitch to the full class (around 12 people), taking into mind that we had developed the pitch from the initial notes that we made.

This was a great workshop which really helped me to define my own work, or at least the set of work that I talked about in the pitch. I also took great advice from the people who I pitched to which really helped me to be able to talk to others about my work. I now feel very confident for when I bump into a practitioner or curator. I would also feel comfortable pitching to any other kind of future employer or any one who would want to hear about my work and interests. 

Briefly, the set of work that I talked about during my pitch was that of a set of images which focusses on the praise of metal work engineers through portraiture.

Having worked in the metalwork industry part time for over 5 years, I began to really appreciate the skills of the engineers that I worked around. I am currently creating a set of portraits to praise the work of these skilled craftsmen.

Presentation Notes

Presentation Notes

Ben Stokes

16/10/13

1.) Contextualizing My Work

·     I want to do further research around a variety of different photographers to help me contextualize my own work as well as categorizing my style of photography.

·     My style is currently fairly varied and I know that by the end of university I will be expected to know where my practice lies within the photographic world.

·     HOW: Read more!!!

·     WHEN: On going, for the rest of my photographic career.

2.) Update My Portfolio

·     In order to obtain jobs in the future, I will need to gather my most suitable and more recent sets of work to showcase my style and talent.

·     My current portfolio hasn’t been updated for over 3 years and the photographic content is not as strong as my more recent work.

·     HOW: Take some time to print out all my work then edit and choose the most suitable.

·     WHEN: Before I finish university.

3.) Presentational Skills

·     I intend to develop this transferable skill in order to get me ready for leaving university. I will be expected to come across as confident about my own work so that I can then sell myself to a potential client during pitches.

·     HOW: Make the most of the informal presentations at uni, they are really good practice!!!

·     WHEN: On going for my own benefit in the future.

4.) Post Production Skills & Techniques

·     This is an ongoing development of skills that will be key when I leave university and have to produce professional work to fit given briefs by a client or employer.

·     Practicing editing skills on software such as Photoshop and Lightroom in my spare time will help me to develop my post-production techniques.

·     HOW: Practicing in my own time!!!

·     WHEN: On going, for the rest of my photographic career.

5.) Networking Skills & Techniques

·     In the past few years it has become apparent that I need to work on my networking as a professional. After attending several artist talks, I feel the need to meet and talk to other practitioners about their work. I feel that I will gain a lot from doing so.

·     HOW: Visit more networking events!!!

WHEN: Continuously in the last year at uni and also ongoing for the rest of my photographic career.