Work Diary - Shoot 6: Mental Illness Location

Evaluation 

For this shoot, I wanted to try and produce a mental illness shoot, on Location. To do this, I decided to travel to the town carpark, and also to a high bridge over the train station, because I wanted to take photos of the height, and photos of a model looking as though they were considering to jump. However, I didn't want to create gory and uncomfortable images, I wanted to create photos that made people think. I wanted to bring awareness to how some people may feel after being bullied or by suffering from any kind of illness on a daily basis. I also wanted to create relatable images, as in some of the shots my model is just sitting down on the bridge looking through the bars and watching the trains go by, which is kind of mesmerising. In some of the shots, I actually captured some trains going by which added to the images. Also, in a couple of the images, I just included my models hands within the shots, holding the bars. This was to make it look like a prison cell, like the model was trapped whilst the world goes by, which resembles the feeling of being lost and lonely. Mental illness is an issue within society as it isn't fully accepted, and often people who suffer with some form of mental illness, feel as though they can't speak about it. By using my photography as a way to express certain feelings and thoughts, I can create images that are relatable and make people feel less abnormal or different, as mental illnesses are so common but aren't talked about enough. 

This is one of the shots I took whilst on the bridge by the train station. I like this shot because it isn't personal as we can't see the models face, but we can see their legs hanging from the bridge over the train station. This photo was taken at a fortunate moment, as a train is actually coming past, which gives the photo a dangerous feel. Even though there isn't much in the photo, it is quite powerful as the model is sitting at a great height, above a train track. 

For this photo, I made sure the bars and the models hands were in focus, and not the background. This is so the hands and bars became the main focus, and were paid attention too. The bars look like prison bars and as the model is gripping on to them, it feels as though they are trapped within the bars. Even though the background is blurred, we can still see the train track and how heigh the bridge is above it. I edited this image into black and white to emphasise the different tones in the image, as there are a lot more darker tones and shadows near where the model is standing, but in the background it is much brighter and there are more lighter tones. This contrast portrays how the model may have been feeling at the time, dark and depressed, whilst the world seemed bright and happy outside of the bars. 

Progression 

I plan to do a follow up of this topic, but shooting in the Studio instead. This is because I want to use the soft boxes in order to control the lighting myself, making it darker or brighter depending on the image. I also want to take normal portraits in the Studio, and then use different editing techniques to create abnormal images that represent different types of mental illnesses, like Christian Sampson has done through his work.