Proposal

Advanced Photographic Practices

Name: Faye Valentine

Project Title: Dear Me

Précis

My idea is going to be personal to me, and about how things have changed since I have moved out and have to take care of myself. I will be aiming this short video at people in my situation who have just moved out of their parents home, and who are also struggling with home sickness and day to day life. The narrative is going to be talking about the now, and certain things that I have to do now on my own such as cooking. I'll be talking about how things used to be when I lived at my parents, and how things have changed now. The visuals will show how things used to be, such as my mum cooking or sorting out the bills. The visuals and the audio will run alongside each other, so the narration will be talking about how I have to sort through my own bills, but the visual will show my parents sorting through them. It will also include personal shots from around the house to show the past of when I used to live there. There will also be snippets of a day out with my family at a location that is personal to me to show more of my past to show how it used to be so different. 

Rationale

When I think about memory, I always think about times with my family as I’ve grown up with them and lived with them for so many years. This lead me to thinking about the transition that I went through when I moved out of our family home to lead a new adult life, many people go through this transition and I hope that they can relate to mine. I then thought about how I see it now and how I used to see it then, I thought about combining them and having them run alongside each other but shown through different ways, the audio and the visual. Referring back to the subject "stillness and memory" I will include my memories from home and what I went through when I moved out, which are fixed key points in my life. For stillness, this relates to me being stuck in time and wanting to go back to the past, to show this visually I will be filming the whole video using a tripod whcih will look like motion photographs. Inspired by the video on youtube “Letters to July”, which I talk about in my research, I decided I wanted to make a video with myself narrating as I’m the one who can talk about my memories better than anyone. I want the video to be aesthetically pleasing, but as well tell a story. I chose this subject as it is deep and meaningful to me and I will be passionate about it throughout the project.

Aims & Objectives

At the end of this project, I wish to achieve new video skills, sound editing and video editing skills, but as well as this I also want the skills to contribute to my photography skills.  All of these skills will be helpful in the future if I ever wanted to go into video, or if I wanted to do any installation pieces. I intend to use my photographic skills to get some creative framing, I will also be using my lighting techniques and try to be careful as the light changes. My work will be aimed at people around my age who are in the same boat as me where they have left home and are feeling the transition from child to adult, I want my audience to relate to this subject and to feel emotion while watching the video. I am planning for my video to be shown in a gallery space, in a room on its own with the walls painted black. I also want to a have a little book that people can write in where they can share their memories of their transition to being an adult. 

Overview

For this project I will need certain equipment, such as:

-A smooth tripod

I will need the tripod to be smooth for panning and tilting. I can get this tripod for the university although if I want to take it over the weekend I will have to take it out on a Friday as they only allow you to take equipment out for 3 days

-A 35mm lens

A 35mm lens has a low aperture and is wider than a 50mm, which is good for me as I will be filming in a small space, and my camera has a cropped sensor.

I will be traveling back home for this project, therefore I will need to get a “open return” ticket. With this ticket I can go on a Friday and come back on a Sunday, this ticket will cost me £20. Other than the train ticket, I won’t have to pay for anything else, therefore my budget will be £20.