The end (of college) is nigh....

I've been working rather manically for the past six or seven weeks, mostly on college work, but also helping out by providing people with my photo skills.

My main project of late has been what is known as the Graded Unit, a project we are assigned at the end of each year at college and are given an actual mark on. Usually with each unit, we fulfill the assignments and we are either marked as a pass or fail as to whether we met the brief that we've been set. The graded unit is where we are actually given a grade. Last year, I did particularly well, and was the first person in my college to receive 100% for the first part of the project. Overall, I got a grade A which was a pretty good feeling given the work I put into the project.

The project last year involved creating a slideshow of 15 portfolio images plus a self-written brief where we had to create five images.

This year, it was mostly the same deal, a slideshow plus a self-written brief, but with ten final images. I handed my work in a fortnight ago, and I should hear by next week what my final result is for the unit.

My self-initiated project this year, was to create a series of portraits based on historical photographs. I wanted my portraits to portray a positive idea of strong women. I based my research on photographs of Lisa Fonssagrives Penn, a model from 1930s - 1950s, who posed for some of the most legendary photographers in some of the most famous fashion magazines.

This project has perhaps been the most time-demanding project I've done, but I managed to produce ten images which I wanted to include in my project.

In addition to the project, we have also held an end of year college exhibition at Wasps Gallery in Glasgow. The launch night, last week was a resounding success, and I'm on duty tomorrow to guard the goods during its last day. I submitted two images to the exhibition, including the one pictured above.

In addition, I've also been busy working on a small portfolio of social photographs in the studio and on location as part of my social photography class. I've also created a series of still life food shots for my location stock class.

Then there's the extra circular work I've been doing. I've had a couple of shoots for some make-up artist students. The favour was repaid when they agreed to pose for my studio social photographs.

Finally, last week I spent a day photographing a bikathon for Leukaemia Research in Glasgow. I'm still in the process of editing the photographs from the bikathon, but it was a brilliant day and a great experience.

I've also recently had a little bit of work experience, with a professional photographer, for a physiotherapy centre. I really enjoyed working with him, and he was kind enough to drive over to the exhibition and take a look at our end of year show.

Currently, I'm still in the process of finishing off a few loose ends of college work, and then next week I'm heading off to London to visit my boyfriend and celebrate his 30th birthday, and the week after I'm heading off to France for a well-deserved two week holiday!

In the meantime, I've updated my website with a range of my latest work. I decided to create a "latest work" gallery to showcase this, before it's filed away in the relevant gallery. You can see some of the images I've spoken about here.

Finally, a little story about today.

I'm a member of a website called JPG Magazine, which is as the name suggests, a photo magazine. The work - articles and photographs - are chosen from user generated content. Last year, they published one of my photographs for which I received $100 plus a free subscription.

Today when I checked my email, I noticed I had several emails from JPG, which turned out to be people adding me as a contact, and updates on activity on my work. Turned out, they'd named a story I'd written as story of the week in their weekly e-newsletter, as well as on their front page. I've noticed a lot of activity on that particular story, and on the images relating to it.

The story is about the top ten things I've learned in the last two years of studying photography, which I thought I'd pass on to others to help them with their work. As well as JPG attention, I've also had an increase in Twitter attention, and one nice guy has even written a blog post about my story which you can read at http://slashmaraud.blogspot.com/

At least it shows the last two years I did pay attention to what I was taught.

catwalks and tweets

Decided it's been a while since I wrote, and there's been movements afoot, so at least I've got a decent reason to write something.

A few weeks ago, a friend of mine asked me if I was interested in photographing a fashion show. My response was of course, yes. It was the Edinburgh Charity Fashion Show, which is billed as Europe's most successful student-run fashion show. Which is pretty good.

The premise for my photography was to produce some shots which would show a mixture of fashion and documentary style photographs, behind the scenes and on stage.

The show itself was held at Edinburgh Corn Exchange. The first night was student night, and so was pretty relaxed with student friends turning up. That said, it sold out all 900 tickets. The clothes were donated by a range of well known local, national, and international designers. The show was organised by students from Edinburgh College of Art and Edinburgh University. The second night was a black tie affair, with tables laid out for dinner, an auction and a silent auction, and of course a celebrity supporter in tow. I learned a lot from the experience, about working a situation like this. Had I been working purely from a press-photography perspective, I'd have produced a range of shots from one end of the catwalk which all looked identical. As it was, I wanted to get more "creative", and so worked around different angles. I felt that given this could produce portfolio work (an attitude I take to every shoot of late) I wanted it to at least look interesting. I really enjoyed it, and got some great networking opportunities, which is always a plus. I think my confidence is growing in that regard, which is quite nice to be aware of.

I've also been trying to shoot the album cover, but so far, no luck. I'm waiting for a spot of good weather - a nice evening. Believe it or not, those aren't as frequent as you'd think even now. The other thing is, there is time constraints working against me on this, so as is the way, the best days are the ones when my subject isn't available for shooting. I'm considering just going into the studio and doing something there instead.

I've also had my first stab at some architectural photography. I'm due to go for "round two" sometime soon, again, I'm wanting some good weather to show a bit of sunshine in the photographs. Until then, the photos remain under wraps.

I've also got my big final end of year project at the moment. I've got a series of shoots lined up for next week, so we shall see how they turn out. In addition, I've found myself inundated with make up artists looking for a photographer.... which keeps me busy.

Finally, I've managed to get myself a website set up! Quite pleased about this, because I've managed to meet my own timescale on this, which was to have it up and running by the start of April. It can be visited here: http://kristinmitchell.co.uk/ I decided to work with white, for a number of reasons. Firstly, I think it's more reflective of how a photo might be displayed, e.g. on a wall. Secondly, I think black is much more common as a choice of photo website colour, and I like to go the other way. Thirdly, I personally find black backgrounds difficult to read text on - white text is fine, but when it's blue or red, it's a bit harder for me to focus properly, so I thought other people might feel the same way. Finally, it's less "look! I'm looking at a photo website!", which if you're sitting in an office for example, you might not really want something that grabs the attention of everyone in the room for all the wrong reasons towards your monitor. I wanted something that lets people look at my site discretely. I've also decided to stay away from talking about myself in the third person on my site. Partly to do with the fact that every time I read that by other photographers, I get Alan Partridge's voice in my head. I very much doubt they have a raving fan of a webmaster who wants to spout well-versed cliches about the genius of the photographer in question. So I'm trying to make it more "this is me, this is what I can do for you". Whether it works or not...

I'm also working on how I'm going to market myself a bit, and trying to work out what goes on inside the heads of other people. A dangerous task, I realise. So I'm currently working on a short(ish) survey, trying to get a feel for how people think about professional photographers, hiring photographers, studios, costs, ranges, how people source photographers for occasions, and so on. I think it's better to create a product that way than to try and copy what everyone else is doing and wait for people to go for that. So if you're interested in taking part.... email me at kristinmitchellphotos at googlemail dot com and I'll add you to my survey mailing list. While I'm going to be targetting people closer to where I live, I think people's perceptions of photography isn't necessarily driven by their geographical location, so I'm happy to take responses from people from different areas too, as well as a variety of demographic groups.

Meantime, you can keep up to date with me on a more regular basis via twitter which I have succumbed and joined.

the last lap

So it's the start of my third and final term at college.... it's all gone so quickly!

Last term, we had documentary and fashion, as well as creative industries which was more practical advice about job hunting, and support for photographers in the real world.

As usual, it's all been a bit interesting in terms of what I like/ what I'm good at.

For my documentary projects, I decided to shoot two of them on medium format film cameras. After wasting two rolls of film, I quickly learned how to load the Bronica camera (and read instructions after finding them on the internet).

Fashion was a bit of a challenge. What I learned most, was about the amount of organisation in a single shoot. It's not just a case of turning up with a camera and asking everyone to say cheese. It was actually very frustrating at times, but I managed to get my shots done. What I needed though, and could have done with, was a friendly pair of hands to assist me while I worked. Running around back and forth between models, agencies, and make up artists (as well as trying to free photographic kit from the clutches of the over-possessive storeman at college) is a lot of hard work. Add into it, the research, and trying to explain what you're after to so many people.... and that's before I've even shot a single frame. It certainly gave me a new appreciation of the work of fashion photographers.

That said, I was happy with one or two shots from the shoot, and I felt that my final shoot, at Chatelherault Country Park in Hamilton was perhaps my most successful.

I've been busy experimenting a lot with different ideas of photography, and for this shoot, I wanted to return a bit to what I like most - dramatic skies and cool skin tones.

I did however relish the opportunities I had to just go out with my camera, on my own, and do my documentary projects. Those were the wonderful moments in between, where I was able to work on a small scale project, instead of something that felt like a mammoth operation.

In addition, I've been working on some other projects, for other people, as a means of testing my skills before I am released into the wild as a new photographer.

At the end of January, I took photographs for a charity ball north of Perth. I met the charity organisers in October, during a work experience shoot with a newspaper, and offered my services to them as and when required. They invited me to photograph people as they arrived at a very lovely hotel, and I ended up being fed a four course meal, as well as ending up in the presidential suite when one of their guests didn't show up.

In February, I was invited to take photos during a music video - a mix of fashion and documentary. It was an absolutely exhausting day, but a very valuable experience, and one which I enjoyed a lot!

I've got a couple of additional projects lined up, including a fashion show next week, and hopefully a chance to do some architectural photography. I'm also meant to be working on an album cover for someone, as a return favour for a photo shoot they did with me in November.

All that, plus finishing my college work in 12 weeks time....

Oh, and I really need to get a proper website sorted out - something I've been doing quite a bit of research into. Hopefully I'll have some more news for you on that front by end of April.

Vision On

So it's nearing the end of my first term in my second year of college. So it's time to tidy up some loose ends of work, and get it all done and dusted.

Last week, I headed down to London for Vision, a photographic event hosted every year by the British Journal of Photography, which is something of a must in the calendar of aspiring photographers.

I had also been in contact with a photographer, who came to visit our college a month ago. After a few emails back and forth, he invited me to do some work experience with him at a studio near the venue for Vision.

It was a fantastic opportunity - one too good to miss, so I jumped at the chance. I was, admittedly, a bit nervous. Lots of reasons why, mainly I feel a bit out of practice at being in a professional environment, and I also become accutely self-aware and self-conscious. Particularly as the more nervous I get, the more inclined I am to babble, and the more I really ought to find a way of stopping talking at least 30 seconds before I do.

Nerves aside, I really enjoyed it. It was great to see a professional photographer at work, even if for him its part of his regular photographic routine - it's not part of mine. He was very good actually at working with me - very polite, very good at explaining things, and friendly. And he had good taste in music, which is of course, always a bonus. There's nothing worse than being somewhere that plays really bad music, for example the time I did a temping job while I was a student, and had to listen to Wheatus. All day. While stuffing envelopes. My arms had never looked like such a mouth-watering delicacy.

After I left, I went to Vision, and met with Laura, Eilidh and James. I'd booked a portfolio review (which cost extra) and had to be there a little earlier. Unlike last year, where tickets for the portfolio review had sold out a week before Vision, this time there were still spaces left. I was pretty nervous about my portfolio review in itself. I'd planned my portfolio carefully - printing out my best images at my usual professional lab. Looking the part is something we've discussed at college, about the importance of presentation to a potential client. So I was somewhat surprised to see how others were turning up with their portfolios. One person in front of me had their portfolio in an empty photo-paper box; others came holding laptops with USBs sticking out of the side. I'll admit, I half expected some rich university art-degree students to come with leather portfolios with their name embossed on one side, and I didn't see anything of the sort.

I was nervous about my portfolio review. I knew what I really had to do, was to detatch myself somewhat from my images. Although what I had was my best work, I had to accept that any criticism wasn't to be taken as a personal criticism, but as one for advancing my work. So I was somewhat surprised when I was told little more than "it's nice!". The review was pretty poor, to be honest. My reviewer seemed more interested in discussing where I got my prints done than what I had in front of me, and only looked at the photos when we had been given a warning of our time being nearly up. My gran could have given me a better critique.

So I took the opportunity to get a second opinion. As there were spaces left in the later sessions, I was given someone else to talk to, who was much better. While the second reviewer couldn't really explain some of their feelings or opinions on my work (something that could have been helpful) they were able to give me some food for thought.

I'm not entirely convinced that the portfolio reviews were worth the extra £5, since I feel that I receive equally honest and constructive critique on a weekly basis from my classmates and tutors at college. I suppose I was aware that at college, we will receive the sort of feedback that is fitting for the work we do - student work. What I wanted to know was whether my work matched to the standards required to be hired as a professional photographer. I don't feel as if I got that from the portfolio review, which was somewhat disappointing. I don't mind people trying to encourage me by being positive, but equally I don't want people to tell me what they think I want to hear. I just want the truth, especially at this stage where I've still got the opportunity to change my work.

I also managed to get a free appointment to have my CV looked at, which was extremely constructive and useful, and I came out with lots of notes on my CV. Nobody has looked at my CV and given me feedback like that since I was 17, so I felt a little lost as to whether I'm doing the right things. This was exactly what I'd wanted - I was told what to do in terms of preparing a CV for a prospective employer. I was told what worked and what didn't work. I was told what I needed to hear, and in such a way that I didn't feel attacked or belittled or broken-hearted: it was honesty without being nasty. And it worked.

I've got a couple of extra things possibly lined up over the next few months - at least three extra projects - which I'll divulge when they transpire. For the meantime though, I'm working through all the things I have to do, and thinking about all the things that I can do to increase my chances when I leave college.

Busy bee

Life has been fairly busy in October, surprisingly so actually.

The realisation of graduating in seven and a half months time has kicked in, and I've started thinking more seriously about what life will hold after the "well done" cards have completed their exhibition on the shelf in my lounge and pats on the back have subsided.

I learned some valuable lessons about what to do and what not to do, after I graduated from university back in 2001.

Things not to do:

• Spend my entire final year "concentrating" on the end result, thereby forgetting to do anything else than plan for the finals.
• Ignoring the idea of life after finals, until I've completed my finals.
  
• Think that just because I've graduated, the potential employers will be beating down my door, the job offers will be pouring in.
• Ignore the college/university careers advice service.

Put simply, in 2001, while a lot of my peers were busying themselves by harrassing the careers advisory service, sending out CVs, covering letters, and double checking their application forms, I was "taking a break" between essays with a bout of TV. Graduating was a wonderful experience, but the summer that followed of unemployed "what now?" hell when I had no new term to look forward to was pretty horrid.

Which is why I've made the decision not to make the same mistakes this time round.

So this October, I've been:

• Participating in a Calumet/Nikon college roadshow, by attending a talk by a professional - and successful - photographer and taking photos in a three-hour challenge;
• Doing work experience at a national newspaper in Glasgow, learning a lot about what they really get up to;
• Contacted a pro photographer, and quizzed him about pretty much everything that springs to mind;
• Borrowed the college kit, so that I can take it home, experiment with it, and add another "I can use this type of camera" tick to the box of things I can do;
• Started to market myself as someone who can provide a photographic service...

I won't go into much more detail than that, because I'm all too aware of counting my chickens before they've hatched. But I'm hopeful.

One of the things I've really learned, is that people seem genuinely interested in what I can do, and it's given me a huge boost of confidence and self-belief. Of course, it might be a bit different when I'm faced with picture editors, art directors and so on, who I imagine as being a bit of a dragon's den for the would-be professional photographer.

Back to school

So its back to college time for me!

The summer has been a wonderful time to allow me the opportunity to reflect on where I've come from, and where I want to go.

It was surprising how quickly last year passed, so I've made some resolutions about what I want to try and achieve at college in the year to come.

I know what I've got lined up, work wise for college, namely the following classes:

• Advertising
• photo-journalism
• image editing 2 (read: more photoshop stuff)
• creative industries
• documentary photography
• exhibition
• fashion
• location stock
• social photography

and of course, another graded unit where I have to produce 10 images, to a brief I set myself.

Last year, I think I did pretty well. I met all the deadlines for my work and produced decent workbooks. But I didn't really experiment as much as I probably should have done, particularly playing around with medium and large format cameras. Now, in this digital age, you might wonder why that would be important. Surely everyone works in a paperless world now of digital workflow, where instead of knowing whether to process something as E6 or c41, you're thinking about working in dng or psd file formats. I suppose my concern is that when I go out there into the big wide world, my job option isn't necessarily going to be a case of walking into a bnk, getting a loan, buying all the kit I need and then waiting for everyone to come running to me with photos they want. Chances are, I'm going to start out on the assistant level and I'm thinking, that the more things I can tuck under my belt of having had experience in, the better. Put simply, I'm looking at this for ideas of skills I can still learn. If I were to fill that in now, my knowledge stands at "I can use Bowens lights, and 35mm film". Oh, and I can drive and have a car. Although I do probably fair better than most in the languages section (I knew a degree in languages would be beneficial!).

So I'm planning to play with as much kit as I possibly can. Including.... the extremely lovely Hassleblad H3D which I had a little play with earlier in the week. But that will be studio only. Out of studio, I want to try and experiment with medium and large format cameras and see what happens. I want to try more darkroom work, even though I didn't seem to gel very well with the darkroom last year. Basically, I don't want to leave college with the same ticks in the same boxes as every other graduate.

Being back at college is a bit nerve-wracking, to tell you the truth. Less about the workload - I know I can handle that, and I feel quite relaxed. More about the prospect of the future.

It's going to be a pretty long journey, to get to where I want to be, and these two years at college are only the tip of the iceberg. I know one day, when I'm finally a professional photographer, I'm going to be saying things like "oh god, I remember this one job I did that was disasterous....!". Because that always happens, in every career, there are always disasterous days, although in the more successful careers, those tend to be a little more hazy as you'll have hopefully learned from the experience and not let it happen again.

I'm going to be skint. I need to get very used to that. Even more so than I am now. I'm going to have more outgoings and I'm going to watch my income go out on the necessities before I get anything (if anything) left to play with/spend on pretty shoes. On the plus side, having quit smoking ages ago, and now no longer having to work out how much goes on the cigarettes, makes things a lot easier financially.

I'll probably have to move south. I don't want to live in London, I think I'd rather commute. I commute already - an hour into college, an hour back. I don't mind it, it's good time I get to myself, when I can think about work, or more probably read a book, fall asleep, or play my DS Lite to relax. So ideally, I'd rather live outside London and get up at some godforsaken hour, than actually live inside London. What can I say? I like hearing the sound of birds waking up when I've just had a shower, and you don't get that in cities.

Admittedly, I'm a bit impatient, and would rather skip to the end to get the long, illustrious career, but that's just me. My worst fear is losing everything; having no place to live, not being able to afford to pay bills. However, I hope I'll recognise what's going on before I get to that stage and make necessary arrangements to prevent that from happening. There's a difference between being a struggling artist, and a stupid one.

In a way, I sort of feel like I'm wandering around the edge of a swimming pool. I feel a bit self-concious; I'm waddling around; I'm nervous of the temperature and the depth, and right now I'm aware the pool is already pretty full and I'm going to have to work hard to find a spot to swim in (or drown). I'm thinking about how I'm going to get in - do I sit by the side and slide in slowly, do I use the steps, do I dive in, do I use the high dive board and do a triple sommersault....

Anyway. Hopefully, over the next 7 months (!) I'm going to try and do as much as possible to make sure that I at least get into the pool and don't make too much of an idiot of myself in public.

Fin.

I've finally reached the end of my college project. I handed in my work yesterday, on time.

While I feel partly relaxed, I think my brain is still whirring from the past two months. It may take a day or two for it to start to slow down a bit. In the meantime, I have some finishing touches to other college assignments to complete, but certainly nothing of the scale of my project.
I'm feeling quite happy with the end result. Ultimately, I know there are areas I could improve, but due to time restrictions, I couldn't continue to reshoot over and over, and I had to take a moment to decide when to stop, and when to get on with the post-production work, with the digital editing, with proofing from the printers, with getting my written work completed.

I feel quite protective at this point of my photographs from this shoot. I expect this feeling will pass, but right now, it's still too recent for me to take criticism, particularly as I know already where my weaknesses are. I rather feel I don't need them poking at with a stick right now. It's a peculiar feeling, and one I hope doesn't become too common. I don't want to become the precious photographer. I suppose though, the difference this time is that this is not an assignment set by college: this was an assignment set by me. And given I've spent two months working hard at this, and I've just handed it in, I almost want to wait for the dust to settle a little and to get a little bit of emotional and mental space between myself and this project.

I know I will feel differently and more relaxed at a not-to-distant future moment, but things are a bit fresh. It's like having a fat day and being told you look fat, or a bad hair day and being told your hair is a mess. I know my weaknesses which will hopefully benefit me as something to improve upon in the future.

I think my strongest shots are those in the bedroom and car. I'm quite proud of them, but there are still areas within those shots that I would like to improve. I'd probably get rid of Colin's wiggling hand in the car. In the bedroom scene, I'd move the pregnancy test kit box to the foreground - someone commented that it looked like my female model was rolling a cigarette. Seems a bit dramatic a scene for a cigarette being rolled, but anyway.

My weakest shot is my street print. The sky is burned out (mostly because it was pretty light and white anyway.... ) and despite digital editing, my only option really was to photoshop in another sky. And that, I felt, was cheating. Two photoshoots were used for this scene, and really, this was the best of the bunch. If I had more time, I probably could have shot this scene again, and again, and again - that would be wonderful. If I didn't have to submit exactly five images, then this would be the scene to get the chop and I would instead submit the other four images.


The lounge scene is perhaps the second weakest - this was a last minute replacement for the original, where Colin's bright red t-shirt made digital editing of skin tones absolutely impossible. Plus, it reflected onto his skin, so he just looked a bit sunburned. When I tried to edit the shots, his t-shirt looked faded. I think in future, I'd be a bit more aware about the colour of people's clothes. I was just too unhappy with the shot I was going to use - I printed it, and it just wasn't working at all. The shot I've used here instead is much better in terms of detail, particularly when viewed on a full size 20x15 print. It's also a bit calmer - there's no bright red blob which demands attention.

The image that seems to fit therefore, into the middle of all this favouritism, is the park scene. Up close, I'm pleased with the colour, lighting and detail. I have one tiny frustration though - Colin's leg. As it's bent under his bottom, he kind of looks like he's amputated from the knee down. I heard someone suggest this about someone else's photograph, and when I looked at my own... well, it's been niggling me ever since!

Overall though, I'm quite pleased with the work I have done over the past few months. I know I've worked hard on this project - and I think I've even surprised myself at how dedicated and passionate I've felt about it. I know there is still room for improvement and things to learn - otherwise this wouldn't be a two year course (I'm still in my first year). It's been tough, but I've found the experience to be exciting. I can't imagine I'll have such creative freedom, time, and access to materials like this very often when I graduate and start working. At this point, I used the opportunity to create my dream project - and I'm so pleased I did that. For the past two months, I've felt quite consumed by this project. And I know what I handed in was my hardest work, and that I have tried my absolute best with this. Whatever mark I get, I know I have earned every single point.

I've learned a lot about myself too. I've learned that planning and time management have benefited me a great deal - certainly I wasn't panicking about how long left I had until my deadline. It's also meant that during the shoots I've had time to have some fun, and enjoy it - to look up from the camera rather than be consumed by worrying. I've become increasingly confident - my last two shoots I think produced the best images because of that confidence. I don't think it was there when I did my first two shoots, and I think that is evident. Given it's my first staged photography shooting project, I think it was bound to be a bit nerve wracking. Hopefully next year, when I have to do a ten-image series, then I'll be able to cut out the first-shoot-nerves.

And so, to a few thanks. I've got to thank Mark and Stew, for letting me invade their flat twice, and fill it with big softboxes and lighting kit. Laura, for trusting me with her bedroom and her keys while she was at a fashion show. Eilidh and James, for being on the ball, keeping me calm and sane and being excellent and responsive assistants.

But my biggest thanks go to my models, Olivia and Colin. Both of them were wonderful - they showed up for each shoot; they were committed to the project from the start; they were extremely agreeable to what I wanted, and neither have had any previous acting or modeling experience. They were both very patient, and made the whole experience a lot of fun. The hardest part was trying to get them to portray an expression other than laughter, simply because they just had the most amusing conversations.

And finally, thanks to everyone who offered me critique, thoughts, ideas, and so on throughout the process when I needed it.