Subcultures - Elderly People

Subcultures Evaluation

The aim of this assignment is to visually document a subculture and in the end produce a set of 9-12 photographs that really captures the chosen subculture. I could not think of one specific subculture that I wanted to document so I chose to create a mind map to help me break cultures into all types of subcultures. I started of with categories such as Hobbies, Jobs, Lifestyle, Fans, Style, Age and from these starting points I went on to discover Giggers, Football Fans and Elderly People. These are just a few that caught my eye out of a list of subcultures, so I chose to look more in depth into these three subcultures.

After creating a mind map and looking more in depth into certain subcultures I chose to study other photographers work and look into what they document and what style they document in. I chose Jane Bown, Bruce Davidson and Phil Borges to research so I could gain some influence and ideas from. From all of them I like the matter and meaning behind the documentary as I think they portrayed their own projects in unique ways. Mainly I enjoyed Jane Bown’s work as her style was black and white but with a high contrast, which made her subject’s skin very eye catching. This was due to the contrast making the person look stronger and bolder because of the light on sections of their face.

Once I had researched into other photographers and had now gained a better understanding in subcultures, I wrote a proposal for my assignment as I had chosen to base my documentary on Elderly People. I chose to capture how they live their daily lives and decided to portray their life in two different ways, depending on whether or not they live a busy life or a relaxed life. If their life was busy I would show it in a fun colourful way but if their life was relaxed I would show it in a sad and dull way by using black and white imagery.

Now I had better structure and control over the assignment I decided to do a photo shoot so then I could gain feedback on how I am capturing the Elderly People Subculture. My plan is to try and create a similar style to Jane Bown with a black and white theme as the photo shoot shows the Elderly People in a relaxed way. I shot my first photo shoot in black and white hoping to capture the style but they didn’t turn out how I wanted them to. I gathered feedback to help capture them how I wanted them to come out like, I got told that if I take the images in colour instead of black and white I would be able to colour select the image.

From my photo shoots I collected key images that stood out and wrote about why they stood out to me as I was going to develop them into final pieces for my project. I then chose 12 images that I wanted to develop which were images from both photo shoots and use them as my final pieces. I showed a visual diary of my images as I also documented how I create the final image.

I finally presented my work in a symbolic way by attaching my images to tags and hanging them on up and down shaped wire to help show that life is not just one straight course as you have good times and bad times. To me my final pieces show a journey and contrast of life between the view and the photographs, which are the meaning I want to come through, through my work.

I enjoyed this project and found it very interesting, as I like documenting another age in life that I have yet to come up to and discover my self. It was an easy in my personal opinion as I found that my ideas came quick to how I wanted to do my assignment. I think I have completed it to the best of my abilities and done as much as I could do for the assignment.

My project was about the capturing a subculture and I decided to document elderly people, as they are a group of their own in their age range. I chose to capture the sad and lonely side of being elderly in life but also show how she is content with it.