Final book design

I chose a standard landscape sized book because most of my photos are landscape and would fit nicer into this that a portrait one. I didn't want a huge book, I Wanted something people would be able to carry around with them but I didn't want a tiny one because I'd lose the personer of the whole thing. I decided to go with the idea of showing a book which 'has lost its child-like qualities' so I wouldn't describe the overall product as boring but it is plain, simple, neat, sophisticated and professional.

The cover of my book, I went for a hard cover as these are the books I like the best, I find them easier to manage and better to look at. I chose my strongest image to go on the front and back of the book.

The title is referring to the evident swap of places of me and my brother in the images, I become him, he becomes me. The title also suggests a close bond, almost a 'what mine is yours' vibe. 'From me to you' is a nice friendly gesture which ties in well with the whole theme of relationship, friendship, interraction and bonding. 

Book design ideas

I've had a few idea about how I want my book to look, I know I don't want a massive book, I think I'm heading towards a standard landscape. My first idea is to have to book hold child-like characteristics as this is what I'm kind of promoting in a way, I could use lots of bright, bold colours, big writing and a smallish size. Erwin Wurms book 'The artist who swallowed the world' influenced me to get this idea, I like the cushioned front and back cover and the bright pink with contrasting green colouring.

Another Idea I have is to go the opposite of the first idea and actually make the book like more sophisticated. The risk with going against my first book design idea is that the second one may look boring and dull whereas I know the first one would be much more eye catching. This idea does have its positives though, the plain, bold and tidy finish would resemble that of 'what we're more like after losing our child-like characteistcs.' The book would itself show a loss in child like characteristics.

My third idea is to start the book off with the first idea and have the last few pages and the back cover as the second idea to show the change in loss of characteristics as you read on but the problem with this is it would be very very perculier, I'd want people to take my book seriously and this idea as well as the first one might not allow people to do so.

Final images

I went onto look back at our old family images, at this point I didn't know this was the route I was going to take for my book, I was doing it purely for entertainment purposes. After my trip down memory lane I realised how much different me and my brother were from when we were younger to now; almost all of our characteristics had changed. I went from a young, confident, centre of attention, loving, friends with everyone child to a wiser, more cautious, shy young adult. My brother seemed to show signs in the older images of what I'm like now, it was as though the 'me now' is like the 'younger my brother' and the 'him now' is the 'younger me then'. I found this contrast very interesting and it allowed me to think up lots of ideas surrounding the changing characteristics and old family photos.

I started to re-create these family images by getting the old photos and re-creating them same situations but how we would act now in them situations to show the change in how we react and are. I took my images to a feedback session but came back with a new outlook on what I wanted to portray. My photos didn't have a strong enough connection with the old images, they needed to portray a sense of awkwardness and look more like the older images I was re-creating. I went away and had a think and got a new idea, my new idea was to have me and my brother be the focus but rather than us act out the actions of our younger selves in the old photos, I had us swap places so I was portraying my young brother and he was portraying my young self. Switching us around created a lot of awkwardness, not only did we have to re-create these already 'too close for comfort' poses but now we had to do them by being the other person.

This was the first photo I produced. The photo on the top is of me and my brother when we've just got out of bed, you can see the darkness and tiredness in our eyes. To re-create this photo me and my brother got up at 7:00am and took the photo within minutes to capture the look of tiredness. Jordan had to put his arm around me and although we are very close, we don't hug or anything so this was very awkward for both me and him. No awkwardness is present within the first image because at that age kids don't feel it. The awkwardness is captured in the second image through the lack of contact made by my brothers arm as well as our faces and how we aren't leaning on one another. I think the awkwardness is the most important thing, it makes the photo interesting, it gives it meaning.

By switching the re-creation rolls between me and my brother I felt as though it not only portrayed how our rolls have swapped from then to now but also it gave us a chance to see how we were. Me pretending to be my brother allowed me to see him pretending to be me, it gave me a sense of knowing of what I was like then through both my eyes and my brothers. 

Initial Images

My first lot of images were to show how we'd changed from when we were younger by re-creating photos from our childhood, I'd have my model stand in a similar place to the image and act as close to the old image as they can but allowing them to act out how they felt about it and show the changes within themselves.

This was the first image I took. I wanted to show the difference between my brother then and now, not only did I want to show the more obvious physical differences though but I wanted to capture the less visable changes to his personality and characteristics. In the old photo my brother is clearly smiling but the second one, he is not, this possibly shows a lack of interest to the camera, a sense of uncomfortableness or simply just that he wasn't particularly happy at that time. When I asked him if I could take a photo of him, it took quite a bit of convincing... One thing I did find very interesting was how he asked me to photoshop his face as he is slightly paranoid about a couple of freckles on his cheek. The younger Jordan wouldn't have cared what he looked like but the older Jordan does!

This was my second image. The two photos show birthday parties. The first one is the younger birthday party and the second one, a more recent one. I was intrigued to see how all of the personalities in the first image come out through body language and facial expressions but the second image our personalities shing through by the choice of costume we wore on that night; you have the bodd in the middle, the 'im not dressin up' kind on the left, the drunken go crazy red guy near the top right corner and the 'lack of clothing kitty' on the bottom right.

So after doing these images I attended a feedback session with my peers and they didn't seem to like them very much. I was told I needed a better connection with the old images to the new ones and I wasn't capturing that sense of awkwardness which my photos needed. I went home and got my thinking cap on!

Trish Morrissey - Seven Years

Trish Morrissey is a London based photographer. I came across one series of works called 'Seven Years' for this Morrissey looked back at her family album and re-created some of the photos using her and her sister. She understood the fact that everybodies family albums are the same, a lot of photos of the siblings stood side by side. Morrissey in a way is mocking this mutual album keeping through the re-creations. Her photos have a sense of awkwardness, I wanted this same awkwardness in my images.

Feedback

My feedback session for both of my ideas proved slightly disappointing but still good in a way. The idea which was more excited about was dismissed right away after them hearing about the idea of the loss of characteristics from childhood idea. I wasn't disheartened by the lack of enthusiasm off my peers towards the germ idea but still at the same time I didn't feel incredibly passionate about the idea which they all seemed to love. I went with my peers and decided to do the loss of characteristics idea rather the germ one because I thought I could make it into something I'd like just as much as them.