ericcwhite

[ericcwhite]

What next

Now that the final work for my degree has been forwarded for assessment, its time for me to continue with my work on the book project. With the summer approaching there will be plenty of opportunities to venture out to the many classic bike shows and rallies that are being held this summer and experiment more with my lens baby system. This system has become a partial success over the past few months, but still needs more practice to achieve more creative images. The first thing I will be doing is to research more into what creative images I can produce that relate to the classic bike scene, this will give me the foundations to continue and progress within my creative style. Motorcycle workshops are another subject I will be working on, in particular workshops that have that old school look to them, so hopefully I can gather some contacts throughout this year that are interested and willing to let me document the places these enthusiasts work in while maintaining their vintage machines. Having just purchased a 5 x 4 technical camera, I was thinking that maybe I can use this to photograph some of these old machines and produce some high-quality images for print sales. For this to be successful there would have to be some initial planning on what bikes will be available and also a location suitable for such images, in particular locations that have a timeless feel to them and give the impression of a vintage look to the final image. So, as you can see there are certainly plenty of options available to myself in continuing with the classic bike scene project as well as splitting the subject matter into separate projects of themselves, for instance classic vintage bikes, scooters and modern custom-built machines. Then once I am satisfied with a sufficient number of images for the book, the next step will be to publish my work.

[ericcwhite]

Essay draft

Academic writing is not my favourite activity, but alas it needs to be done and I need to put together an essay with the right references, this seems to be what I am concentrating on more and also when I’m taking quotes or words from a journal or book I try to include my own words but still put the reference name, date and page number if required just in case. I’ve also found choosing words then looking in the thesaurus for better academic ones, so it looks more impressive.

Well at the moment I’ve completed the draft of my essay, I found it easier to concentrate on small sections of about 500 words than the whole piece, this way I’m not having to think about two many aspects of the essay.

I still need to make adjustments so hopefully now my book on the project module is complete ready to print through blurb I should have the essay finished a week before the deadline. Oh and there is the 10 or 12 images to write about, but again this might take a couple of nights.

So I am getting there, but I’ll be glad when the essay has been completed. Then as we have about five weeks for the project deadline I can work on the website.

[ericcwhite]

Annotated Bibliography and my Evaluation

Now that I’ve finished the annotated bibliography, it’s time to share my experiences. Most of my reading sources have been in the form of books as I find the information in them particularly easier to read and digest the important parts of the text that I will be writing about in my degree essay. To compliment this, I’ve obtained some good analytical and critical journals which in some cases give another view to what has been written by the authors of the books. The books I feel have given me the best inspirational sources for, really because of the images that help tell the narrative within the pages and this makes it easier when reading a particular book, you have a mental image of the subject matter, in this case the Mods and Rockers. The most challenging aspects of this bibliographic research is being able to find journals that are written about the photography and photographers that documented the mod and rocker culture during the fifties and sixties. Now that the bibliography is in place and I have some good references to work with, my goals are to have a documented historical and contemporary view on the lifestyles of the mods and rockers from their origins in the forties to the enthusiasts of today who are reliving the experience of those fifty or sixty years before them. Having put together this annotated bibliography around the subject of the Mods Rockers, peer feedback has been positive if not a bit thin, but this could be down to everyone being busy trying to put together their own pieces of work. My tutor has been very helpful even at times when she may have been getting frustrated with me when I was not quite understanding the full pictures when it comes to my source requirements, but despite some hic-cups near the end I feel her support has brought me through this process and I think the work although not perfect, but suitable for taking forward into the next stage of this process, the essay.

[ericcwhite]

Research into the mods and rockers subculture

Since my last blog, I have been busy trying to formulate a question or questions for my essay on the mods and rockers subculture, I’ve decided to combine two questions to formulate my research. The two questions are firstly an evaluation Question: To what extent did the confrontation between mods and rockers damage the motorcycle scene through documented imagery?. This question within my research will try to evaluate how much the confrontation between these two groups have damaged the reputation of motorcyclist since the events in 1964, this I can identify with my own experiences during the late nineteen seventies and early eighties as motorcycling then was regarded as a hobby for troublesome individuals. The second Question: What were the circumstances that caused the rivalry between the mods and rockers and how did photography contributed to this?. This will look into the evolution of these two groups and identify why a new generation of young people rebelled against new reforms and old traditions within society and how journalists and photographers professional or amateur documented these changes. Work on my degree project has been continuing quite steadily over the past couple of weeks, most of the events and meetings have been quite small apart from the last one at popham airfield where there was a large gathering of vintage motorcycles. Unfortunately, subject matter in the form of motorcyclist dressed in fifties attire was pretty slim and opportunities to get creative and interesting period shots were difficult to achieve. Fortunately, there is a large gathering of scooters on the isle of Wight over the august bank holiday for the international scooter rally supposedly the largest in the world, so opportunities for good shots and also conversations with mods that were around during the sixties might generate some interesting stories of that period and what it was like to be a mod confronting the rockers.

[ericcwhite]

Topics,Themes and Questions

Motorcycling is a passionate hobby of mine especially the classic bike scene, whether that be motorcycles or scooters, so having this enthusiasm for such machines is something I intend to use as a topic for my practical degree project and relate this to my written work within my dissertation. This subject is something I would like to explore more thoroughly especially the historical and cultural elements of the motorcycle scene, admittedly this involves many aspects and to be able to write about a particular aspect of this scene requires me to break these down into smaller sections and concentrate on those that initially interest me the most. My initial three themes were related to different periods of the motorcycling scene, the first was to investigate the glory years of British motorcycling manufacturing industry and how we were able to produce some of the most desirable machines on the market, then there was the manufacturing decline of the British motorcycle because of the increasing development of the Japanese market creating more reliable and cheaper machines. The final idea was how enthusiasts of classic British motorcycles were investing money into these classics to compensate for low interest rates offered by the banks and by purchasing such machines this became a profitable way of investing your money along with classic cars. After a while I realised that researching these themes would be difficult to relate them to my photography practice, so after some discussion with my tutor I decided to take a different route and this would be the study of the culture of the mods and rockers and how photographers documented the rise of these two motorcycling groups, and why there was so much rivalry and crime associated with them. This new approach to my topic theme was also something my peers agreed with and from their feedback on the forums, satisfied me that this was the best way to take this topic forward, not only this, but also it would be easier for me to put this into the same contexts as my practical photography work. The goal now with writing this essay is to research and study the history and culture of the mods and rockers and their philosophy behind their organizations and understand when these groups started out, how they became the scourge of society during the sixties and why the general public viewed and associated law abiding motorcyclists with crime within the documented photography and photographers during this period. The next stage with this essay is to identify a question, that will work with the theme I have chosen, at the moment I have three possible questions that need to be investigated more and eventually one will used as a starting point to my essay.

[ericcwhite]

[ericcwhite]

Experimenting with Theme Ideas

It’s time to start experimenting with theme ideas in the contexts of the classic motorcycle scene, this will be the subject of my final degree project. I’ve started by working on the motorcycle workshop aspects of this project as I feel this could be the most difficult subject to document purely because I need to access a selection of motorcycle workshops that people own and use as a hobby, or the more professional workshops that enthusiasts use to work on machines as a profession. Most of my research on this subject as been through trawling the internet for images, and the best sources have been through image searches using “Pinterest” this is one such result https://uk.pinterest.com/lhalcreative/bike-garage-shed-workshop-man-cave-interiors-and-s/?lp=true. Another source as been the motorcycle magazine “Built” http://www.builtmag.co.uk/. Although not aimed at the classic old motorcycles, but the new wave of custom built machines being designed and built in small volumes in largely small workshops around the country. Now that I’ve completed my initial research, I’ve started taking images within my own workshop using myself as an experimental subject to try different ideas for documenting someone within their working or hobby environment. The two shots I’ve included within this blog to demonstrate my ideas so far include one image of the general workshop taken at a low angle and the other of myself within this environment using a tripod and self timer set to ten seconds, the bike and workshop only, the camera setting was F4.5 1/30th ISO 1600 12mm Ring Flash, and the self-portrait was F8 1/8th ISO 100 12mm No Flash. To enhance the images further and to give them a grittier feel and bring the detail out of the workshop environment I used the Color Efex Pro 2 photoshop plugin set to detail enhancer. For this experiment using a combination of the ring flash and natural light, and a subtle use of photoshop, I feel this has been successful and will be something to continue with while obtaining images of other workshops, and also it keeps everything simple.

[ericcwhite]

Introduction

My name is Eric c White, I’ve been interested in photography since the mid-seventies after viewing some photography taken by my grandfather during the first world war, also my father was a keen amateur and documented activities he and friends were involved with since the late forties’. My first venture into photography started with the use of a Russian zenith camera that taught me how to manually control the exposures, this developed into buying a Minolta SLR camera system. During the early nineties, I embarked on a o level course at college and culminating four years later with a City & Guilds qualification. From this I started taking on wedding, portrait and some commercial work alongside working for a photography company known as South West Photo Mounts, that specialised in photographic presentation materials and equipment. During the emergence of digital photography from analogue, I must admit I became a little disillusioned with the photography scene and felt the need for a professional well experienced photographer was becoming a thing of the past along with film. So, after some discussions with friends who wandered what I would do with all the equipment and the studio I built in the back garden, one of these friends who had embarked on a art degree at Bournemouth art college suggested that I would benefit from some more training that would not only inspire me to get involved back into photography, but also show me what new developments were out there for me to explore and find another direction for my photography interests. Now after almost four years I am getting to the end of my BA honours photography degree, and in this time, I have found a lot of inspirational ideas for me to explore and more importantly renew my interest in photography as a whole. So, over the next six months I will be sharing my experiences during the final part of my degree and hopefully inspire other people to take on this challenge and find an interest in photography. In this first post I have included some short reflective notes on my photography, inspirations and where I want to take my photography interests. Is there a particular issue that is important to you or that causes you difficulties? • With documentary photography, there are particular issues that interest, or annoy me most of these are related to general life issues that are personal to me and can affect my future or wellbeing. • There are some topics that interest me, as a photography practitioner, the main one is classic motorcycles and this is a subject that is dear to my heart not only being involved with this subject, but also documenting aspects of the classic bike scene. • The other is the ghost towns in and around the western states of America, this is a subject that intrigues me and how some of these places have been re populated over the last fifty years into small communities who not only want to save these places, but to share the history of what these places were before they were abandoned. Are there examples of work by other photographers or visual artists that can be argued to have addressed this issue/problem? • At the moment, I can’t think of any photographer or visual artists that has addressed this issue/problem, but there is the photographer Martin Parr who’s work has inspired me to search out ideas that would take my photography to a new level. • Documentary and street photography are two genres that inspire my work at this time in my life, I enjoy reading articles relating to documentary/street photography and finding out ways of developing my own work in the themes, ideas and creative works that I find during my research.