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Photographer : Steve Mccurry .

- Steve Mccurry is an american photographer born in 1950, and he is best known for his photojournalism and editorial photography work. He is also best known for creating these images posted above, the ‘Afghan girl’ in 1984. These images appeared in the National Geographic magazine. 

The image is of a young woman with green eyes in a red headscarf looking intensely at the camera. The image has been likened to Leonardo De Vinci’s  painting of the Mona Lisa, and has been called "the First World's Third World Mona Lisa. The image became "emblematic" of "refugee girl/woman located in some distant camp deserving of the compassion of the Western viewer. 

The picture of the girl was taken when she was living in Nasir Bagh refugee camp in Pakistan during the Soviet occupation in Pakistan. 

I think these photo is powerful for many reasons. First, it’s overall composition, from color, to form to subject etc. The image is very powerful because of how the subject is looking intensely in the camera, with a very apparent emotions on her face that can convey several messages to the audience. She has the ability to make us stare at the picture, so we could try to understand her more and understand what she is trying to convey to us, so we could interpret everything she means and relate in our own way. Also, the second thing is the time in which this image was taken, which was during a soviet occupation in Pakistan. So, when people view an image of this girl at the time of the struggle that her country is going through, we begin to relate to her more and we get super emotional and intensified of what she is feeling or going through at that moment.

I think Steve Mccurry was able to capture a powerful portrait of a powerful subject at a time of a great and huge importance in history time. Thus, that is why I think this picture created a buzz and is considered so huge now in the world of photography.

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Photographer : Cindy Sherman.

She is an american photographer and film director. She was born in 1954 in New Jersey, U.S. She is most famous for capturing some of the best conceptual portraits. So, that means that her portraits represent a certain idea and concept. Her pictures are not just ones of different subjects, but they are pictures that illustrate an idea and hold a lot of meanings behind them. 

The idea behind her ‘clown portraits’ that are posted above is that she is trying to show two sides to a story. That is to say, she wants people to look at these clown pictures and feel like they could see two things, the ugly or sad side of these clowns plus the happy and cheerful side they portray and bring to the viewers. For her, clowns usually make people happy, cheerful etc. But, as much as they bring laughter, cheer, and happiness to people, there is an ugly and sad side behind them that people might not always see. So, these pictures are representative of that. They are representative of how everything can have a ‘good and bad side’ or a ‘happy and a side side’ etc. She thinks that clowns are sad but they are always hysterically happy. So, they have characteristics inside of them that contradict each other. 

When asked about this project, she said ‘’you could be painted to look like you’re happy and still look like you’re sad underneath, or the opposite too.’’ She also thinks that clowns are a mask that hides what is underneath. It is a mask that hides the true emotions that might be emotions of total sadness that we might not realize. 

When I saw these portraits of the clowns at first, I didn’t really understand them or know what they truly mean. I just thought they are funny and weird looking clowns in a form of portraits, but then as I read more of the message that Sherman intended to present these images, I understood way more. I felt like I related alot to the concept behind them, and the intense meaning behind each and every image. That is what conceptual images deliver to its audiences, which is a much deeper look to things rather than just a literal meaning.  

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SELFIEVASION PROJECT 5

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SELFIEVASION PROJECT 4

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SELFIEVASION PROJECT 2

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SELFIEVASION PROJECT 1

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FINAL PHOTOGRAPHY PRODUCT. #hugerollup

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PRODUCTION AND PRINTING PROCESS for Final Project at CIC.

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SelfieVasion- Final project

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Is she that obsessed?

A selfie taken of her with someone through the reflection of the light of a car. Selfies have become an obsessive act that has reached a level beyond the normal to some people. People snap selfies not just everywhere and all the time, but also in some of the weirdest ways. Selfies are all about you. So, have we become that self-obsessed to the level that we can over-snap ourselves doing nearly anything or nothing? Maybe! #selvasion

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SELFIE PROJECT

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/couple-snaps-photos-118-manhattan-subway-stops-article-1.1397707

A selfie photography project of couple snappping many selfies in Manhattan’s subway station. 

This couple roamed around 118 metro stops in Manhattan’s subway station, to take a selfie in each stop. In 9 hours, they snapped 118 pictures of them in every stop.They only had 10 seconds between each stop to snap pictures of themselves posing in some certain way. 

The whole purpose of their project was to showcase the idea of ‘documentation’ and to show people a series of their pictures of a journey that they chose to go on. Subways for them are kind of a waste of their time because of how much time they spend there, going from a place to another. They have to spend hours each day in the metros because of how time-consuming and crowded it is usually every single day. 

So, they chose one day to document a full day (exaggerated day) of them visiting every stop in the subway, and so they did that in 9 hours. 

Selfies for them was an escape of the boredom they were going through, and was the easiest and fastest tool for documentation of this type of project. 

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My experience with Photo Essay VS Photo Series...

I think both visual approaches in both a photo essay and photo series is very differently interesting.

- Photo essay: I felt like the photo essay was more of the ‘camera itself and its overall technicalities and positioning’ . The camera doesn’t move, and I had to follow the same angle to create an overall consistent visual approach in all the images. It overall creates visually appealing photographs, which are completely consistent. However, since, the camera does not move a lot, it hasn’t given me the freedom to move around a lot and experiment with different angles, which I like way more. 

- Photo series: I enjoyed the photo series way more because of how I get to experiment photographing my subject and overall topic from different angles and perspectives. Also, each picture in the series needed to be photographed in a certain angle, and so having the freedom to play with angles is really important, so you could later on the desired effect you want. You want each picture to stand on its own, and have its own perspective, angle and overall look. So, a photo series allows you to do so. The action in the photo series is the story itself and the subject, so you get to move a lot, and play with the camera totally freely. 

- They are both different visual approaches in photography, and I think each approach should be used according to the topic and the subject you are photographing.

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Assignment 3:-

Photo series-

This photo series is about the dangers of smoking. The cigarettes in the images are a representation of human beings’ body parts (such as lungs), while the ‘smoke’ part can be considered the ‘human overall health’, What I intended to show in these images was how people’s health is being completely deteriorated because of a habit like ‘smoking.’

Instead of picturing people smoking to show the negative effects of smoking, I chose to picture the main subject of smoking, which is the cigarette itself. I think that the whole process of lighting up a cigarette all the way to turning it down and blowing it off in the snuffer is exactly the same the same process that goes into any smoker’s body as he/she continuously use smoking as their habit. 

To explain more clearly, let’s take a look at the images, from top to bottom. The first picture starts with a cute cigarette box full of the white and bright covered up cigarettes. And so, the first pictures symbolizes a human being’s clean health before smoking become part of his/ her everyday life. Their lungs are completely clean and are not damaged in any way possible. Also, the color white is a symbolic meaning of that ‘pureness’ and ‘cleanness’. And so, that is how the cigarettes look before they are lit up, and how smokers are before they start getting into smoking (that they were completely clean and healthy). The same thing goes for the second picture, which also showcases how white and fresh cigarettes seem from the outside before they get lit up by a lighter. 

Then, in the third picture, the cigarette gets lit up, and the smokes starts blowing all over the place. The white covered part is still there, but it starting to fade away because of the smoke that is completely taking over. So, that is also like smokers, in that, the beginning, their health is still clean and all, but is starting to move onto a kind of negative direction, and is beginning to deteriorate in some way. 

Then, we move to the fourth, fifth and sixth pictures where the cigarette is being almost completed damaged of all the smoke, and all the white parts are becoming somehow non-existing. Also, ashes are building more and more as the cigarette is being blow into more and more with time. That is to say, as smokers continue to smoke more and more, their lungs and health are getting completely damaged exactly like the cigarette, and it becomes hard to find any residue of the purity of the health. The ashes that are being scattered everywhere symbolizes how a smoker’s health is being damaged in every way possible, not only lungs, but also other organs of the body. 

Lastly, the seventh picture which is completely damaged and dead cigarettes with their ashes all lied down all over them. The cigarettes are broken, damaged, torn and can no way be repaired. That is what exactly happens to a human’s health and particularly their lungs because of smoking! A human’s health becomes completely damaged and unrepairable! 

In conclusion, my project aims to show a strong message of smoking in a very different way. Because, I did realize very recently that the process of smoking a cigarette from start to end is exactly the same process of a smoker’s health from start to end. (From being completely pure, fresh, and healthy to damaged, deteriorated and unrepairable)  

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Assignment 3:- 

Photo Essay

- When you first take a look at these pictures, you might think to yourself ‘What is this?’ or ‘What are these pictures saying’, and ‘Is there really a meaning behind it.’ My answer to all of that is yes, because the meaning behind this photo essay is a very strong one. I like to call this photo essay ‘’THE OVER 100 AND THE UNDER 10′. 

If you still don’t get it, allow me to explain further. What I was intending to showcase in this photo essay is the ‘luxury/ wants VS basic/ needs’. That is to say, these 6 photographs are of desserts  that are either over 100 pounds or under 10 pounds. They are all desserts, and they all super tasty, but the price tag of them and the place in which they are sold says a lot more about these desserts than their outside look. 

Not everyone can afford to buy the luxurious and the very pretty desserts we see everywhere around us in shops. They are very attractive, presentable and tasty, but their price tag is out of the ordinary to a lot of people. So, even if some people are craving these type of desserts, which are shown in the first three pictures, they can’t afford to buy them. Whereas, in the bottom three pictures are desserts that are sold in a very normal to basic supermarket, and they all are under 10 pounds. They are super affordable and they taste pretty good as well. 

Someone who can afford to buy any dessert can take a look at all these pictures and feel like they can always have the ‘choice’ to purchase any of them at  any time because they have the ‘money’ for it. While, the rest of the people who are considered of lower classes, do not have the same ‘choice’ . They can only think of buying any of the three bottom pictures, since they are the most affordable ones. 

So, the aim of the whole pictures was to show a concept that is far deeper than what the pictures show, which is how some people can have the freedom of choice at all times, while others have only a limited amount of freedom and choice at times. 

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Diary #8 4/04/2017 Who is that? Who's face is on these two animals? That's me! Yup that's me with my face photoshopped inside of these two filters. Selfies are all about fun, and so when I get to play more often with selfies in a more creative and filtered way, I will go for it! #selfielove

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Diary #7 30/03/2017 A weekend selfie with two of my closest friends before we went and grabbed our burger order from the burger truck behind us! #selfielove

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Diary #6

4/04/2017

Here are two selfies I captured today at work, one while I am grabbing my morning coffee and the other as I am working on a current project for the company!

#selfielove