www.1in10arecocks.com

oh mez, what have you started.

A few weeks back our tutor Mez linked a website on her twitter feed called www.chatroulette.com. if you have not tried this, i suggest you do before you read on. Otherwise you'll not have the same twisted view on reality that i now hold very close.

I instantly called it like i saw it and responded on twitter with a simple 'i wish i could see their hands at all times' stab at the clear masturbation going on over the camera feed. However, having linked this over Facebook. Two very bored friends of mine have done some actual scientific research. The first found out that if your female and you say your 14, 80% of the guys on the website become more sexually explicit, the other a male canvased until he had found 50 males. In this time he found 6 females and was greeted with 12 counts of male genitalia on entry. We have had unconfirmed reports of sightings of both Boba-Fett and an all girl orgy, however there is no screen grab proof to either at this point. Im sure the research will continue and this will rapidly become an internet fad. Apparently they've reviewed it for the guardian website too.

All hail the marching cock army!

Guardian blogs;

chatroulette-webcam-voyeur-site

zoe-williams-chatroulette

location scouting and theory craft

Spent the day location scouting for places we can apply the pre Raphael-ite paintings I've chosen to attempt to replicate for the picbod# module and i've come away with a degree of success. Not as much as i was hoping for, but then again, there's only so much you can do in late winter when your relying on greenery. I also have had the question of colour or black and white come up and i need to address that a.s.a.p.

Firstly, here are the images im going to try and modernise...


(info i'll fill out in a few on each image)

These images have in part been chosen because i think they best suit the model i have for them and in part because there locations are easily replaceable. But also because the clothing all has one simple characteristic, it flows. Tomorrow i will find an outfit to use for this, as its Rosie it'll probably end up being tie dye or hippyish to look at, but long and flowing. 

Ive whacked on my flickr account (which you can get to on the right) the location shots ive taken for these images and now i just need to prey the weather holds out for me so i can get these images done in time. 

I've whacked a colour one on there and some black and white ones. Something i want to talk through with jonathan tomorrow is whether he thinks i should go digital+colour+professional printing. Colour film+professional printing or monochrome film and print myself. I've found a few places who's quality seem good enough and their lead times are around 48hrs. So no real pressure there. 

Im still passing masonry, but instead of breeze-blocks im down to rubble. 

In Depth, The Tom hunter tribute project.

For the picbod# module, i wanted to study my relationship with my partner. However, for various reasons im at a point now where im getting very close to breaking point and im still not happy with the images we have created. A major problem for me is my composition in the images, they dont feel striking enough or dont explore the environment correctly. They say it takes a photographer 4 years to find their eye for such problems and if thats the case ive still got a little over 2 years still to go before i find mine. However i've only got 2 weeks left to produce and prepare an image and turn it into a digital and analogue artefact that can be submitted to the gallery show titled picturing the body.

I also have to consider cost and manufacturing time. If i want to make a book for example, i'd need to submit it for printing by mid week at the latest. For top quality digital prints i have 1 week before i need to submit images to a professional print company and i also need to factor in cost. So, being realistic im limited to two options. Either digital prints like above, or shoot on medium format film and do the printing myself. I can say now without any worry i'll be doing the latter. There is a freedom when you make your own prints. You have so much control on tone and contrast at such a late stage that a lot of developing can still be done to the work.

Think im getting ahead of myself? Me too. Should probably tell you my idea whilst were here......

I, in a panicked state decided to go back over the past 12 months and look at the photographers i've met or spoken to and the work i'd done in my own time as well as whilst at university. I was very concerned about my composition and post production and wanted to address both issues. As i flicked through my notes i came across Tom Hunter. For those not familiar with Tom's work go here...

toms work is brilliant and i enjoy it for many reasons. However for the inspiration tied to this module we only need to reference one image. This is Tom's version of 'the lady in the lake' a highly famous pre-raphaelite painting. He used the image as the basis of his composition and then brought it into his own neighbourhood. He used modern clothing and didn't fear to leave in the original skyline.

I considered this... Could i apply the same basic framework and find some paintings that i feel could also be used to represent my partner in some way? Could we pick a few paintings and have a go at replicating them ourselves, in my style. Not Toms, to give the work at least a flavour of originality?


We had a good look though quite a few genre's of painters and movements and have settled on 4-5 images as our start point. Im not promising i'll stick to them, more that they will form the basis of a simple exploratory shoot this afternoon when the sun's a bit lower in the sky. I also know i wont get the final images today. That will have to wait till wednesday, as i dont have a medium format camera here right now and i want a bit more control over what my model's wearing than just the clothes she'll turn up in. But the really important part of this is that, with maybe 4-5 days to spare i finally have an idea im happy with. I now know what im doing and what im working towards. I know that im going to shoot these images and that im going to make them work. They will then be a series of 3-4 prints, that i will develop and print myself and frame ready for the exhibition. I need to do a fair amount more in my sketchbook and ive written some critical essays on the photographer's i've looked at to this point that need tweaking and then sticking in, but i feel for the first time like ive got this under control. Which is nice... trust me.

QR codes and staying cutting edge

This odd assembly of pixels, if read with the correct device, will lead you to my website. Im reliably informed by wikipedia that the two dimensional bar-code was created by japanese corporation       Denso-Wave in 1994. The 'QR' is derived from 'quick response' and the code acts as a gateway for further information.

I remember years ago, when these first came out they, like bar-codes were used in toys for kids. I digital top trumps style set of games where opponents would scan in their favourite cards so the stats could generate a winner. With the spread of camera technology and augmented reality i can see matrix codes of all styles spreading world-wide quite rapidly.

'What is augmented reality?'






Above is an example of the technology already being implemented into iphones and blackberry's world-wide and fully augmented reality is current tech, that just requires a role-out. Personally i think its fantastic. Never again will i get lost, or bored with an application such as this. Although the 'app' shown above only works the housing market, there are apps for finding everything and i would imagine that eventually they'll be like 'rss' feeds brought to a centrally controlled browser where you subscribe the feeds that interest you. Examples would be art gallery's, history, story feeds, restaurants, night clubs.. the possibilities are limited only by our imaginations


I see potential for QR and matrix codes to slot into this world. Maybe as information points, or in advertising. Maybe one day we could have an exhibition of just QR codes, each one leading to a separate website with a whole body of work? Its not quite time for that, maybe in 6-12 months. Not enough people currently own the correct types of phone or software so rather than being cutting edge, you'd just be obscure. Either way, its interesting to see the development in data handling. Were starting to compartment and gateway the data we handle in every day life. The age of the iphone has begun.

Tom Hunter and why he may just be a life saver

So im struggling for idea's and i'm prone to look through what i've already done in these situations...

So i looked at my Tom hunter tribute picture, i wondered why i did it. I wondered why he did his and looked through his work.

I looked at the pictures that inspired him, i looked in detail at the pre-raphaelite paintings that he transformed into his own work.

I turned on my itunes and listened to my music and showed them to my model/partner. We wondered if we could find paintings that we could modernise in the same style as Tom did. We found some we thought would work really well. In context to the images already shot and as stand alone images.

I realised i could do it in my favourite wishy-washy short D.O.F indie/grungy style.

We sourced locations where we could do it and realised with minimal props we could make it work really well. We could use places like Rokkit vintage in london to find an outfit or two thats striking and individual.

We realised that with the use of my remote control we could do some pretty weird photo's together. Including the two of us in a pretty abstract style. Using the paintings as a start point, but not being afraid to drift away from them.

And would you believe it, the sun's due to make a pretty large appearance tomorrow in the skies above me. Guess i'll have some good stuff to show Jonathan on monday after all.

Why the internet is a bad thing pt 1 - Addiction

I love the internet. I wanted to declare my love early in this post as i need everyone to know i'm very much pro-internet. Im also pro recreational drugs but that doesn't mean i can't see the obvious problems with both. But unlike drug use, the internets failings or problems are not often publicised in government warnings so im going to take a few minutes of your time to point them out. Starting today with addiction.

ad·dic·tion  (-dkshn)

n.

1.

a. Compulsive physiological and psychological need for a habit-forming substance

I speak from experience when i say that the internet can destroy your life. Not that many years ago I was living with my partner of 3 years, had a full time job in a position of responsibility and owned a cat. I was the going places kid who had settled early. Then, one day i realised that all i had once taken for granted was gone and the most horrible realisation kicked in, they had lost me to a computer game.

I wonder how many of you have turned on your computer to check an email, then logged off 2 hours later because of constant internet based distractions. It could be anything, wikipedia, imdb, Facebook or maybe like me you were pulled into a computer game. I remember years back a football manager game produced by Eidos (the makers of the tomb raider series) ran a warning and helpline for addicts of the game. Even now it has a game status bar on it reminding you to wash or feed the cat and the more software developers realise our weakness, the more your pulled in.

The main threat to your sanity these days is M.M.O.R.P.G.'s. Massively multiplayer online role playing games such as world of warcraft or eve online are deadly. In these you team up with other addicts to work together and complete in game tasks for pixillated rewards. The games themselves are addictive, but no more than the silly flash games on Facebook. What really makes these games deadly is that your not playing against a computer, your playing with real people who you can talk to through various voice software. This means the game builds a sense of importance and friendships are formed between people who have never met or live in different countries, destined to never meet face to face. At the height of my addiction i would easily consume anything up to 20 hours a day online. Talking to people on both UK and US timezones. But i also made the effort to meet the people i played the games with. Numerous times i have gone to london and will soon be going to america for many reasons, one of which is to meet some people i spent 4 years of my life with, via my modem. I know how easy it is to get addicted to these games or any game now and i feel lucky i could step away and pull out of the mess i was getting my life into. However some people on this earth will not have the same mental strength as me and sadly this week it cost a baby its life.

South Korea child 'starves as parents raise virtual baby'

It a horrible thought, but i dont think this will be the last case of internet neglect. My own neglect cost me a relationship, a job and a cat. Not mortally, she took it with her. But somewhere out there, people need to realise real life comes first.

Picbod# catch-up; Triptychs, textures and tights

i continued to shoot all through the rough patches and always had in the back of my mind that some of my images needed to tell a story, either alone or as a group. I'd never explored triptychs before this year and decided that i wanted to at least have a go at trying to represent a night through the format.

As valentines day came up it became the perfect opportunity to try this method out. I was still reeling from the aftermath of what i've since come to call 'flesh-gate' and i think that shows in the few photo's i plucked up the courage and took that night. My aim became more about being ambiguous and subtle rather than address what i should have, and that was the intimacy between me and my partner. That aside i like the images. There not emotionally charged really, just some nice plain images. I'll only whack one of them up here for that reason, in triptych form of course...