Over the past couple of weeks I have learnt a significant amount about how to use photography and imagery to create a message/narrative. This can be done in many ways, using mise-en-scene and camera framing to create a large range of effects on the audience, all techniques which I can apply to my music magazine.
Firstly, mise-en-scene can convey meaning to an audience through six primary elements, costume, lighting, acting, makeup (and hair), props and setting. For example, a well dressed, brightly lit, tidy business man stood in a confident pose can convey a clear message of organisation, authority and power; whereas a dark, filthy scene of a child wearing rags cowering in a dark alley can convey the complete opposite, a sense of vunerability, hopelessness and despair; all through the simple use of changing what and how each component is placed in scene.
To further convey a message, however, you can take a step further to convey a narrative through the use of a camera. By controlling and altering the aperature, shutter speed and ISO as well as changing the angle, framing and distance of the camera from the model you can create a clear and distinct story. An example of this could be a centrally framed, close up of a small flower using a shallow focal length to blur the background. This creates a sense of value for the flower as it is the centre of the image, as well as singling out it’s features and isolating it from the surroundings by taking the image closer and more focused than a standard image.
Overall, I believe that after gaining this knowledge and skill I will better be able to take a clearer, more observant approach to the planning and excecution of my magazine photo shoots. Forming images that convey not only a clear denotation of what is happening in the shot but also implying connotations and showing what the photo can represent. This can create more emotionally-connected and attractive images that will appeal to the target demographic of my magazine.