Flower photography project

Meaning:

The cycle of life, is how i would describe these three photographs i took, in a symbolic way. The first picture represents our youth or childhood, which in most cases we are completely happy, playful and full of colors in that phase of our lives, this is also known as our golden years. It’s the years were we have no worries and make the most we can of our time, and that’s how we create great memories. Then the second picture, represents the second part of our lives, our adult and old phase. Those are the times when we start feeling a sense of emptiness of not having that natural joy we used to have as kids, and we start getting nostalgic of those past golden years, how they will never come back, and they are only a part of our memories. In that picture the nostalgic atmosphere is very clear as i took the photos of those flowers because they seemed empty ones, with no color, just dry and with lack of life. Also the blur that is in the flowers expresses more the emptiness, and how those great years are gone, faded away. Finally our last phase in life comes. It didn’t matter how nicely we bloomed, how much effort we put, how happy, sad, successful or not we were, there is something that equals all of us. That is death.

The fire destroying the flower was a good and exagerated way to show that, as some deaths are tragic and mysterious, or maybe just the idea of dying is like that, it’s strange imagining how one day we won’t exist anymore and we will just be a piece of memory. Eventually everything comes to an end, the good and the bad.

Process:

I decided to take this fist picture in the morning, so it could have a natural bright light. Working with artificial lights, didn’t really worked for me, as it showed a lot yellow undertones, which in this picture that’s not the idea. I took it in a kind of garden, so i could have a bright green background. The idea of this picture was to be very bright and with a lot of saturation naturally so i wouldn’t have to edit the picture a lot, lowering the quality (i did put a little of saturation anyways).

The aspects of this photograph are: firstly it’s structure has diagonal and curved directions, which creates more texture in the flower, so it doesn't blend into the background, even though it’s in focus, plus it gives more life to it. The colors are very saturated (a bright orange and green). The space is atmospheric. It creates a happy, childish, playful, and a full of life kind of atmosphere. The lines are curved, and crackled, which as i said before, it gives more texture and life to the picture. The shape is organic, as the main thing in the photo is a flower. And finally the shades/lights have high contrast, for example in the black line that is above the flower, which defines it more.

This second picture is very dark, plus it’s completely different and suggests the opposite idea of the first one. I took this picture at the afternoon, so it could have a natural light, but not a very bright one. As you can tell the background is kind of black, i didn’t took it at night, this effect is the result of a very dark building being right in front of the flowers. I took the photograph of these flowers because they were almost dead, dry or simply didn’t bloom, so this went good with the atmosphere and the meaning that it has. I used a f/1.8 lens, which helped to make most of the picture blurry, out of focus, more empty and creating a circular motion in the corners of the picture.

The aspects of this photograph are: firstly it’s structure has vertical directions, and it has an effect of being dynamic, this is because the lens as they did the effect of putting the circular motion, then it looks like if the flowers were being moved by the wind. The colors are expressive, as this darkness represents something nostalgic, in addition they are unsaturated, and it seems as if the colors of the picture faded away. The space creates a sense of emptiness, nostalgic, sad and melancholic atmosphere. The lines are sort of straight, but go in a diagonal direction, and some are just broken, for example the plants from beneath. The shapes are mostly organic, as the picture has flowers (a natural element). And lastly the shades/lights are dark so it “went” with the atmosphere.

I took this last picture, also in the light of the day, because i just needed the fire to give it’s natural “yellowish and reddish” light. I decided to put dry mud all around the flowers, so i could strengthen the idea of death (as you burry someone/something underground), plus it gave the effect of the flower being surrounded by darkness, and that creates a mysterious atmosphere. Another good thing the fire did was to give a red tone only a little bit around the flower, which makes the death of it more “diabolical”, tragic and peculiar. I was able to burn the flower because it was fake. I burned it to show clearly the theme of death, the destruction of something (the fire destroys what it burns, or it makes it different, going from a phase to another, in this case it’s from life to death). Also i wanted to exaggerate, to make the death more tragic, mysterious and interesting, (not by only throwing broken petals of the flower) because fire emphasizes more that idea. Of course i took many pictures of the process of the flower burning, yet this one was clearly the best, because it was the one in which the fire was right in the middle/above of the flower, and it’s even bigger than it. This shows that it doesn’t matter how nicely you bloomed in life compared to anybody, we all have the same end. Death. It’s bigger than any of our lives, cause it lasts for all the eternity, while a life can be counted in years.

The aspects of this photograph are: firstly the structure of it has a very defined vertical direction, which the movement of the fire going upwards, which also creates a dynamic effect. Dynamic in the sense of change, going from existing, to not. The colors are saturated, mostly the yellow of the fire, so this element shouts the meaning of this picture. There are also warm colors, like red, brown and yellow, making the scene more tragic, mysterious and peculiar, as those are the colors of death. The space, as i said many times, has a tragic, mysterious and diabolical atmosphere, mostly because of the dark colors and the image that this photograph has. Most of the lines are curved, as you can see in the front of the picture there is like a circular/curved direction that has no mud on it. This circle that seems to be rounding the flower means the cycle of life. which is exactly what this series of photographs mean. And there are lots of broken lines that belong to the “dry mud”. The shapes here are organic (as there are mostly natural elements, such as fire, a flower even though it’s fake, and mud). Finally the shades and lights are dark, with high contrast between the background and the flower being set on fire.