35) Botanical Gardens Photoshoot - 27/11/17

At the weekend I visited the Botanical Gardens in Stoke Bishop to take some photographs of plants, another subject that makes me happy. This idea stems from looking at the BBC Lifestyle Happiness Manifesto for my first shoot, which had the happiness step "Plant Something". I thought I'd extend this into a real world setting and show an area of a lot of plants which I visit that makes me happy. I find being in this environment of nature really calming and I want to highlight this within my project.

As I shot a lot of this area for my zine rotation last year I made a conscious effort to not shoot some of the same compositions, but give a new outlook on the area. I partially combatted this by using my flash for some of the shots, giving them a different look, also in attempt to make my photographs in the style of Wolfgang Tillmans' work. As well as this, I feel when the seasons change you get a completely different representation of plants in their habitat, and I shot my zine work in a warmer period so I think these images from Autumn time will have a different feel than before. When shooting I was also thinking of the purpose of the images in my zine, for instance using them to layer underneath and on top of other photographs, as well as being standalone images. For this reason I tried to shoot things which are boldly colourful and have quite unbusy compositions for the layering in the zine, as well as shooting plants I could see unaccompanied by other photographs. After going to the Botanical Gardens I also stumbled across a really nice fruit and veg shop in Clifton, which prompted me to think that this is another subject I want to shoot that makes me happy, in relation to my idea of having a good meal, relating to the happiness step from the manifesto "Count Your Blessings". You can see some of these images at the end of my contact sheet, but I want to do a dedicated shoot for fruit and veg shops.

Below is my contact sheet from the shoot.

Although I'm pleased with the images from the shoot, I don't feel like I shot everything I wanted to on this visit because the greenhouses were closed, and this is where I particularly wanted to base the shoot. I also feel I don't have enough photographs in this bright, flash style that I'd like. This is why I'm going to revisit it and shoot again.

Below are some of my favourite images from the shoot.

I've grouped these two above images together because I feel as though I'd use them for the same purpose, layering below other images or accompanying them on the page. I love the bright exposure and vibrant colours in the images, really epitomising the season of Autumn through the orange toned leaves and the evergreen bushes.

These two above images are shots which I compositionally like, however I wish I'd used the flash to shoot with because they have this brightly exposed element missing. I don't want to portray plants and nature as dark and cold, which is quite difficult to do in this season, so I feel like the flash would aid me in steering clear of this. I really like the close up crop of the area, and I want to continue shooting in this style when I go back to Stoke Bishop to reshoot.

This next image is one of my favourites because it has all the elements I wanted to show in this shoot: beautiful nature, vibrant colour, and have this brightly exposed flash style to the image. I like the central composition and shallow depth of field, making it the centre of attention in the image. This is the shooting style I'm drawing inspiration from for when I go back to reshoot.

This next set of the three above images I included because I really like the colour red which is prominent in all of them. I could see the top one being used as a layering image, and the other two being standalone photographs. However I still think the lighting in these is not bright enough, making the scene look quite dark and unengaging, so I'd also like to reshoot some of these scenes to give them a different atmosphere.

This final image I put in just as an example of one of the fruit and veg images I took. This is the only one I was fully pleased with because I really like the pop of colour and bright lighting. I think it gives the image a really healthy and wholesome feel, so I'm going to shoot some more fruit and veg shops / stands in this style, because health makes me happy.

Overall I'm pleased with the images even though I don't think a lot of the photographs will be used because they don't have all the elements I want, but the idea is there and I think it will be developed fully once I've done another shoot.

#obsessions #photoshoot