At a recent session of Skills for Art School hosted by Sarah and Lauren we had a presentation regarding Professionalism and Responding to a Brief.
It was interesting to hear how one’s art and life are intrinsically linked and it makes perfect sense. The experiences I have been through are undoubtedly going to reflect in the images I produce, whether it’s steered consciously or subconsciously.
Brief Encounter
If you’re presented with a brief it’s primarily due to it being suitable for you, either because you’ve been recommended or you’ve sought it out. This means if someone recommended you for a job, it was probably because the person who recommended you liked your style and thought it fit with the brief or can see how your style would work in connection with the subject matter. If you’ve applied/tendered for it then it’s something that you’d enjoy or have considered a possible next step to expand your skill base and experience, again it’s likely that I personally would apply for something I enjoy over something I wouldn’t.
Due to your art and life coming together you should consider all of the parts that go to make you up when planning work from a brief, and it should be a reflection of you, your style, experiences, attitude and general personality.
The brief contains most of the information required for you to attack it pre-armed with the knowledge of what is needed so must be carefully studied to pick up the clues and specifications before tailoring them to your modus operandi but not changing the brief drastically that it bears no resemblance to the original request.
Who Am I?
One section of the slide set in the session was “Who are you?” and reminds you to consider why you do what you do, why you make images the way you do. If you can figure out the underlying reasons why you’re interested in some images more than others then this will help you find the right subjects, methods and techniques to improve your practice.
As well as this section there was another equally valuable question “Who are they?”, and by they we mean the people writing the brief or requesting your skills as an image maker. It’s worth looking at their previous work to examine what they liked and why they liked it, don’t be afraid to ask the questions in meetings as to what was the reasoning behind their previous decisions.
Being empathetic to the “client” or brief writer doesn’t mean that you forget your reasons for being a photographer, it just means that you try and merge the two personalities together to come up with the ideal combination.
With this in mind attendees at the seminar were given a task to consider another person’s mindset and take a photo that they may have taken, then repeat the exercise as yourself.
In my daily work as an IT Analyst, I can be very empathetic and have an understanding of what comments/emails/comms will annoy someone or give them a boost of confidence so I felt pretty comfortable with the first part of the task but it wasn’t as easy as first imagined.
“Joanne”
For the person whose mindset I’d try to emulate I picked my wife Joanne. We’ve been married for over 25 years and I still have difficulty reading her mind so I gave it a shot. Jo is around my age but she’s female, from a small family, one of two girls, raised in the country side, around farm animals, in extremely challenging financial circumstances for most of that time, with a very strict father who has some very traditional values, and a mother who is very caring for her family. The family was a very Christian family early on with grandparents being religious and a bit stand-offish.
Jo has a good few valued friends that she sees regularly and spends a good amount of time on the phone talking to them or visiting them to go for walks etc and has a good relationship with her sister and is often on the phone or at her house.
In terms of details and control, she’s on it and like her father doesn’t take people’s lateness well, with a schedule being provided for a reason. Her memory is excellent and organisation skills are second to none, she’s got me and our two kids through many a challenging time. She likes to read books, such as detective/crime novels and thrillers and on tv watches reality programs like AMbulance and 24 Hours in A&E etc. Music selection is based around the eighties and poppy disco tunes too.
She also has a great deal of integrity, honesty and cannot lie to save herself. She even informs on herself trying to sneak alcohol into music festivals. Tidiness and organisations are some of her most important considerations. Jo doesn’t like adrenaline sports or things that appear to be out of control and prefers to be in total control of a situation. She has a very healty diet and tries out new recipes to keep her and the kids eating different meals where possible.
It’s weird to write that stuff down without making it sound like I’m pointing out perceived faults or things that sound bad….
Considering we have a lot in common, we also have a lot that isn’t so common between us.
“Bob”
I was brought up in a town environment in a council estate with not very much money about but was always up to something mischievous like scrumping or exploring places we shouldn’t be. I’ve ended up being spoken to by the law for a few non-serious things as kid like setting fire to things or playing on or near a railway track so I’m a little more “naughty” than Jo.
Playing out with friends was a big part of my childhood and I’ve still got some close mates that I still meet up with when the circumstances allow, but, it’s not very often I phone any of them up, or them me. I’ve three brothers and we’re thick as thieves when we’re all together but can go for 8 or 9 months before phoning each other up for a chat. Never really any bad blood in our family and we all get on like a house on fire. My mum has MS and has been bed bound for around 8 years and my Dad “likes a drink” after his Dad also showed him the ways of the pub. Unbelievably to my dad, I don’t drink. After stopping around 7 years ago I’ve never had a hangover and never ever had to wait for two hours for a cab after a night out.
My interests are around learning to do different things, I like shooting sports (targets, not animals) learning to play guitar, photography, making cosplay costumes and other things like mountain unicycling and electric skateboarding. I’m a bit of an adrenaline junkie and also not frightened to wander off the beaten path to investigate somewhere I’ve never been before. I’m very inquisitive and like to learn mechanically how things work and stop working, I’m ok at fixing my cars and diy and like to give it a try to see if I can do it.
Books I read are varied from Terry Pratchett, Tom Clancy, Science related books, photography related and like to listen to movie and science type podcasts as well as watching movies. I’d rather watch a movie than One Born Every Minute that’s for sure. I’ve also a bit of strange sense of humor and like scaring my family by sneaking up on them or hiding behind curtains and even making up strange dances and songs to entertain. Spontaneity isn’t something I get to do in my job really so I find other ways of exercising it, and have been on three TV quiz shows in an attempt to overcome some of my fear of public speaking and meeting new people. Another reason for starting this degree course too I might add.
My eating habits are very different to Jo, and most other normal people, I’m super fussy and as I’ve explained numerous times, would be happy with a tablet for the day that gives me everything I need so I don’t have to bother with eating at all. It’s all a bit boring to me with cooking shows being of no interest to me at all.
“Jo’s” Photo
For the photo from Jo’s perspective I walked out to the shop at lunchtime taking a small digital camera with me. Thinking about what she’d be thinking about on this short walk I found myself thinking of organising the afternoon and rest of the week, whilst looking around for something “pretty” to take a photo of. Jo has no interest in taking photos usually so I was fighting against the type even carrying a camera. I got almost to the shop when I saw something that I thought she would like if she was out with a camera, a tree in someone’s front garden that autumn has started to turn..
The task told us to look at this picture for three minutes and see what was satisfying or annoying to the person whose mindest I was in.
Looking a the image through Jo’s eyes I would say that there was some lovely colour in the photo with the red colours showing how quickly autumn was affecting the tree. The fence is a nice colour too but would be a nightmare to maintain. I (as Jo) wouldn’t notice much else about the picture that was pleasing but there are several things that might be somewhat irksome. The fact that there are leaves across the lawn looks messy, the rocks by the path aren’t evenly spaced, the path has rough sides and the bush in the right hand side seems untidy.
“Bob’s” Photo
Time for Bob to take a photo next so I went out for a walk in the evening and it was raining when I noticed my shadow on a wall. I brought up my digital camera to snap the shot.
The details in this image are pleasing to me, the three different blocks of colour horizontally and the dark shadow with a light shadow also next to it. The window in the corner of the picture tells me it’s a building that I’m on top of and the umbrella indicates clearly what the current weather situation was like. As does the big fluffy coat I was wearing and this can be seen in the big furry hood part of the shadow on the back of my neck. I also like the anonymity of the image, as it could be anyone, even someone spying on the neighbours, a voyeur or even a policeman on a stakeout..
If I was to look at this photo with Jo’s critical eye I would be annoyed by the step in the wall causing a change in levels of the shadow and the fact that the wall is grubby. Jo wouldn’t have been out with a camera in this weather either as it’s not her bag so might have difficulty conceiving why I like doing this especially in those conditions.
Conclusion
What I got from this lecture and exercise was a reminder to think about what other people want rather than railroading my ideas through with no concern of other people’s previous history, ideas and pre-conceptions.
Thinking as my wife might, might not seem much of a stretch but it was and it was difficult trying to consider how she might feel about herself as she snapped the picture.
To try and use a random generator might have led me to struggle even more, I’d find it difficult to comprehend how someone from a completely different background and life experiences might perceive everyday events. I also wouldn’t feel comfortable trying to second guess how some people perceive situations as I haven’t been through the challenges they have. For instance, I’d be foolish pretending that I could begin to understand what an LGBTQ+ person / person of colour may have been through and would feel like I was perhaps abusing what is often seen as a position of privilege with persons of my background not having been subjected to prejudice and ignorance. I’d hate to think that I was contributing to that ignorance by assuming I could put myself in their shoes.
Wow, I’m sorry for that last paragraph, and I know that people from all possible backgrounds might be the provider of a brief in the future but I would prefer to talk to them and ask them honest questions to try and understand further. This is kind of what I do as an analyst in my day job, I talk to a customer about what they want, what they’ve done in the past, what they’d like to do in the future and how they want to go about meeting these goals. As I mentioned in the top of this post, I feel that I can be very empathetic towards people and have a good relationship with all of the people I interact with on a regular basis, even if I’m having what we’d call a “Crucial Conversation” I can look at it from their side and try to help them understand what the compromise needs to be or how we are going to overcome the issue.
Putting it into practice
I’ve also struggled with the Briefs for the Colour Film and B&W Film modules, with the former being “The Colour Of Change” and the latter being “The Path Is The Journey”, with tonnes of ideas spilling out of my scatterbrain but not exactly understanding how to tie these together into a five image set, so I think I may spend some time talking to Jack and Matt to ascertain if there is any further information they can share as to what their expectations are and if there is any subtle clue as to better fit my images to their personalities.
Thanks Sarah and Lauren for an informative and thought provoking session.
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