Sebastien Shahmiri
Shahmiri is a multi media artist who focuses his work on Domestic Violence. Domestic Violence itself is a very heart wrenching topic as no one believes the person you love the most can hurt you. My inspiration for this shoot is the image on the right. I found it particularly interesting due to the level of abuse the subject has suffered and I was drawn to the fact the information in the background is all about Domestic Violence and it isn't just boring and plain. If it was plain the image would have less meaning. I feel as though the background helps the viewer to understand the message of domestic violence, but it also helps the focus be more on the subject as it's making the most of the negative space. I decided to recreate Shahmiri's images as I feel the way the paintings were mounted have great meaning behind them. The subject itself is rather dramatic and stands out as the artist has used bold colours like purple, to me this makes the message of the painting more prominent, which is domestic violence.
To recreate this image I slightly changed its style due to it being a painting, I tried to capture a similar vibe in my images through the cuts and bruises on her face. To take my images I used a low ISO this meant that my image had no noise, I used a fast shutter speed to capture a still image due to people not being able to stay still for a long one. A wide aperture resulted in a shallow depth of field, however this was not relevant as the background of the portrait was plain and was going to be covered. To edit my images onto this background I opened a new page and gathered information on Domestic Violence. I then removed the text in the centre where the portrait would be. I then sanded and scrunched the sheet and put it back through the printer to print the portrait onto it, I did this a few times with different images. I decided to develop this idea further by writing out the information in the background giving the images a more artsy vibe. I then scanned the images back into the computer and applied a filter in photoshop- this was a black and white filter, I used a rubber on a low opacity to remove the filter slightly over my model. I felt as though this gave the images a gloomy dulled down effect which I feel represents the feelings of a domestic violence victim.
To recreate this image I slightly changed its style due to it being a painting, I tried to capture a similar vibe in my images through the cuts and bruises on her face. To take my images I used a low ISO this meant that my image had no noise, I used a fast shutter speed to capture a still image due to people not being able to stay still for a long one. A wide aperture resulted in a shallow depth of field, however this was not relevant as the background of the portrait was plain and was going to be covered. To edit my images onto this background I opened a new page and gathered information on Domestic Violence. I then removed the text in the centre where the portrait would be. I then sanded and scrunched the sheet and put it back through the printer to print the portrait onto it, I did this a few times with different images. I decided to develop this idea further by writing out the information in the background giving the images a more artsy vibe. I then scanned the images back into the computer and applied a filter in photoshop- this was a black and white filter, I used a rubber on a low opacity to remove the filter slightly over my model. I felt as though this gave the images a gloomy dulled down effect which I feel represents the feelings of a domestic violence victim.