Zane & Lindsays Photo Essay - Decay

Zane Dubash - 42210178 & Lindsay Bennett 42911028

"Decay"

'Forgotten'

The theme we chose for our photo essay was ‘Decay’, with a sub- theme of ‘Forgotten’ which we represented using various images of car wreckages. The images show a range of cars, which have been left in car yards. We chose to use cars from car yards because there is a sense they have been abandoned and ‘forgotten’. This comes from the lack of ownership of the cars as well as the extensive damage found on the cars. 

The damage on the cars presents the theme of decay in forms such as rust. An example of decay would be the photo showing a rusty door, which has become unhinged from a car. Cars are an everyday aesthetic, therefore by showing cars in such a different form to what the viewer is used to, the themes of decay and forgotten are highlighted.  

Surfaces and Decay - Tamara and Nali

By Tamara Grennan and Nali Lishomwa

Music Credits

Pekkanini (2009) "Soft Shuffle Theremin"

Creative Commons Licence: attribution, non-comercial and sharealike

http://www.jamendo.com/en/track/3255326/soft-schuffle-theremin 

Our chosen theme was surfaces with our sub-theme being decayed. We choose surfaces as our theme as it encompasses a wide range of things such as roads, signs and walls. Our subtheme decay was chosen because we wanted to reflect how theses surfaces over time decay and are only very rarely restored to their original condition. In todays society almost everything around us is man made; each and every day we pass surfaces, which have decayed without giving them another thought paying barely any attention to them. Our music was chosen to convey our theme through the slow melody and down beat tempo; we believed this best conveyed the decaying surfaces.

Our photographs were taken around the suburbs in which we both live; north Ryde and Penrith. The photographs were taken in areas of high pedestrian and traffic activity; places which people pass in their daily lives. In everyday hundreds of people pass these surfaces either on foot or in motor vehicles without even a second thought of the how they have gotten this way or why no one has restored them. 

Stairs and Shadows - Daniel Perez and Jon Cedric Roxas

MAS110 Photo Essay
Shadows and Stairs
Daniel Perez and Jon Cedric Roxas

Music: Neurowaxx ft. Stateshirt, The Starry Tides (2009)
“This is on the stairs”
CC License: Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC 3.0)
http://ccmixter.org/files/Neurowaxx/21948

Stairs are more than just mundane objects; they are an important part of our everyday lives. The purpose of this photo essay is to suggest the extent to which such mundane objects heavily impact upon our day-to-day lives. The staircase was utilized as a metaphor for the mundane people, objects and events which hold our lives together. This encourages an audience to appreciate the mundane objects within their lives which benefit their functioning within society. Shadows represent the changing nature of our lives however the single staircase remained constant. By utilizing just one set of stairs in 50 different mediums, an illusion was created that one object can be manipulated into many different scenarios. This portrays the polymorphic concept that one mundane object can help our existence in many different ways. The music utilized has a constant rhythm, evoking an image of one using a staircase. The bass guitar has a low pitch which gives weight to the shadows and emphasizes its darkness. Thus, it can be suggested through assistance of sound, that darkness surrounding our everyday lives does not alter the fundamental nature of the everyday mundane objects. Therefore, despite the difficult situations in which we are presented daily, objects which we often overlook are the ones which we rely upon the most. 

Kim and Tom, photo essay.

                                     Kimberley D'silva - 42853605 & Thomas Svich - 428889774

Decay and Abandonment

Our photo essay comprises photos that centralize around the themes of abandonment with a sub theme of decay. The photos were taken from two distant and distinct locations - Parramatta and the Gosford metro. The idea was to take photos of buildings, particularly houses or public use areas, that had been abandoned, decayed and worn out. Most of these places showed signs of history, being used and then boarded up or destroyed and neglected over the years. The point of the slideshow is to show the waste of buildings and space in our society. The photos were taken using an iPhone camera and a Lumix camera, the 24 photo show was edited through iPhoto and compiled using iMovie.

Consumption, Waste and Decay - Mikaela Heise and Katie Buttress-Grove

Contemplating the central theme of waste and the subtheme of consumption and decay, our photo essay establishes the inextricable link between consuming and discarding. Engaging with familiar practices of consumption pertinent to Murray’s discussions of the mundane, the photography develops an intimate perception of decaying rubbish. Placing focus on the cyclical development of food to waste, and packaging to rubbish, our photo essay explores the increasingly habitual behaviour of resource exploitation and the resultant mass littering or polluting. 

The practicality of these products and food items are overlooked as they are freely discarded, reasserting their ephemerality and the frivolity of consumer practices. Aligning with Murray’s notions of the transitory and temporality of life, the intimate close ups provide textural variation of decay, elevating the fleeting beauty and substance of these everyday aesthetics. Through this depiction the essentiality of these subjects, namely food, is highlighted reaffirming its indispensible everyday purpose. 

This observance of the mundane was achieved within the Macquarie University campus with the use of a Canon 60D to achieve the most precise quality when observing tonal contrasts and textural characteristics. Tonal manipulation within Iphoto enhanced the visual vibrancy of the images, providing for an appealing narrative of wasted subjects. The song “Wasting Time” by Stephen Fowlds (2012) compliments the melancholic tone of the photography, stimulating a nostalgic response in regards to the essentiality of food and 
packaging.

Our photo essay can be accessed via the YouTube link provided below:

Mikaela Heise 42867584

Katie Buttress-Grove 42865794

Abandoned Industry

Abandoned Industry

The “Remediation Theory” was first conceptualised in the mid 1990’s by David Bolter and Richard Grusin (Murray 2008). According to this theory, the “newness” (Murray 2008) of new media lies in the way old media is remediated. One media grows out of another in the way that without the former, the latter would never exist.  In other words, without film photography, our assignment completed today in this digitalised society, might never have been possible.

It was difficult at first to narrow down one specific theme that occurred in current urban life, however we eventually decided on ‘Industry’, and more specifically ‘Abandonment’. We eventually decided to capture ‘Industrial Abandonment’ because we felt it was a major theme that was largely forgotten by urban society, thus deserved recognition. In order to capture the main theme we decided it was best that we explored an area renown for industrial work, yet also a site that displayed the sub-theme of abandonment. We decided on the old Flour Mill in Summer Hill. With a ‘Nikon D5000’ (D-SLR), many ideas in mind and a sense of adventure, we ventured into the factory and captured what we thought best represented ‘Industrial Abandonment’.

Produced By: Kieran McKinn (42862795) Bridget McKinn (42912954)

Music By: Gurdonark.
(2007) "Restless Sleep" MP3. CCmixter, . 8 Oct, 2012. CC BY Attribution
http://ccmixter.org/api/query?datasource=uploads&search_type=all&sort=rank&search=industry&lic=by,sa,s,splus,pd,zero

Murray, S (2008) Digital Images, Photo-Sharing, and Our Shifting Notions of Everyday Aesthetics. Journal of Visual Culture August 2008 vol. 7(2). 147-163.

 

Industrial: Seclusion & Barriers by Joseph E.B. & Ceasar M.

For our photo essay, we chose the main theme of Industrial with the sub themes of seclusion and barriers. We came to this choice of theme and sub theme because of the strong link it has with everyday aesthetics, and how people tend to usually pay little notice to industrial areas and the ways they are secluded and protected, thus providing a sense of “lost nostalgia and memory” (Murray). With this, industrial areas demonstrate how such mundane subjects can create aesthetically pleasing photographs and that capturing everyday aesthetics is an imperative factor in everyday imagery.

 The collaborative images were captured within the Port Botany district during the mid-semester break, including numerous importing and exporting container yards and logistics dispatches. We used a digital single lens reflex (DSLR) camera and mobile phone camera to capture our images and used iPhoto and iMovie to develop our images and slideshow. SoundCloud was also used to search for appropriate creative commons licensed music for our slideshow.

By Joseph El-Badawi & Ceasar Morales 

Roads-overlooked: Emma Gerrie&Yuri Choi

Roads... overlooked

The main theme in focus was ‘Roads’ with a subtheme of ‘Overlooked. We decided to concentrate on roads that we travelled by on a regular basis, taking photos of aspects that go unnoticed everyday despite the fact one passes them so often. Our aim was to evoke attention to these disregarded characteristics of roads and to emphasize that if you take the time to look closer, you will notice unexpected things you’ve previously never observed. We emphasized this notion through images taken on both a rainy day and a clear sunny day, in order to highlight different features of roads that go unseen, depending on the type of day. Our choice of music further accentuates this distinction between rain and sun and the overlooked aspects of roads, through the build up of beat once the photos change from rainy to sunny. The music is at a fairly slow tempo to stand concurrent with the commonality and routine concept that is often associated with roads, however the gentle piano solo throughout the song highlights that beauty can be found from everyday mundane objects.

MAS110 Everyday Aesthetic: Roads-overlooked, 2012, 31''

<http://youtu.be/k40tUEOqT70>

Produced by Emma Gerrie(42848431) & Yuri Choi(43013279)

Music: Ahren Music (2012) 

           "Winter Sonata"

           CC license: Attribution/Non-commercial/Share-Alike

           http://www.soundcloud.com/ahren-music/winter-sonata

Urban Decay by Natalie Maguire & Adam Facer

Urban Decay 

by Adam Facer & Natalie Maguire

‘Urban Decay’ is a photo essay focused on rust and decay in an urban setting. We chose rust as our theme and decay as our subtheme, focusing mainly on the vibrant colours decayed metal can produce in a range of urban areas. In order to depict our chosen theme and subtheme we explored local areas such as Canoelands (near Wiseman’s Ferry) and East Ryde. We also relocated to a more diverse location in the Northern Beaches of Sydney in order to explore a different urban setting.  To portray the concept of everyday aesthetics that Murray explores in ‘Digital Images, Photo-Sharing, and Our Shifting Notions of Everyday Aesthetics’, we chose to photograph common everyday objects that had been altered by the processes of rust and decay.  The track ‘Ice & Chilli’ was found on ccmixter.org. We believe this track accompanies our photo essay appropriately, contributing somber and gentle sounds and contrasting strongly with the bright colours of the rust depicted in our images.

Natalie: 42858186

Adam: 42855659