Assignment Two: Vice versa – Tutor Feedback

Overall, I’m happy with the feedback that I received, and feel the issues that were raised – specifically around the presentation of my images – will benefit me greatly now that I have a better understanding of why that particular element didn’t work. Of course, my tutor took into account the limitations I had surrounding this assignment, and for him to describe my work as “critically interesting” and “appropriate under the circumstances” was certainly reassuring that I had in fact stuck to the brief to the best of my abilities and produced strong images that were a current record of the times – which was ultimately what I hoped to achieve.

My tutor’s main concern wasn’t at all to do with the images themselves, and though he felt each portrait had a place within the final series, he wasn’t sure the sequencing that they were presented in necessarily worked. We discussed further the potential issues of ‘narrative’ within photography, and more so, when as photographers, we want to present our images in chronological order. His thoughts were that producing a narrative in this manner could be problematic, as gaps in the timeline are more evident – unlike in film, for example – and therefore, the sequencing may not be as fluent as one intended it to be. I must admit, it took me a while to get my head around this concept. But, when reviewing my images again, I understood my tutor’s mind-set. I feel that the sequencing between images one and two, and four and five, shows evidence of gaps within the timeline, and though this makes sense to me, for the viewer, it may be confusing. My thinking now is that does the narrative need to be literal in terms of its timeline, or, should I just present my portraits as standalone images that are all relatable to a common theme. After some consideration, I will change the way I present my images for assessment. As I know many others will have felt the experiences that I documented, I feel it’s not necessary to present them in chorological order, which I believe will help with the overall narrative.

We also discussed what the role of the captions was and how I could make them more personal towards the individuals mentioned. This was similar to what was brought up for my last assignment, so I should have really applied that notion here. My tutor said I could adopt a more photojournalistic approach, where they usually consider who, what, why and when (dates). Again, this is something I shall change for assessment.  

Lastly, we talked about future assignments and how the situation – in regards to taking images in my home due to the lockdown – will most likely be the same. My tutor had a great idea that each assignment hear after should tie into one another, meaning that I’m creating a large body of work all related to my time in isolation with my family. He suggested that I take more group photographs of my family, though that may depend on the brief of the assignment.