Photo Story Feuilleton #3: Connect Content and Form

Some photos take your breath away. Even more than single photographs, a photo series can blow your mind. It can change the way you see things and it challenges photographers to create powerful stories that they want to share with the world. But how to create interesting photo series? As with art in general, there is no specific recipe or approach. However, when you overlook the photography field you’ll discover some basic angles that might inspire you to go beyond creating single photographs and come up with a true photo story. Starting point is to work with a concept. A second ingredient is to make sure that things happen on more than one layer.

In this feuilleton EAGER – platform for inspiring photo series, approaches the subject photo series from different angles inspiring you to make your very best photo series!  

This is the third angle of a series of six. Read the first angle, The Power of Repetition, here. The second angle, Time Flies, so Try to Catch It can be read here, the fourth Make The Surreal look Real here, the fifth angle The Abstract Way is available here, and the last angle Catch Reality in Documentaries here.

Angle 3: Connect Content and Form
What if you want to tell a story that is rather abstract? In that case an approach where you make a strong connection between your story and the form in which you present it can be really powerful. The starting point is your story that needs to be told. You want to demonstrate something, or provide insight, or proof your case. The keyword is this angle is: control. The photographer creates a scene in which he is in control (which is rather different from making a reportage or documentary where you usually don’t intervene in your scenes). The first step is to think out a strong visual concept and the second step is to use the power of repetition (see Angle 1) to tell your story. The best concepts are the ones that suggest something, and have your audience draw the conclusion for themselves.

 

Take for example the jogging photo series from Sacha Goldberger. Sacha wanted to show the difference between our natural and brute side versus how we represent ourselves to society. He created an outdoor studio in a park, and asked joggers that were passing by for a favour. He wanted them to sprint and pose for the camera right after. Exactly one week later he made portraits of the same persons in his professional studio. As you can see, he asked them to wear clothes in matching colours and had them pose in exactly the same way as in the park. Those elements make that you can really compare the photographs and draw your own conclusions. We consider this a strong way to communicate a story that in itself is rather abstract, but quite clear when you see these photographs.

Another example is the ‘Anguish’ from photographer Ted Daamen. His story is about how our individual freedom seems to disappear with the world getting more crowded every day. Again we see that the photographer helps you to ‘read’ the story by choosing repeating elements, like fact that the lighting conditions in all photos match and the use of small walls that symbolize the space we have. All persons in this series were approached on the street and have been selected to form a cross section of our society. Again an abstract story with a powerful presentation.

Source: didyousayeager.com