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Analog Horror - Backrooms and Mandela Catalogue

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Analog Horror - Backrooms and Mandela Catalogue

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One of the main sources of inspiration for my final piece and my work in general is analog horror, a subgenre of horror which involves using old style filming equipment or making the video look old, like on a VHS or a Film Reel. This includes making the video appear toned down and adding certain overlays such as timestamps, static and glitches to emulate the look of old camera footage. I was inspired by two specific analog horror pieces on YouTube which were, ‘The Mandela Catalogue’ and, ‘The Backrooms’. I think that the video within these include creepiness, uncanniness and gore turned up to the max.

‘The Backrooms’ analog horror YouTube series is made by a content creator named Kane Pixels (Kane Parsons). The specific content and imagery that is shown within these is the type of gore and horror that I also want to convey in my images and my work. Within this video series is a VHS style video where a few young adults are making a short film, where suddenly one of them (the cameraman) is "clipped" out of reality. "Clipping" (as it is used in the gaming context) refers to when two things intersect improperly, so the person "clipping" out of his reality here refers to him passing through two different spaces of realities, ending up in the second reality by accident. I really like the Backrooms because the majority of the scenery made visible to the audience is the same almost all the time. Every turn taken, the walls, room and lighting all remain the same, creating a sense of dread that this person is never going to get out. The creators make you feel as though you are the person that’s in the Backrooms, and this feeling only breaks when the person filming starts talking to themselves/ the camera/ you as the viewer. The series then suddenly gives the audience a wall full of text and some rope next to it, ladders in some rooms and random loud noises coming from around the corner. With this, suddenly it isn’t just a sense of dread that you aren’t going to get out anymore, it is instead a sense of dread that that something or someone else might be with you in this strange, creepy place that you don’t know how to get out of, and that whatever it is may be dangerous. I have taken a significant amount of inspiration from the monsters here to create the designs of my creatures in my own work as I feel they fit the world I have made in my pieces.

‘The Mandela Catalogue’ analog horror YouTube series by Alex Kister is another piece of inspiration for my work because Kister uses a lot of audio and eerie imagery to sell his horror story and create a creepy atmosphere. Much of the audio is distorted in some way and the imagery used is stretched out, distorted or altered in some way to look off-putting, uncomfortable, creepy or scary to look at. One of the things that I had taken from Kister is the way he uses high contrast images throughout his analog horror series. This is where I learnt that simply increasing the levels of a black and white image of a person's face can really make something look familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, and create uncanniness. This is what I knew i wanted to do within my work and I believe that I achieved that, as despite not using a face, I used something very familiar to most people in one of my pieces- a room in a house with a window, a TV and sofas which are all linked with comfort in some way. The four walls of the room represent protection, the window represents freedom, the TV represents entertainment and the sofa represents relaxation. However to contrast with this relaxing, normal feeling, I created a small animation of something coming out of the TV, and made the window appear as though it got shattered from the outside so that something could invade the space.

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Ewa Mos is an artist/illustrator/photographer who takes pictures and does illustrations over them. This is the kind of concept I want to bring into my work, not necessarily her style. the type of look I want comes from the Analog Horror genre itself.

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The Backrooms is another popular analog horror YouTube series created by a content creator named Kane Pixels (Kane Parsons). This specific content and imagery that is shown in these is the type of gore and horror I want to convey in my images.

What they show in these video series is a VHS style video where a few boys are making a short film and suddenly one of them (the cameraman) is "clipped" out of this reality. "Clipping" (as it is used in the gaming context) refers to when 2 things intersect improperly, so when the person "clipped" out of his reality, it means he has passed through 2 spaces of realities (each different) and ended up in the second reality by accident.

The monsters shown, I have taken a significant amount of inspiration from in my design of my creatures as I feel they fit the world I have made in my pieces.

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Steve McGinnis is a horror illustrator. Most of the time he deals with the mythical, for example vampires or zombies, however this is not what I am looking for to do in my work. however, his use of gore and colours is what I liked the most. I used the dark colours he uses in my work but using a filter to make them uncomfortably vibrant, showing to the viewer and making it obvious that these pieces are in fact a horror series.

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This is an example of some "Scary" Graffiti that I liked and wanted to try and copy the style of in my work.

The reason for graffiti being put into my work in the first place is due to the fact that my pieces and series is called "The Apocalypse Series". This being a series of work based after something horrible happening or some kind of breakout.

Now, given that one of my main inspirations is the Backrooms, my series is based on a similar concept where the 2 realities or worlds are improperly intersected with each other, however, humans don't "clip" to the second reality, the monsters and creatures are the beings who "clip" into this reality, hence "Apocalypse".

A common trope for when the world is being taken over and there's mayhem is when people start breaking rules and start vandalising and breaking places, this is the reason why I like to include graffiti in these pieces where I can.

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This is an example of vandalised graffiti I want in my work. It's bubble graffiti and it contrasts with the "Scary" graffiti, however I like the fact that it is a playful look and says something kind of grotesque. Yes, the spleen is an organ, and some people may not think its grotesque, however, the implications of the word itself bring to mind blood and dismemberment, as if someone took someone's spleen out.

I like the fact that, once you get past the playful look and read what it actually says, you get hit with a gross realisation. This is also something I would put into my work.

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As wider research into the field i read this book by Anita Nipane on Graphics Design about the Fundamental and underlying principles in every design

After looking into becoming a graphics designer, I wanted to look into what kind of things you need to know to become a graphics designer. I looked at different videos and books, and a book that I found useful was ‘Graphics Design for Beginners: Fundamental graphic Design Principles that Underlie Every Design Project’ (2017) by author Anita Nipane.

I found this book really useful as it really clearly highlighted four fundamental parts of graphics design in a light hearted way, and went into detail about what graphics designers apply to their work every single day. As someone who is very interested in going into this field, this book was very useful and taught me a lot.

The book started by highlighting four fundamentals with an acronym, ‘CRAP’, standing for: ‘contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity’ (Nipane, 2017: 8). The book then went into more detail for each fundamental, describing why they were important. For an example it says that contrast can help lead the eyes of the viewer to different places in a specific order, which ‘can create a hierarchy and flow of your design to communicate your marketing message’ (Nipane, 2017: 9). I also learnt about the optical centre, which can be emphasised with ‘contrast’, ‘size’, ‘form’ and ‘design elements’ (Nipane, 2017: 53).

The book also had a lot of information on things I was already familiar with from lessons and previous learning, such as white space. The book states that the main purpose of white space is ‘to reduce noise and clutter so that focal elements of the design can be easily recognisable and perceived’ (Nipane, 2017:57). It was really useful to refresh my knowledge of this though, and the book gave tips on how to use white space in designs. A tip that I found useful was not to be afraid of empty space within designs, because it empty space can actually add to the design and make it look much more sophisticated. Feeling like I need to fill all the space on the canvas in my work is something that I can panic with at times, so this was useful, especially as the book gave visual examples.

Something that was really useful not only to know from a graphics design perspective, but also just useful to know for the creation of general digital art, was how to make your own ‘shades, tints and tones’ (Nipane, 2017: 69). It outlined how most graphics design softwares and apps allow you to choose different colours, and how ‘if you want to make a shade, just add black’, for making a tint, you ‘move the slider closer to the white colour’ and to create your own tones, you ‘add grey’ (Nipane, 2017: 69). I tried doing this on Procreate, as shown below.

Overall, this book was extremely useful and is one that I have purchased to be able to refer to not only in case I do become a graphics designer, but also because it contains a huge amount of valuable information for any type of digital design or art.

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In order to gain work experience and see what it is like to work in the field I have been interested in, I went to work with a company, DSZ, that specialises in graphics design and print. Initially they didn't have any design roles available, but I mentioned that I have experience with editing videos and photos and they took me on, allowing me to use this as an opportunity to learn more about and use Davinci Resolve instead of Premiere Pro because, from the research I had done, it is arguably more versatile and quicker than Premiere Pro.

This required me to learn a whole new software in a lot of detail, and so I was slightly daunted, yet excited to try it out. The jobs that I was given were small in the beginning while I got the hang of things and adjusted to the new environment. These kinds of jobs included being given the images of a poster menu and being told to animate it slightly, for example to make a burger, wrap or some text on the poster menu pop up slightly to make it look a little more dynamic and much less static. This seemed easy at first, however there were a few snags along the way that were easy fixes when I think back on them now having really learnt a lot during my time at DSZ, but were much more difficult initially when I had started out. The little snags included things such as the white border around the image being a bit too visible, or that the image would expand but then move off to the side accidentally before returning to its original place.

I was eventually able to resolve these issues, and they liked my work and the effort i put in to make everything perfect, so they gave me another job straight away, something that was much more difficult, which was putting steam on a static image of a pizza. My boss heard I was using DaVinci Resolve and heard that this software made making effects very easy, so they even tested out DaVinci themselves. This came with a few challenges as well, such as the steam not looking real or being too fast, and on my first attempt the steam looked more like smoke because it was too thick. I Eventually was able to make really convincing steam, and made many versions, some more intense or at different speeds so that the client could choose the one they liked the most.

My boss then told me to animate the client’s logo to go the signs that were in their shop. Unfortunately the company had a lot of problems with the actual screens and the graphic cards that they use, so they are likely going to make some changes.  My boss let me know that they will likely need me to either redo or reformat the animation I have already done because of this, but I am appreciative of the opportunity to do it again and be able to practise my skills. In total, I have animated 11 screens and a logo while working at DSZ, so I am very proud of my work there with lots to add now to my portfolio. I have learnt a lot about the work that goes on between a company and clients, and have learnt a lot about DaVinci. It has allowed me to feel more confident about working in the field, and I learnt that I am capable of doing a lot in the right conditions.

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Horror is the genre I chose for my final piece as not only did I find it the most intriguing and fun to make work for, but I find topics like the uncanny really interesting. This time, I wanted to do something different, so rather than my piece only including a photograph, I also included sound to make the pieces feel more alive and dynamic, as well as to help convey what was happening in my art to viewers. I wanted to create a projection for the image in a dark space to suit the horror genre, and was able to achieve that through painting the walls dark. I also put up some curtains to block out any light so that viewers could be fully immersed in the darkness, creating a stark contrast between my pieces and the dark setting, (although I had to leave  a small section left to be white for the projections, so that the art would be fully visible).

To further try to create a dynamic and immersive experience when viewing the pieces, I ensured that I included headphones in the space to attach next to the projectors, so that anyone looking at the art could be fully immersed with the sounds. I also allowed enough space between the projector and where the art was projected to allow viewers to stand very close to the pieces. I did this not only so the art was more in their face but also to try to make the art feel bigger and claustrophobic (to add to the horror, uncomfortable, uncanny feel of the work).

I used sounds which were recorded myself and also copyright free sounds online which i felt fit the art perfectly, and I used Premier Pro to edit them together in a specific way to tell a story of what was happening in my work. Within the pieces of work, I included scary creatures who were appearing and breaking out during an apocalypse (hence the series being called ‘Apocalypse’). Many of the sounds that I made for the pieces included the sounds of breaking bones, smashing and screaming. I think that these helped me to create the immersive effect i had wanted because, since I was deliberately using headphones when making the audio on Premiere Pro, I was able to make the different sounds sound closer or further away from the viewer. Upon completely editing them all and adding them together in a way that reflected what was happening in the pieces, I turned them into videos, one portrait and one landscape. These videos were then put on a Lupa video player, which is a video player that allows you to loop any video that you put on it until it is turned off, and then they were put into the projectors ready to be played. I am glad that i did this as I think it added to the immersiveness, where the viewer could simply step in and put on the headphones rather than having to firstly figure out how or what audios to play for specific pieces.

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The graphic designer/illustrator and photographer Ewa Mos was a big inspiration for me and my work for my final piece. Mos often takes photos and adds illustrations to them, combining the photograph with illustration. Although Mos is not necessarily known as a horror artist, much of her work can be seen as a little weird and creepy, which I find quite interesting. This is because Mos tends not to use dull colours and instead uses quite bright colours and bold lines.

I really appreciate Mos’ work because even though the image is static, the illustrations she creates causes the static image ito be transformed nto a an almost fluid image. For example, in the piece with the buildings in Birmingham, the liquid, human shaped yet monster-like illustration that Mos has done is very dynamic. Mos makes it seem like it is actually moving by having the liquidiness of the monster’s body placed on top of buildings and anything else that it is touching. It also blocks like the monster’s liquidated head is bending around the building. I think that the holes throughout the monster’s body bring a lot of life to the piece as rather than a massive block of colour blocking most of the photo, it warps, drips and bends like water around and on top of different elements of the photo. The fact it is so dynamic even though it is just an illustration on a photograph it is a bit uncanny and eerie because of how it moves and looks like the shape of a human. The drippiness and liquid look, the fact that it looks like a human figure and the use of a bright (fairly close to skin) colour may suggest to the viewer that the liquid that is dripping is the skin of a giant human, creating a creepy and eerie feeling.

Another piece of Mos’ that i am fond of is a photograph of a woman holding her hands out which has an illustration of a heart in the woman’s hands on top. The colour Mos has used are once again lighter colours for the heart than what is realistic, and Mos has included bright blood dripping and spurting out of the heart, down the woman’s hands. I really like this piece because it is very dramatic through the way the woman looks directly at the camera as if she is giving you this bleeding heart. Within similar illustrations like this, I have more often seen a more ‘cute’ looking icon style heart, however in this case the heart is an actual human heart. The uncanniness and eeriness of the picture shows through, especially because the heart is bleeding with bright blood, unnatural and unfamiliar. With bright blood tending to mean fresh blood, this could symbolise many things and be interpreted many ways. It could arguably be conveying that she has taken her own heart out and is giving it to the viewer or has taken someone else’s heart out, or perhaps that someone else has given the heart to her. I am really inspired and appreciative of Mos’ work because her illustrations just look as though they were meant to be part of the photo with how she integrates them with all the elements of the photo. I hope I was able to achieve this effect in my pieces, and hope I can also achieve this effect in future work.

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Joshua Hoffine is a horror photographer whose work i admire as he plays with the uncanny very well, and is able to bring the viewer to feel both comfortable and and very uncomfortable at the same time. One of his pieces that stood out to me was his piece with the dead mother with what looks like roaches coming out of her mouth. What appears to be her child stands next to her on the bed, reaching out to her as if she is confused, not knowing what’s happening to her mother.

I really appreciate how the picture has been taken in very warm lighting, which I think has been made very warm on purpose, since usually warm lighting is used to make the viewer feel comfortable and warm. However, the warmth of the light is almost harsh as everything seems to be really yellow-brown because of it, such as the walls, the bed frame, photo frame. The piece is brightened up through the woman’s and child’s blonde hair, as well as the bright white dress or nightgown, the child’s pyjamas and the bright bedding. The yellow tinge cast over the whole piece is uncannily warm, and a little too warm to be comfortable and inviting.

The most obvious horror factor in the picture is the fact that the mother has roaches coming out of her decayed and eaten, almost skeletal mouth. The mother looks to be wearing make—up so it lures you again into feeling like she is alive and you should be comfortable, but then as you move your eyes down, you see that her lips are gone and almost her whole jaw is exposed. However other than this, her face and hair look neat and shiny, like a doll or a wig. This causes her to look a little fake, however her neck and body look human, and the dead look of her mouth make her look like she was at some point alive. I think this mix of something looking both real and fake at the same time really helps create the sense of uncanniness. The subject’s neck is bent in an unnatural way, but only very slightly, subtly adding to the odd feeling that the piece gives viewers. The woman wearing white may represent innocence and that if  she is actually dead, then whatever may be about to happen to the child is not because of her and that she may be possessed by something or someone. However, it may also be an alluring factor, creating a false sense of security, where she seems innocent at first glance, except it was her all along. Cockroaches are often seen as unclean and can represent decay, and so I here the cockroaches may arguably be symbols of death, telling the audience that this dollish looking woman is in fact dead, causing a sense of insecurity and fear for the little girl.

The child reaching out to the mother and not yet grabbing her may indicate that something is going to happen as soon as she touches her, and the fact that the girl seems unphased by the roaches may suggest that she can’t see anything, explaining why she is still reaching out to her mother, who (as indicated by her rotting mouth and jaw) has potentially not moved for days, wondering if she is okay. However, as the mother is wearing white and not the child, the child appearing unbothered by the roaches could suggest that the child is behind this horror, and that perhaps her reaching out to her mother is not a check up of concern, but one of wondering if what she’s done to her has worked.

Another aspect of this photograph that i liked was the use of the photo frame, as within the photo in the frame, the mother and child look directly at the camera. The use of theis photo being black and white whilst the rest of the piece is coloured stuck out to me as i believe it symbolises how their happiness and seemingly close relationship is in the past. Furthermore, it could represent their spirits or ghosts looking toward us as the viewer as if to say, “you’re next“.

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With horror the genre that I most enjoy exploring, “the uncanny” is something which was mentioned in a lot of  books and articles about the genre, and how using elements of uncanny in art helps to make the audience feel more uncomfortable and therefore uneasy and scared. The uncanny was therefore important for my pieces that I had submitted as I wanted there to be an air of familiarity yet also unfamiliarity in my work in the photographs. This is because according to Freud, the mix of unfamiliarity and familiarity can cause the feeling of uncanniness, and according to an article i read (which i have linked below for reference), ‘bringing horror to the ordinary is to blend elements that don't belong together’.

I used colour theory and also adjusted the hues, saturations and contrasts of my work to make them look more and more unusual, unappealing and uncomfortable to look at. My photos were heavily distorted from the originals and were meant to have an air of familiarity to them which was important to my piece as if I did too much to the photos then they would be completely unrecognisable. However, if i did too little, it wouldn’t have looked as unusual, and have been too similar to an only slightly edited photograph (which is now seen a lot due to easy access to things such as Photoshop, Procreate, AI and photopea online). I have added an example of one of my pieces where i did this below, showing what the photograph looked like originally and what it looked like after I worked to make it look unnatural, uncomfortable and uncanny. I deliberately used bright yellow hues and high contrast to add unfamiliarity, yet ensured it still looked like the inside of a room for the element of familiarity that is still present with the uncanny.

The uncanny is an important component of my essay as well, especially when considering CIndy Sherman’s ‘Untitled #250’ (1992) piece. In my opinion, this piece is seems deliberately made to be very disturbing to viewers as the subject her was made entirely of fake components, such as masks and silicone, to make what looked to be a very realistic human being at first glance. This unfamiliar fakeness of the body yet familiarity of the human body creates a very uncanny, uncomfortable and disturbing feeling. I feel that upon looking more closely at the piece, it gets more disturbing as more and more finer details become visible. The arms are mannequin arms, the face is an old lady's face despite the subject looking pregnant, something is coming out of or going into the fake genitals, and the subject is laying on a bed of brown haired wigs. The most disturbing part to me however is the fact the subject, despite being clearly made of mannequin or dolls arms and silicone, looks alive as it is staring directly at the camera and therefore directly at you as the viewer, creating a feeling of unease.

In summary, I love the feeling of the uncanny and using the uncanny in my work because to create this, work does not necessarily have to entail gore or be grotesque, it just has to make the viewer feel as uncomfortable as you want them to be and with the right balance familiarity and unfamiliarity, in the piece, you can make the audience feel as uncomfortable or uncanny as desired, giving the feeling of horror.

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After doing research into DaVinci Resolve, I was really interested in how it allows you to do things like change the sky, change brightness, change lighting and colours in photos and videos. So, I started off by watching a tutorial (I have linked it down below for reference), which allowed me to learn how to change the sky.

The video gave a lot of helpful tips, including that it will be harder to change the sky if you have a reflection of it in something like water. So, since this was my first time trying to do this, I used a video that I took of my partner’s graduation, where there was no reflection of the sky. I have added the original video below for reference.

Once I had the video imported into DaVinci, I went into the ’Color’ section, then to the ‘Color Wheel’ subsection, where I then put the temperature up to give the illusion that it was a warmer day, and to make it look natural I also increased the tint. I then added a node before moving on to the ‘Qualifier’ subsection and used ‘3D Picker Add’ to select the sky in the video. Doing this with the qualifier is important because as it is a video, it will follow the sky as the video is played and apply my changes to the sky throughout the whole video and not just one frame. Once I had selected the sky, I added the effect, ‘Sky Replacement’, which allowed me to shift the levels and change the colour of the sky, change the horizon as well as add artificial clouds and a sun. I then exported the video as an MP4.

Overall, being able to pick the colour of the sky and clouds meant that I could give it the warmer, more lively look I desired. This really made a big yet natural looking difference to the sky, which looked really flat, cold, cloudy and plain before, as visible in the screenshot i have added below. Knowing how to do this on DaVinci is something that will be really useful in the future especially because I am considering doing things like marketing and video editing in my career, and this allows for a complete transformation of the vibe of footage. It was also really useful because usually if I wanted to do something similar with work I was doing on Premier Pro, I would usually try to do it there or would have to do it in Adobe After Effects, and usually wouldn’t get the same kind of results quickly and easily. For this reason, I personally prefer DaVinci, especially because of this.

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When looking into different artistic career paths and different things that interested me, I also realised that things like animation, making videos, marketing and video editing were very interesting to me. I knew that Premier Pro can be used for all these things, however, the price of Premier Pro is something that made me look into alternative softwares.

Upon conducting a lot of research, I found a lot of information about DaVinci Resolve, which has a free version. I found a huge amount of articles and videos on why many people prefer using DaVinci Resolve to Premier Pro.

For an example, in the article, ‘DaVinci Resolve be Premier Pro: 2025 Head-to-Head Showdown’, it says that both softwares a really similar in that they were both designed for professional video editing and both ‘include visual effects, color correlation, and audio editing tools’, and both work on Windows and Mac. The article argued that Premier Pro was the best option in terms of its ease of use, support, basic and visual effects. However according to the article, DaVinci was considered better for colour correlation (which the article said DaVinci was specifically made for) and pricing. It also said that DaVinci had the best reviews and ratings, for example on G2 and Capterra.

I also watched a number of reviews and opinions on this on YouTube, and the one I found most useful was ‘DaVinci Resolve vs Premier Pro For Beginners- Real Reasons to Switch’. This was really useful as it included clips of using both softwares to highlight the points made in the video (which I was able to refer to later on when trying out DaVinci Resolve myself). The video also went into more detail than the article, going over and comparing them on topics such as: scrubbing, time framing, speed and flow of the softwares, audio, and more. The main thing that made me interested in DaVinci was how the video showed the differences in colour correlation on Premier Pro versus DaVinci. It showed that there were many more options on DaVinci, and how you can edit more specifically. You can even do things like sky replacements, changing textures, eyes, and even things like changing brightness of faces during videos over a certain time frame. This convinced me that maybe DaVinci would be more effective for work I want to do in the future, because I like to look at videos from an artistic perspective, and these tools on DaVinci seemed much more tailored to that type of video editing.

This all led to me deciding to try out DaVinci for myself, to see if I preferred to use it over Premier Pro.

Article used: ‘DaVinci Resolve be Premier Pro: 2025 Head-to-Head Showdown’,

https://www.evercast.us/blog/davinci-resolve-vs-premiere-pro

YouTube video: ‘DaVinci Resolve vs Premier Pro For Beginners- Real Reasons to Switch’

https://youtu.be/m2SphvWzV3E

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DaVinci Resolve 19

DaVinci Resolve 19

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DaVinci Resolve 19

Hollywood's most popular solution for editing, visual effects, motion graphics, color correction and audio post production, all in a single software tool for Mac, Windows and Linux!

Free

DaVinci Resolve Studio 19

The most powerful DaVinci Resolve adds DaVinci Neural Engine for automatic AI region tracking, stereoscopic tools, more Resolve FX filters, more Fairlight FX audio plugins and advanced HDR grading.

£245

Editor Keyboards

DaVinci Resolve Speed Editor

Includes large search dial in a design that includes only the specific keys needed for editing. Includes Bluetooth with battery for wireless use so it's more portable than a full sized keyboard!

£325

Color Panels

DaVinci Resolve Advanced Panel

Designed in collaboration with professional Hollywood colorists, the DaVinci Resolve Advanced Panel features a massive number of controls for direct access to every DaVinci color correction feature.

£22,585

Fairlight Audio Consoles

Fairlight Desktop Console

Portable audio control surface includes 12 premium touch sensitive flying faders, channel LCDs for advanced processing, automation and transport controls plus HDMI for an external graphics display.

£2,525

Fairlight Desktop Audio Editor

Get incredibly fast audio editing for sound engineers working on tight deadlines! Includes LCD screen, touch sensitive control knobs, built in search dial and full keyboard with multi function keys.

£3,695

Fairlight Advanced Consoles

Used by Hollywood and broadcasters, these large consoles make it easy to mix large projects with a massive number of channels and tracks. Modular design allows customizing 2, 3, 4, or 5 bay consoles!

From £17,675

Fairlight Studio Console Bundles

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Accessories For Custom Furniture

Fairlight Audio Interfaces

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Professional video editing, color correction, visual effects and audio post production all in a single application. Free and paid versions for Mac, Windows and Linux.

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Ana Mandieta is a photographer whose work i initially wanted to write about in my essay, however I felt that it wouldn’t have fit very well given the context of the essay and how much detail I wanted to go in with Cindy Sherman. However I am glad that I had researched into her,  as my research allowed me to see her piece which is made up of multiple photographs which show her with a male friend, where they shaved off his beard before attaching it to her face and then taking a photograph of it.

Within one of the photos, Mendieta is staring directly into the camera, and i personally got the impression that it was in a challenging way due to the seriousness of her facial expressions. It is almost as if she was challenging the audience or society as if to say ‘so what if i have a beard?’, challenging societal expectations for women to be completely void of. This seemed to be a very bold statement, as it is very different to the conventional way people generally take selfies or even photographs of themselves. People are often presented in a very specific, put together and stereotypical way, usually with their best hairstyle, make-up on and the aim look as good as they possibly can before having a picture taken of them. Mandieta breaks this conventional way of taking a selfie, dressing with her friend’s beard way that makes her look less socially representable or stereotypically feminine with a fluffy and patchy beard. Therefore, i think this photo really challenges the way society as a whole has a particular image of what femininity is, and challenges the need to always look a particular way in photographs.

This image of her in the portrait photo is also reminiscent of a mugshot where the opposite could be said. Instead of it being a way to break conventions of society, it could be seen as a way to say to the audience, “if you look like this, you’ll end up like this”, in a mugshot, almost conveying it is criminal to look like this and not be socially presentable. On the other hand, it may be a way of referring to how if women do have facial hair or dress or present themselves in a way that isn't considered feminine, they may be received poorly and as taboo by society. That they are condemned to be treated almost as a criminal, and as if they are doing something wrong if they do not comply with society’s expectations.

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As part of the essay I wrote and for my pieces of work for my final piece, I decided to conduct a lot of research into colour theory so that I fully understood how colour plays a role in what kinds of impressions and emotions you portray through art. Whilst doing this research, I found a book that I found really helpful which was Stephen Quiller’s work on colour, particularly his book, ‘The Painter’s Guide to Color’ (1999). Despite it being mainly targeted towards painters and more physical rather than digital art work such as photography and video (which I am more interested in and have focused on learning about) I still found the concepts that were explained within the book to be relevant and very useful to know for my own work.

Within the book, Quiller stressed the importance of ‘Value’ and ‘Intensity’ of colours. He went into detail about using colours that cancel each other out, and giving examples of this such as yellow and violet, blue and orange, blue and green, and red and green and all colours in between. Something i found really useful here was that it provided a grid called the ‘Value-Intensity chart’ where Quiller added black to make colours ‘become dirtier’. When elaborating on the colours that cancel eachother out, Quiller referred to the neutral colours as ‘quite beautiful’ and ‘very beautiful’. I have added screenshots of Quiller’s charts below which were from page 50-52.

Quiller also gave details on different colour families, and what emotions are conveyed through different colours. For example, red can convey ‘excitement, love, passion’ and also ‘solitude, melancholy, desperation and suffering’ (Quiller, 1999: 90). Quiller also spoke about how different shades within the same family can represent different things, for an example, ‘violet represents virtue, pride, and maturity’, however, ‘when neutralised, violet expresses… depression, sadness, mournfulness and bleakness’ (Quiller, 1999: 92). He also gave examples of different events that different colours represent, for example red ‘represents Christmas and Valentines Day’ (Quiller, 1999: 90). All of this information was most useful in my opinion as knowing what colours can express different emotions and remind the audience or viewers of different times and events can help me to create a specific feel to future work i make. For an example, if i wanted to create an atmospheric, yet sad looking christmas piece, I could use blue, as ‘a pale, neutralised blue-green creates the most atmospheric depth’ and also has a ‘solitude, melancholy and stormy nature’ (Quiller, 1999:94), as well as red due to its link to Christmas that Quiller mentioned. On the other hand, Quiller’s work taught me that if i wanted to, for example, create a piece with a happy, young couple set on valentines day, I could perhaps use red to convey that it is Valentines Day and convey passion, and also a bright yellow, which can show ‘joy’, ‘warmth’ and ‘youth’ (Quiller: 1999:98).

Overall, Quiller’s work was really enlightening, and i find it really interesting to know why certain emotions, weather and even time of day or year, are portrayed within art and design through the use of colour. It is definitely something I am more mindful of now and will refer back to and apply within future work, especially the horror work I like to do.

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For my essay, I chose to do it on ‘The Young-Girl’, of how they are perceived by society from their selfies and how they are constantly expected to present themselves in a specific way in order to be deemed as feminine. Throughout my essay, I referred to a blog called, ‘The Young Girl and the Selfie’ (Gram, 2013) which explained all of this in great detail. The artist I looked into was Cindy Sherman, whose early work I believed really reflected what was written in the blog. For an example, Sherman’s ‘Untitled #479’ (1975) is made of a number of self portraits or selfies, which starts off with her looking like a stereotypically less attractive woman, wearing thick glasses, no makeup, modest clothing and a straight facial expression. Each photograph following on from this one included her gradually changing her appearance, clothes, body language, and expression until eventually by the end she was a more stereotypically attractive woman, with styled hair, heavy makeup including bold lipstick and blush, more skin exposed, and a seductive pose. This really reflected what was explained in the blog, about how ‘Young-Girls’ are expected to continuously present themselves in a way that society deems attractive to seem feminine, whilst diminishing their own identity in the process.

Other work that I really liked but did not write about in the essay includes ‘Untitled Film Still #2’ (1977), which is also a self portrait which includes Sherman posing at herself in the bathroom mirror, supposedly after a shower since she is wearing only a towel, however despite this her hair is perfectly in place and dry, almost looking like a wig. Her perfect, almost unnatural hair may similarly reflect what ‘Untitled #479’ does, as needing to have perfect hair even after a shower reflects the unreasonable expectations of femininity meaning always being perfect, even within your own home after a shower. The fact that it looks more like a wig rather than her natural hair may reflect how the identities and real beauty and features of a ‘Young-Girl’ are often stripped in the pursuit to appear stereotypically beautiful, and have to pretend to be someone they are not. The fact that Sherman has a lot of skin showing through only the towel being worn, along with her arguably seductive pose in the mirror with her lips parted and head tilted, may also show how women are expected to appear sexy to be attractive, which is also something which Gram touches upon in her blog.

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Cindy Sherman's Untitled Film Stills is a suite of seventy black-and-white photographs in which the artist posed in the guises of various generic female film characters, among them, ingénue, working girl, vamp, and lonely housewife. Staged to resemble scenes from 1950s and '60s Hollywood, film noir, B movies, and European art-house films, the printed images mimic in format, scale, and quality the often-staged "stills" used to promote films. By photographing herself in such roles, Sherman inserts herself into a dialogue about stereotypical portrayals of women. Whether she was the one to release the camera's shutter or not, she is considered the author of the photographs. However, the works in Untitled Film Stills are not considered self-portraits.

Additional text from Seeing Through Photographs online course, Coursera, 2016

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Cindy Sherman. Untitled Film Still #2. 1977 | MoMA

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Cindy Sherman. Untitled Film Still #2. 1977. Gelatin silver print. 9 1/2 × 7 9/16" (24.1 × 19.2 cm). Horace W. Goldsmith Fund through Robert B. Menschel. 811.1995. © 2021 Cindy Sherman, courtesy of the artist and Metro Pictures, New York. Photography