Thursday 11 August 2011

Working Title

A few weeks ago now, I did a shoot for a collaborative of artists who go by the name 'Working Title'.  They were in Runcorn Old Town producing an interactive piece of work using an abandoned garage. The idea was to allow the public the control a remote control vehicle with a camera and mic attached, when pointed at the actors (each of whom was an historic figure from Runcorn's past) they would perform.

You can see more about this here:

http://workingtitleuk.ning.com/

Or at their blog:

http://workingtitleartistscollectivecrea.blogspot.com/

But rather than show you the shots of the actors I made good use of having access to an abandoned garage... here's some of my favourite shots:











Friday 5 August 2011

Whispers

Sometimes there is a beauty to be found in the young and old, a life that I don't remember or am yet to experience...


Friday 17 June 2011

Exhibition!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well tomorrow is the last day of the exhibition, that would be Saturday 18th June. It's been such a good experience, an amazing diversity of images and a pleasure to have exhibited and studied with my fellow students!

The opening night was awesome, a complete blur that went by in the blink of an eye. But what a night!


So what now.... I am left feeling at a loss. Time to move on to another project me thinks....

BUT, if you couldn't make the exhibition, here's all 17 images (on my website!):

http://www.caseycarlin.co.uk/gallery_428192.html

Enjoy!

Thursday 9 June 2011

End Of An Era

Well I finished my journal for 'Minute by Minute', everything is ready for the end of year exhibition...

While I'm happy that another project has been completed, one that I am truly happy with, this one is twinge with a bit of sadness as well. Its my final project for my degree, and signals the end of an era....


But when one thing ends, another begins!

Wednesday 25 May 2011

Chuffed!!!

I'm over the moon, my image has been chosen by CUBE for their press releases and website to represent my years exhibition...

It was decided blind, they didn't know who's picture was who's...

You can see the image at the website: http://www.cube.org.uk/exhibitiondetails/bloom/54

This is what it looks like:

Tuesday 17 May 2011

To Stop.... And Face Up To The Music

This last project has been hard, both mentally and emotionally. Its drained me but maybe not so much in a bad way... BUT I had hit a wall, the kind that life throws at you that seems insurmountable, only to be given a reprieve at the last minute (thanks AJ and Marc).

I felt that perhaps I was stuttering, rehashing the same thing in different ways... no one wants to see the shit rehashed, the last thing I want to do is bore people. Anyway, AJ and Marc gave some advice... each in there own way, but it basically came down to the same message... I am avoiding the real issue by skirting around the edges!


I make no bones that I have issues, this project has become one of facing up to myself, stripping off all the crap, so there's nothing to hide behind.... so thats what I did.... strip.

It was just me and the camera. This is some of what I created, it may or may not be used:




Each means something to me, I feel a bit shaken by the impact of the effect it has had upon mw... but they are personal things I will talk about another time... or not.

Thursday 12 May 2011

Hard To Face It

Sometimes, you can skirt an issue... especially in photography. Sometimes no matter how well you think your saying something, you never quite make it... you get to a point and then back off.

Maybe its time to face up and say what I have to say.... thats what I'm going to try to do in the next few shoots, hopefully I'll get there.

But in the mean time:

What worries me most... more than my actions to date... is when I look into my eyes I will see that I am just like them.... what then???

I tried for so long not to be a 'real man', that when the injury happened that robbed me of so much that it had a galvanising effect... what it took with one hand (literally), it gave with another, and I fought to be the man I had tried to deny I was for so long.... confusing, but when is life anything but?

Wednesday 20 April 2011

For One and All????

Well, still working on this final project for University... this shoot was more about single shots, I'm not sure whether or not to use them in this format, but they where quite interesting and are a bit more intense (for me at any rate).

Maybe this is something I should play about with in parallel with the  main, photo-montage thing???

Enjoy


A Self Portrait

Saturday 9 April 2011

To View Myself

Photography was and is a form of therapy for me, a way I can mould a mood, a feeling, an event... allowing me to express it, so that those around, those who choose to see my images can be immersed and share in my reality. I wanted to say 'wish' to share but thats not how it works, I don't get a choice the same way I don't get to choose my mood.

I avoided mirrors as a child, a good catholic boy, so afraid to see into my eyes and into my soul. As a teen I looked at everything that caught my reflection, so sure and confident but never into my eyes...

BUT it was suggested by a friend, that maybe I should, maybe it was time to go full circle and to face myself. The thought of it terrified me and still terrifies me, I try so hard to be a goof ball, unthreatening, soft, brushed off as a flake.

Do I really want to see the stuff I am made of, to face that reality? What if I am like them? What if I am not the man I try to be? What if I let those closest to me down?

This is very much what my project is becoming. Many of the questions I am asking have no answers but it has taken me a lifetime to realise this, granted not a long life so far but long enough for Alexander the Great to conquer the known world, or for Christ to live his life and be dead, so surely I should know something by now?

Is this the right time or is this a can of worms that should be left alone? Quite simply I don't know, but this project is making me feel... that in its self is a good thing.

A self-portrait:

Thursday 31 March 2011

Final Project (YIKES!!!!!!!!!)

Well as I said in my previous post, its FMP or final major project time on my degree.... very scary!

So after much thought, pondering and hair pulling, I decided to look at 'The Self In Flux'. The idea is quite a simple one, I hope to explore the ever changing thing which is the self. No small order, but you gotta do what you gotta do! I quite like the idea of this amorphous, squishing thing which never holds its form for more than a split second... that even we are unaware of what we truly are, I suppose its the whole idea of what really is the self? What would our reality be like if we did comprehend what we are, warts and all? What are we truly capable of???

Anyway, I could go on with these musings forever. To be honest the whole project is a rhetorical question, lets be honest, there is no answer and its a privilege to have the kind of life where I can spend the time pondering such stuff.

Anyway, I've been playing with the idea of using long exposures and composite images as a means of expressing this liminal entity we are. I think the idea of using lots of long exposures appeals to me because its a total record of who that person was over the sum of all the times of all the exposures added together. Anyway, this is what I initially came up with:

While I was initially happy with the image, I'm not sure that its exactly what I was looking for??? I would perhaps like more of the eyes showing, more for a belief that they are the key to the soul... so perhaps they say more about us than anything else...

Anyway, I had another play, a few tweaks here and there and this is what I ended up with:

Wednesday 30 March 2011

Time To Begin!

Well, I think its time that I join the bloggers of the world and finally start talking about what I do and what I'm up to. As you might have guessed I'm a photographer, and while I do most kinds of photography my dream is to make it as a fine art photographer!

My fine art work is a combination of film and digital techniques, I often look to the origins and early years of photography to find inspiration then kind of mash it all up with a contemporary vibe to create something new and forward thinking. I find that most of my work centres around Reality, The Self and Society... there's a definite psychological edge with many of the images being conceptual and experiment!

I think this is going to be a record or my journey on this road. What ideas I'm playing with, what shoots I've done, where I'm at, up and coming exhibitions etc etc.

(Well teasers at least, got to leave some stuff for my website and exhibitions)

Speaking of exhibitions, I'm coming to the end of my FdA Degree in Photography. So things are a bit nuts with me and my friends busting a gut to get everything ready for our end of year show at the Cube (Manchester, UK), due to be held around the 13th-21st June.... I'll tell you more about this and my project 'Minute by Minute' in the coming weeks.