Saturday 26/9/20 - The Idea

The idea for this project is to take the theme of the original painting and instead twist it into a new context. Instead of being the glorifcation of war this will be about the utopian ideas of the future versus the dystopian. As I mentioned in my research this is because it's something that's very imaginative yet it still is something important to us today. Throughout human history we have always been looking towards the future, many times it has been very ambitious and idealistic however some instead look at things in either a more realisitic or cynical approach. Some like to look at the advances technology will bring us or how better the world will be whilst others look at the damage we could cause with it or other issues such as climate change or conflict.

Initially my plan was to simply recreate the painting through photography but only replace the flowers hiding the woman's identity with edited in cybernetics and technology. Instead I plan on making the entire photo cyberpunk inspired through fashion, atmosphere and photography techniques, this will also still include the idea to replace the face with edited in cybernetics. In terms of props/equipment the most I'll need is a mask to cover the part of the face I'll be editing out and some lights to help the atmosphere. I'll also be using one of my previous photo tests as influence for this (Link here)

For this photoshoot I plan on taking inspiration from the film Blade Runner and its sequel primarily however I will look at a range of sources, more specifically the ones I noted in my research.

After this I plan on moving on towards creating a short video using this as a base. The concept is relatively simple as it requires only two different shots which will give me a chance to explore a bit of technique when it comes to film and use my experience in photography. I'm doing this with only two shots to give myself more time when it comes to editing. This is because I plan on taking a risk and going out of my comfort zone through attempting to use VFX. I've had very limtied experience with this in the past so I'm looking forwards to being able to experiment with it. The short film idea is to have the first shot being a person with both a prosthetic arm and a small light on their temple standing alone in a sort of deep thought. The shot will change focus from their face to the light on their temple before they pull it out with their prosthetic and break it in their hand. This is meant to show them rejecting the idea of the utopian future. This will intertwine with a shot of a woman dressed similiar to the original painting. The light on their temple is meant to be a cybernetic implant into their head, inspired by the games Detroit: Become human and Borderlands pictured here:

This shot will feature them intially with their head turned away from the camera but slowly they will turn towards to reveal a cybernetic face. This is to show their thoughts visually, the idea that all of these promises look inviting but when looked at realisitically a lot of them may not be what we truly want. One example of this is the idea of microchips implanted into us, something which Elon Musk is working on. It comes with a lot of possibilities both good and bad.

To mark out the areas where I will attempt to use VFX I will use green material to cover them up. Aside from that I don't need any other props / equipment. When it comes to the small light on the temple I plan on also using a green card but I will use a small torch to shine light onto it so that the lighting is realistic instead of being edited in post. I may also make a physical prop for this (One that doesn't actually light up) to make the filming and editing easier.