Gaze
1. I chose to use natural lighting as I do not have access to adequate indoor lighting. This obviously meant that I had to shoot outdoors. The style I used was faux-action. My location was the street as my subject was playing road hockey. I wanted the gaze to communicate focus and determination.
2. The shoot went very well, but my plans changed many times beforehand. I knew because of the light I needed to shoot outdoors. However, my initial plans of shooting at a skate park were interrupted due to repeated bad weather. This forced me to develop a shoot that I could do at a moments notice. So I changed the location to areas around my house. Another problem I encountered was the subject. He is my nine year old brother and a terrible actor. I overcame this by having him actually go through the motions of what he was supposed to be doing. This added another level of difficulty as it forced me to have perfect timing.
3. The message I got and aimed to convey in this shoot was that focus and determination is not correlated to skill level or age. If someone enjoys what they are doing and really wants to do it they will.
4. My goal was for the subject to be viewed as focused and determined. Initially I had very little control over the subject’s image but once I found a way to get him to react the way I wanted I had control. To manipulate the gaze I placed a tennis ball off camera and told the subject to always look at it.
Gaze Contact Sheet
