Project Rationale

Elizabeth Chandler

BA (HONS) Photography - level 4

Photoskills B - Cyborg assignment (The real body shop)

Project Rationale

Upon completion of the 6 week Photoskills B assignment I wish to reflect upon my work, evaluating my progress, development of ideas and the success of my final piece.

The work I have produced for this assignment is titled “The real body shop”.

It is an A3 digital composite produced using Adobe Photoshop and multiple (9+) high quality stock images found on the internet. 

The work is a dystopian reflection of the cyborg, which simply means the merging of the body and technology. It illustrates a negative opinion of anatomy in a culture where body parts are increasingly seen as commodities. It challenges the culture of cosmetic surgery and reflects the impact of the media on women's appearances. The piece is aimed towards a gallery audience as a statement about the influence of modern society on women and their views regarding their physical appearance as well as the ability to selectively enhance and transform ones external aesthetic. 

I have referred to many sources to gather information that informs this assignment, from make-up adverts, the sex doll industry, advertising and pornography. In addition i have looked at many photographers work and photoshop creations to inspire the visual construction of my work. 

My final image communicates the concepts surrounding the culture of thinness and the ability to transform ones body via cosmetic surgery and other such procedures in order to enhance, alter and/or completely reconstruct specific parts with as much ease as purchasing a new pair of jeans.

Intertwined with this, there are elements which suggest a protest against the female body as a sexual object. 

Both the porn industry and advertising have stimulated many of my ideas; Both have contributed to the social expectations of female bodies. They are the puppet masters governing women's actions to constantly strive to better their physical appearance and achieve conventional beauty which is defined by society. 

Magazines encourage women to exert themselves to achieving levels of beauty which are, on the most part unattainable. 

Through research i discovered that women’s magazines have ten and half more adverts and articles promoting weight loss than men’s do, and over three-quarters of the covers of women’s magazines include at least one message about how to change the female bodily appearance. 

After looking at such magazines and studying the articles I Found very often the weight-loss/ beautification programs are followed by surveys and reports which inform women of things that men ‘look for in women’, or advice on ‘finding your true love’.

The whole idea stemmed from a trend i noticed on twitter.

A twitter trend is automatically generated when a topic is of particular interest at that time. The trend #Toohotinhere involved members uploading pictures of themselves using a sunbed.

Instantly it made me think of the assignment as it related to technology and the way in which humans depend on it.

I started looking at expectations of appearances and what made people want to look a certain way and why.

I found that desirable physical appearance varied according to location and changed depending on social groups.

This research lead me into looking specifically at women and the way in which they are impacted by social stereotypes and the media.

The development of new technologies such as the internet and smart phones makes media consumption greater than ever before. One effect of this, is that the indoctrinating images of the “perfect” female aesthetics have increased significance and responsibility for encouraging body modification.

I created a poll on facebook asking if people agreed that the media influenced the way they think they should look. Of the 32 people who answered, 15 agreed 100% with the statement, 13 said they thought it sometimes influenced them and only 4 completely disagreed thinking that the media has no influence on them what so ever. Interestingly, of the 4 who disagreed 100%, all but one were male.

In terms of the technical aspects of the work, There is an element of illusion in the image. 

I have combined photographic elements which initially were tonally different, I used photoshop not only to cut and paste items but also to mimic the lighting and shadows in order to create the illusion of the images belonging together, at first glance you could mistake the photographs content for any other shop. 

I included a generic boutique background as to reinforce the message that it is as easy to ‘upgrade’ your body as it is to purchase a new item of clothing.

My final composite consists of many layers, most of which are sections intricately cut out of other images. For example the body parts belong to celebrities or models.

Through using layer masks, shapes and blending modes i managed to make the body parts look like singular objects that stood alone. I then used the warp and perspective tools to ensure the body parts sat on the shelf in a relatively realistic manor. 

The warp and perspective transform tools also came in useful when adding tags to items, the angle of view helps diminish the initial ‘cut and paste’ look and gives the image more dimensions. I slightly blurred the background to introduce photographic elements such as selective focus and used the filters panel to alter the appearance of the body parts which have had a ‘plastic wrap’ filter applied to them, not only to make them look like false interchangeable parts, but also to ensure consistency.

Final image

Bellow i have included screen prints captured during the process of making the final image above.

the top three images illustrate how i used the curves feature, colour balance and altered the contrast to active the desired tone to the image.

next i cut out legs from an image, refined the edges and pasted them onto the shelf, i used the perspective and warp tools to ensure the legs looked like they sat on the shelf in a fairly realistic manner.

next i applied the adjustment layers of colour balance and curves ect to ensure the tonality of the legs matched the tonality of the shelf

i duplicated the legs and made a mirrored version of them, increased the size slightly to enhance the feeling of perspective

i applied the same colour balance to the second pair of legs and introduced a new body part which was also created by cutting it from a photograph of a model.

i applied the same lighting and colour effects to the stomach and also tried to introduce a shadow  in a similar direction to the one which is being cast on the original image of the shelf, this step of copy and pasting items and applying appropriate adjustment layers was then repeated for each item.

here i used a shape to create a shelf tag, changed the layers blending mode to achieve a drop shadow

i added a text layer and adjusted this to sit on top of the blue sign made previously

i repeated the previous two steps for the rest of the body parts

i then looked at the shelf itself ad though about how shadows cast from the object would be cast onto the shelf and painted them in behind each body part

next i introduced another stock image but used to warp and perspective tools to skew the image appropriately so that when i placed it behind my composite it would align and create the illusion of shop isles

Next i added the plastic wrap filter and adjusted it to make the objects look almost like doll parts and also to ensure they remained consistent in how they looked.

i then had to mimic the lighting effects, colour balance and contract to make both the foreground and background match. (see next two stages)

Add caption

i then introduced some of the tags which were the same as the ones used in the foreground to enhance the idea of it being one shop. I did the same with the shelf tags and text layers - ensuring they matched the ones in the foreground yet trying, where possible to alter the perfective of the tags to make them match the angle of view

finally i blurred the background slightly to introduce photographic aspects like depth of field.

After my proof print i made some other minor alterations such as the alignment of the shelving and saturation of the lips, i also removed some white lines which were visible from the cut and paste process - for this i used layer masks.

The Real body shop - further development

I tried to incorporate the idea of body parts for sale and display them on shelves to mimic a shop like feel, then i looked at adding elements which suggested a stage like puppet show to represent the fact that the body parts are so easily swapped and changed due to the demand for 'perfection' which defined by the media.
As much as i liked this image to an extent i wanted the suggestion of being able to purchase designer body parts to be more simplistic, as to reinforce just how easy it is to change your physical appearance today.
From creating this image i realised i would have to decide between the puppet like elements and the idea of making the body parts everyday objects in order to simplify and strengthen the main message of the work.

I want to try and create a more dynamic view with a perspective and make an illusion that is convincing enough upon first glance yet not so convincing that it is difficult to establish that it is a digital composite.

I am going to use stock imagery and combine empty shelving where i will place the body parts with a backdrop of a boutique clothing store to enhance the suggestion that you can purchase, say for example a new pair of boobs just as easily as you could purchase a new outfit.

From doing all the experimentation i will remember to be conscious of important elements when selecting the images i use.

The body parts will be cut from photographs of celebrities as with many of the objects in the above example.
I don't think i need as many objects as i have on this example simply as i don't want to clutter the image too much.
Often real boutiques have a clinical, open layout - this is an important element that i will have to consider when creating the composite.

further development

Thinking about the strings on my image and what they represent i decided to play around and see what i could achieve by  controlling where they lead to, in this case I thought i would use technological items which have the ability to influence the way people think about female appearances.

I don't particularly like this image as I feel it looks more like a poster and I want to create something more aimed at a gallery wall.

In addition if i was to develop along this route i would consider my subjects involvement with the items and ensure she was facing them to illustrate how connected to technology we are.

Developing images after feedback

After last feedback i decided to use this idea of having loose parts, only instead of using the ones i removed off my models body i used celebrity body parts and an image from a make-up advert (lips)

i tried experimenting with this in various ways, I do not like the effect on these images however they have helped me establish that what the image needs it a more dynamic background which reinforces the idea, for example a stage where the puppet is being controlled, or a shop!!!

Development of photoshop skills

I took some photographs of a fellow student in the studio to use in creating my digital composites. I experimented with different positioning as to give me a variety of images to play with.
I used a white background and even lighting to ensure the cut and paste process in photoshop was as easily achieaveble as it could be.


I played around and created many images which I then presented during a feedback session, this was extrememly usefull in helping me identify which elements of the images were most successfull in communicating my ideas and how to further development them.

This image seemed to stimulate the most interest and it was mentioned that the simple idea of having interchangeable  body parts was effective in communicating my ideas. To further develop this I am going to look at how i can incorporate prices and enhance the idea of the items being sold and purchased with ease.

I played around combining many different techniques in photoshop to create these images.
Another aspect that was said to be working well was the puppet strings.
I want to try giving my images more context and background so plan to experiment with that next.

Another idea i was playing around with in photoshop was putting body parts in shopping bags/baskets .