JF+Wk+9

Topic: Weight loss product The photos will portray a single individual who is attempting to loose weight. The first set of photos will show the man, eating healthy, exercising excessively and taking diet product on the market (except for "The Product"). The photos will show the man frustrated or depressed about his minimum results. I may show a before and after photo for this first section, which will show how little change has been accomplished. I then will show a photo of the man on the couch watching TV. A "The Product" commercial will be on the screen and i will photo shop a light bulb over his head. I will then show picture of the man; eating McDonalds food, not exercising and taking the product. I will end with a before/after photo of the man showing how "The Product" help the man reach his goals. The "new and improved" man will be holding the product and smiling where the "old man" will be sad/ pouting with his shoulders slumped.
 * 1) Topic description

PHOTOGRAPHY AUDIENCE PROFILE SHEET
 * 1) Audience profile for VSP
 * Viewer’s Name: **
 * Viewer’s Job Title: **


 * **Kind of Viewer** || **Primary** || **Secondary** ||
 * Education || High School or more ||  ||
 * Professional Experience || Middle/ upper class workers ||  ||
 * Job Responsibilities || Hardworking people that make enough money to afford such products. Most likely lower-middle to upper class individuals ||  ||
 * Personal Characteristics || Overweight (or they think that they are overweight) ||  ||
 * Personal Preferences || They want to find a product that gives them the results they are looking for without too much effort. ||  ||
 * Cultural Characteristics || Any Cultures will do ||  ||
 * Attitude toward the photographer || They are hoping the solution to their weight problem is in the photos ||  ||
 * Attitude toward the subject || Hopeful, willing to try if they can be convinced ||  ||
 * Expectations about the subject || Looking for a quick and easy solution to their problem ||  ||
 * Expectations about the photograph || The photo will eventually show them the solution to their problem. ||  ||
 * Reasons for Viewing the Photograph || They are looking a solution to their weight problem. Succumbing to the pressures in the world to loose weight (health reasons, beauty, etc) ||  ||
 * Way of viewing the photo || Could be skeptical (does this product really work? they’ve tried all the other products with bad results) or hopeful. ||  ||
 * Viewing Skill || Old enough to know if the ad is what they are searching for. Able to comprehend the meaning of the photos and “put themselves in that persons shoes” ||  ||
 * Viewers Physical Environment || Lower -Middle to upper class homes with corresponding lifestyles ||  ||

Starting to work on the VSP. Here is what I have so far . ..

 * The idea: I will make an advertizement for an amazing diet pill, the name of which has not been decided. This pill will produce
 * Where: I was reading my email at yahoo.com when an add for "the Hollywood Diet" came up. The Hollywood Diet is a beverage that is designed to replace all food that a person will eat in a day. The people who use this diet eat nothing for 3-5 days and only drink the "Hollywood Diet"-- they essentially starve themselves skinny.
 * The critics1:
 * Reflection: You can’t easily refuse when I ask to take your picture. What sort of argument might you use? My hair’s not done. I haven’t any make-up on. I feel a certain way--angry, bored, sleepy, sickly, peevish--that will not show me at my best. But I succumb to your pleading because for some reason the moment must be preserved.
 * The critics2: There too from Sontag: “As photographs give people an imaginary possession of a past that is unreal, they also help people to take possession of space in which they are insecure” (9). Need to think about this in terms of the story I want to tell or retell.
 * Search: Looked in Google Images for other photographs by Manish Swarup, the Associated Press photographer. Saw other images of the same burning man plus images of Tibetans including the Dali Lama. Copied some of them to my desktop. Took the color shot that appeared on the web and put it in Picasa and made it B&W so it looked like the image they used in the paper. Then I uploaded them all into Prezi.
 * Prezi: At first I situated them randomly and created a path from what I considered the beginning (the burning man in the distance) to the end where he is on the ground being put out by those in the crowd. Then I reconsidered this plan and instead put the photographs of the burning man around the others of Tibetans and reconfigured the path to go from the outside to the inside and back and forth in this way. I thought of Eisentein’s montage method in this regard.
 * =====What’s next: I am not satisfied with the “story” yet as I’ve constructed it in Prezi. I want to investigate Sontag’s idea of the camera and aggression. Also, the initial image of the photographer to the left of the burning man in the original photo needs critical attention as does the NYT’s editorial decision to post the photograph (in B&W) on page A4 of the paper. Also, there are the comments to the blog where a person was offended [ Gulfres from Houston:The NYTimes should not put these images on the web without some warning as to their graphic and disturbing nature.] by happening on to the images. =====
 * My point: I want to try to argue for Sontag's idea of the camera as an instrument of aggression. Right now I've just presented the story (of the Tibetan man) but want to say why his story is important. My audience is that person on the blog site and those like her who complained about the intrusiveness of violent images into the day to day. I want to identify with her and by way of this identification understand my own aversion to violent images. I want to tell a story of coming to understand the aggressive nature of photography. And is it good or bad? That's at least what I'm going for at this point.