✨Swimming With The Swans - Photography Archive #1✨

This is the first post on here of me documenting my older photography that id like to share!

This photo shoot was entitled "Swimming With The Swans." I shot these in September 2024, and the model is my longtime friend Gareth. It was originally taken for my second year A Level personal project, surrounding the theme of fabric (I approached this by talking about clothing out of context.) 

To set up these shots was a challenge. I knew i wanted him to be in a body of water, but i live in the most land locked, country bumpkin area of the UK. (The ocean is hours away :(....) My solution for this was to instead use the Quay in the city my college is based in. Was this water absolutely vile? God yes! (He was sick for days after this, but that's only because he dove in several times as he dropped the cord phone....) But after using Gareth as a subject for 4-5 years now, i knew he'd be so down. Hes the kind of person who will do the strangest, craziest or most dangerous thing without question, especially for a good photo shoot. (He's a very good subject, he COMMITS HEAVY) 

I wanted him to portraying a 9-5, bland office worker, very single clueless father - core. This was because, as i mentioned before, the project this was made for was based around the idea of clothing and context. What's more out of context than taking calls in your work clothes in the water?

We did face a few issues. 1) Gareth kept f*cking dropping the phone. He literally dropped it 3 or 4 times. OMG. That's why he low key got E coli (?????) 2) The quay happened to be filled by a flock of particularly aggressive swans. They kept chasing him around the water, and the nearest way to climb out was around 8 metres away, so he was in a constant state of swan induced fear and panic this entire time.This was a huge hindrance, but it also birthed the funniest pictures of him rapidly swimming away from an oncoming hoard of swans. 

The top picture was fully a mistake - He was flailing to try and keep his balance, but somehow i captured the perfect moment which has literally become my favourite picture i've ever taken. As for the phone, its one of my absolute fave props. I got it from my local recycling centre, and it was originally white, so i spray painted it red.  I lovee red and blue/green, so that's a recurring theme in my photos!!