Junior Conceptual: A Junior Design Student Conceptual Project by Sydney Mozer (2016)

I shot this photograph in response to my spoken word poem to explore the feeling of judgement through social norms. My poem expresses the competition between peers due to the high standards that society depicts. The poem states, ''Why is life treated like one big race? It’s a disgrace, that our intelligence is determined by a letter, our attractiveness by a number.'' This shows that there is a constant, unnecessary feeling of competition solely due to the social norms which state that an individual’s status is solely influenced by an individual’s weight and grades.

I chose to shoot candles of different shapes, and sizes, some being lit, and some not. This reflects how people are meant to differ from one another. In addition, my picture expresses the beauty of fire despite its ability to harm. Just like fire, although people may be beautiful on the outside, they can still hurt you. Similarly, people considered ''ugly'' on the outside, are capable of having the most beautiful inner qualities. To shoot these candles, I grouped them all together and lit the majority but left a few un-lit. I then shot from directly above the candles. In photoshop I made the burning candles slightly brighter. While shooting, I had a slight issue with getting enough light in so that the candles would be the proper exposure. After adjusting the aperture and shutter speed, I found a good balance.