Falling Back: A Junior Design Student Conceptual Project by Benjamin Peterson (2017)

I am exploring the feeling of humiliation through the experience of seeking the companionship of others.

I used paper cranes in my photo to represent people. The majority of the cranes are in the top left of the frame facing away from the center of the photo, symbolizing a group of people leaving. The bottom right of the frame is taken up by a lone crane, made out of crumpled and plain printer paper. He is lying far away from the other cranes, like he was abandoned, and the camera is looking straight down; like an observer looking on a situation. The lighting of the photo is done from a single light source coming from the top left of the frame to convey the feeling that the only light is coming from the group of colorful cranes. The black background is flat and black, which conveys a sense of loneliness one might experience after being humiliated.

The cranes represent people and the more colorful cranes represent vibrant people, while the plain crane is smaller and crumpled, symbolizing someone who was just humiliated for being different. The camera placement, along with the arrangement of the crane captures a moment just after the plain crane was humiliated, and now the group they were trying to be in is leaving them. The black background adds a sense of loneliness to the photo, which is how the plain crane feels at the moment just after being humiliated. The almost pitch black around the plain crane represents how, when someone feels humiliated, they are embarrassed and only want to disappear. Instead of capturing the event of humiliation, this photo highlights the moment just after being humiliated.