Jean-Robert Dantou

A bent toothbrush, a pipe, a trashbag, an engagement ring, perfume bottles… A photographer and social scientists sought out objects that focus on decision-making for people described as suffering from mental illness.

How can a decision be made when the person in question is described as being incapable of deciding for themselves ? How can their perspective, and that of their friends and family, be taken into consideration? How can it not be taken into consideration? In each case, the dangers the person faces, as well as the dangers they put others in, have to be weighed up against jeopardizing their freedom.

The perception of these dangers makes a difference. What are acceptable risks, unacceptable ones, and for whom ?

Each decision brings into play a combination of experiences, knowledge, perceptions and norms. These “marker objects” beckon, signal, allow stories to be told that are intertwined with the lives of those that suffer, those that care for them, those that love them and live with the uncertainty.

Jean-Robert Dantou is a French photographer, living in Paris, who focuses on similarities between photography and social science for above 10 years. He explores different topics such as mental health, memory or migrations. Dantou has many different photography styles, from people to objects. In his object photographs, he takes images of a single object on a plain white background.

The objects are quite random, ranging from a broken toothbrush to a toy vehicle. It is a simple, odd yet effective style. Dantou uses high-key lighting to brighten up his photos and uses high aperture to focus the object more. These images strike me as they are simple and random, but they could have a deeper meaning to them.

If I were to ask Dantou one question about his work, i would ask,

"Do these images have a meaning, and if they do, what is the meaning?". This is because the images are relatively random and i believe there might be significant meaning towards the images.

In my opinion, I believe the image of the toothbrush snapped in half

could represent anxiety as anxiety causes stress which the toothbrush has been 'stressed' so much that it has snapped in half.

This also relates to how Dantou explores the link between photography and social science.

I am inspired by Dantou's work as i love the concept of taking photos of objects that would be used in daily life, but have a deeper meaning to the images.

The idea is to lay singular objects on a white background with high-key lighting to brighten up my images.

I am inspired by Jean-Robert Dantou and his simplistic style of photography of objects.

My plan is to have a big white sheet of paper and use it as a background, i will lay my objects on it and take photos with lots of light

There will be no setting. just a plain white background.

The lighting will be high-key to make the image pop more and is more visible

I will use singular objects and put them in simple compositions by themselves.

The camera angle will be facing towards the front of the object so the white is all around the picture.

The main challenge of this photoshoot is the lighting as i do not have studio lights.

I think the shoot went pretty good as i got many images. i could improve by using better lighting.

Contact Sheet - RAW images

In these images i took photos of differnt objects that i have in my house. These objects consist of 2 bottles of cologne, a computer mouse, keys and a calculator.

I used highkey lighting to brighten up my images

and i have used 2 sheets of plain white paper

to have a white background in my work.

This photoshoot came out well as i got good enough lighting and i have taken many images.

i could improve this buy having better lighting and using different objects.

Experimenting with Brightness and Contrast

Process Logs

1. I have turned the contrast to 100. This makes the shadows more defined and the object darker.

2. I have then turned the brightness up. this removes most of the extra shadows in the background and makes it look almost plain white.

Highlighting success:

I believe this is my best development of the "Experimenting with Brightness and Contrast" developments. This is due to the fact that the development looks almost 'professional' to an extent. The image is clear, bright, well balanced and the angle was a perfect choice.

In this development I had turned the contrast to 70 and the brightness to 17. I had drawn with the fix tool to correct any imperfections in the background or the subject of the image.

The overall developments went relatively well. Although, I still believe this is my best development in this series.

Experimenting with Black and White

Process Logs

1. I have used the black and white tool to make the image monochrome.

2. I have then used the curves tool and turned the curve up to make the image brighter.

Experimenting with Series

Process Logs

I have used the crop tool to increase the size of the workspace so that there is a white border around the image

I have then zoomed out so the image is smaller and then I have used the crop tool again to make the workspace even bigger to fit 4 other images around