Robby Cavanbaugh...

Robby Cavanaugh is a self taught photography and fine artists based in Southern California. His Fine art based work started in 2010 and has been recognised globally.

"He strives to create works that transcend the reality we all see, to a reality we can all feel. Robby’s vision for his photography lies on the edge of dreams, where the surreal meets the material."

Much of his work uses techniques within the realm of fine art for example, he often edits his photographs to appear as drawings to further enhance the idea of creating our own reality.

"What one may perceive as imaginary, I see as realities in all of us "~Robby Cavanaugh.

His inspiration for a lot of his photographs comes from conflicts within himself and past memories from his childhood. The way he dealt with these conflict was to bring them to life in photographic form. He edits his photos in the way that he sees it in his mind, for example drawn, painted, or simply just left as it is. A lot of his photographs are focused around the idea of dreams and how we leave the reality that is this world and create our own reality as we want it to be within our dreams. He also focuses a lot on sleep and the illustrations of sleep without necessarily an obvious person sleeping, for example using alarm clocks and clouds to symbolise the idea of sleep and what we associate sleep with.

The image above is of two people appearing to be a couple. They are submerged in water whilst the man cradles the woman. They look as though they are purposely positioned there, however as they are posed with a pillow and a white blanket, it is an uncommon environment for them to sleeping in. The woman is lower than the man suggesting a sense of protectiveness from the man, further implied by the way the man is holding on to the woman as she rests on his chest. The man looks in control of the way they are lying whilst the woman clings him. The woman's eyes are closed and  they are in the sleeping position with props that suggest a sleeping state. However the man's eyes are slightly open and so this suggests the element of protection further as it is as if he is watching over his partner as she sleeps. The colour composition is significant as the colours circling the pair are dark and portrays the mood as being lonely due to the emptiness of the dark water . However in the centre is the white of the pillow and the blanket which brightens up the image. Due to the fact that they are in the middle of the composition and the water around them is vast and dark it suggests that they are alone and an anomaly to the water. This is heightened by the fact that it is an uncommon place for them to be sleeping and looks out of the ordinary and somewhat deviant.

My Responses...

For my responses to Cavenbaugh, I chose to focus on the tree stump as the environment of sleep. I used a model with a white dress on to show the idea that they had been left there to sleep which is an unusual place for sleep. I then incorporated the feathers from my initial 100 to show the development of ideas throughout my responses. I then incorporated the alarm clock which features in some of Cavanebaughs shots but particularly with the tree stump photograph I replaced the mug with an alarm clock to show the development from his photographs to mine and how mine links to my project of sleep.

I then continued to develop on my ideas from the shoot and use the clock within some of my other shots. Within the image above, she is cradling the alarm clock as if she has been put there and the clock has been planted on her to wake her up at a certain time. This is where the inspiration for my development shoots comes from inspired by fairytales and the mysterious imagery throughout. I was inspired by the way Cavanbaugh uses the light and shadows around him to create this mysterious tone throughout his photographs. I adapted this within my own work, by using locations and angles that create natural shadows and incorporating light clothing and props to make the final outcome more contrasting. I also made the images less saturated using photoshop to make them appear duller in colour, to further emphasise the dark, mysterious atmosphere that Cavanbaugh applies to his photographs. Although the inspiration for the colour composition stems from the photographer I researched, I wanted to make the images stand on their own, and so I incorporated my ideas throughout them.For, example, the theme of these shoots is how the subject appears to be sleeping in uncommon environments and the use of the clock adds another mysterious story line to these images, which allows the viewer to put a story alongside an image. 
The images above, are of a young girl in a white dress lying in the middle of a wooded area. In some of the images she is cradling an alarm clock and in others she has it resting upon her, which emphasises the importance of the object, in that we often associate sleep with waking up, which is symbolised with the clock. Furthermore, some of the images have feathers draped beside the young girl and this is also another object that we correlate with sleep. Often within films and television feathers are used as a way to portray dreams or dreamlike scenes and so we link those two objects together. I chose to incorporate the feathers to develop on my initial ideas and initial 100 photographers to make sure that throughout my project, everything links together and tells a story. Although, these images, to some, may appear to be just a girl lying on the floor with an alarm clock strategically placed in her hand, in my opinion it symbolises the mystery of sleep. Moreover, it shows how sleep is an unknown state that no one can fully understand as we are not conscious whilst it happens and so the mysterious nature of these photographs mirrors that fact. This is further emphasised by the way the images are took out of their natural setting, for example people normally sleep in a bed not in a forest, and they don't hold their alarm clock waiting for it to wake them up. I wanted to distort normality within these photos.