Instead of continuing along the track I had taken with this project I have paused and reassessed what I want to say visually. Just now I want to evoke a sense of breaking out and transformation from one thing to a, as yet unknown, other.
I also want to speak very consciously with an aesthetic. I know everything has an aesthetic but I mean that I want people to see something that is and both isn’t a bar code and to recognise that immediately and so they can tell its my playing with the form. Thus they will not pass the image by and just think it is a bar code but will recognise its an interpretation of one and so the image will say something else. So I created two versions of imaginary bar codes that try to suggest this using paint, Photoshop and Lightroom and am pleased with the outcome. (Sometimes pausing pays off!)
I am pleased with both results. I think the key was taking codes as my inspiration rather than trying to use actual codes. I think the lower image is better as it is both sharper and while offering a sense of busting out it is still heavily constrained by its own edges.
