We arrived at Week 10 (the halfway point in the course) a lot quicker than perhaps anyone thought we would. The 'team' is working well together, commenting and critiquing each others' work without ego or apparent agenda. The fresh eyes brought to photographs help immensely - it allows a new perspective to be offered and a different appraisal of each piece of work by a group you respect enables choices and changes to be decided upon in the best possible manner. This week was about two topics; Health & Safety and Portfolio preparation. We went through some ideas and issues around a variety of H&S subjects and looked at a couple of web sites to enable us to have a resource or two for our work folders. Whilst not the most stimulating element of the course thus far, its usefulness cannot be overplayed as we all realised that both ourselves and our photographic paraphernalia are at risk when engaged upon framing or considering a shot. Any subject or model is likewise at potential risk and the discussion that followed was lively and quite entertaining! We all had been asked by Denise to have one of our potential portfolio images printed off for this week, and we duly took these in for Denise (and our classmates) to review and comment upon. The image above is the image I chose to have printed off and take in. I had around 20 images ready to be considered and felt that I had a fairly firm 'running order' in my head for those that would be included. My Portfolio is titled 'Five Trees' and it places 5 trees in the wider farm landscape that they inhabit. The above image appears as Photograph #3 - 'Book Cover'. This image was captured on a late afternoon shoot when the sun was sinking and the evening mist was beginning to wind itself around the landscape like a friendly cat. It was taken at ISO-800, f/16, 18mm focal length on my Canon EOS 700D / T5i and when printed looked very striking. It is so striking in fact - or at least it is to me - that I have already chosen it to be the cover for my next poetry collection ('Moments in Time' [ISBN 978-0-9935949-0-8]), which will be published in early 2018 all being well. One of my reasons for taking this course was to increase the results of my landscape endeavours. All of my 5 previous collections of poetry have had one of my photographs as the cover (at least those in paperback). But even though I used Photoshop to enhance the images i used for them, the results have never been as good as I wanted. I knew I could do better and this course - with practical image capturing and Photoshop elements, was a perfect place to start. Current facilities enable a photographer to have a vast array of post-production at their fingertips. But if the image is not that good to start with, you are unlikely to create something as close to your idea as you would wish - or at least this is how I have experienced it. I believe that this course has already enhanced my landscape images; and 'Book Cover' has the colours, framing and 'mood' that I am searching for for this next collection. Interestingly, when I showed all of my other images, two that I had thought of as preparatory to the main document were well regarded by the group and I altered my plans to include them instead of two which were of blue sky with the tracery of branches against it which did not seem as strong to the rest of the group. This session allowed me to firmly place the portfolio plans in my head and, upon returning home, I have spent the last few days refining and altering the portfolio into its final layout and thus its (hopefully) final draft. I have spent time in printing off on one of my own printers a complete 'mock up' in order to take it in upon our return after the Easter break for comment by our course Tutor. As usual, since having the whole portfolio printed off; I have discovered a couple of errors. But it is beneficial to discover these now rather than when the final document is printed and bound for presentation! So, we now have three Mondays off, so as I am (completely) finished with my Risk Assessment, and have reached a point with my Portfolio (at this time) that requires outside comment; my energies must turn to the Coursework folder, journal and check list which, I have to acknowledge, I have somewhat let alone over the last couple of weeks. As all of our Unit One work has to be completed and submitted on 15th May, I have a bit of work to do to get it into some sort of order and ready for submission! Have a great Easter all, keep snapping....
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So this week was mainly about preparing for our Portfolio submission. It was interesting, looking at the images that everyone brought along to the session; everyone is a photographer yet everyone looks at the world differently and has a very different approach to their work. Even those using (on the face of it) a similar subject are using different techniques and trying to record something different than the other.
My Portfolio is well under way, and I am finding it more challenging than I thought I might. No one who knows me will be surprised at this but I always find inspiration easy, to include efforts in any work I undertake is easy - it is in the editing that the final piece comes together and this is a feature of creativity I still find challenging. My academic work over the years has increased in scope and depth and now I find a simple approach -direct and brief - a little more difficult than I'd like! The above image is one taken as a preparatory study for part of my portfolio. Trying to catch the light source on the underside of the branches on the left, whilst capturing the tractor marks and general field texture was my aim; and I am not far away from what I wanted. We are increasingly looking at Photoshop techniques which is a very real reason I joined the course - I've been using Photoshop since iteration 2.0 but it is something that i have never learnt 'properly'. It's great to learn by doing, but the drawback is that it can lead to you becoming proficient in only a few areas. I know what to do in regards to the areas I regularly use; but the coming week or so will hopefully increase my depth and width of knowledge, and this is something I relish. Looking forward to printing one of my images and seeing how it looks on good quality paper to take in to the session on Monday. Things are getting serious now... Take care, keep snapping... Now don't get me wrong, I enjoy sifting and sorting paper, images, words and the like. And to me, walking into a stationery shop (a shop that sells paper, pens and other lovely things, not one that never moves) is something to enjoy. On Monday we discussed the planning and prep for our portfolio's. I had always had two ideas in my mind. One was to use Keith's collection of musical instruments (he has many) to take photos of them in intricate and enjoyable ways. To bring out the curve of an acoustic guitar, the neck of a Saxophone, the colour and lines of a Djembe and so on. Instruments can be soulful, evocative, even tinged with the erotic. But apart from one or two shots - the final one being Keith playing his favourite guitar but focused tight in on the hands and instrument as it is played, not the player - I believed it would be a little challenging given the time, access and skill I have (or have not) in that area. Perhaps on another course.... My main hobby in photography over decades has been landscapes and sunsets. Trying to 'paint with light', bring out the muted colours and moods of a sky as well as the obvious and startling ones. Always striving for that perfect balance of light and dark, tone and feature. Never really capturing it as I wanted too. Don't think this is false modesty - I am proud of many of the images I have taken, lots of my photos have been good, even better than good, some people have (said that they) liked them; but I've always thought I could do better. And I have always endeavoured to improve with every shot I took. So for the Portfolio for this case, I quickly thought about a line of five trees located in a couple of fields near my daughters school. There are five; all of different heights and general size. Essex often gets a bad rep in my opinion; it is thought of a vulgar and dirty, prosaic and unfulfilling. not a nice place to live. Yet it has some lovely scenery, the tone and quality of the light can be startling at times and I knew that, if I take images at different times on different days, the colours and mood of the landscape, the tone of the trees so stark in the increasingly green fields, would (hopefully) result in some great images. The monochrome image above is one of a set of preparatory photos I took when seeking out aspects and locations around the tree group in order to make best use of the line and form that they create in the landscape they live in. I wasn't sure how many photos we could have in our Portfolio, and it now appears that there must be a minimum of 5 but a maximum of 10. This meant a lot of cutting out of images I wanted to use (you are not shocked, I can tell). Our session on Monday was really useful - we all looked at each other's work and ideas and some were simply stunning. I've always been a 'decisive moment' (Cartier Bresson) type of chap; in the moment even if not actually part of the moment. I have always sought to record 'slices of time' in my work - whether that be a photo, a poem or a drawing. To record something that in some way is important to me is very fulfilling. Some of my classmates are recording delicate tracery of the skeletons of flowers, some street and architecture, one still life of flowers in the style of Mapplethorpe and all are unique and lovely. Looking at theirs and then at my poor offerings resulted in a moment or two of panic, but I recovered enough to continue; I will do all I can to result in a good looking portfolio and try to bring out the best in the landscape in which I find myself. So I took a couple of images along that I thought were not great but I liked, and the consensus of the group was that they deserved a place in the portfolio - I was surprised by the feedback but this made the session stand out even more. A person engaged upon creative pursuits always tries to make something that communicates and is pleasing or challenging. Even if they purport to create only for themselves; they still want some form of recognition of the attempt. To have the feedback of six other people looking at my images with fresh eyes and from a different perspective was very interesting. So, next week is more information on the Portfolio, around print finishing, to border (or not to border), colour and density and other technical issues. It will be an interesting session, of that I have no doubt! Take care, keep snapping.... Week seven saw us a little depleted as a couple of our compadre's were unable to make it. Nevertheless the pushed on and even had a guest in part of the session who was reviewing the course and course tutor.
This week we didn't touch the cameras, it was all about the legal stuff - things that many of us had never thought of but which are crucial and important to be aware of in order to take good photographs in the correct way and with the law on your side. So, we went through the Code of Conduct for the National Union of Journalists (www.nuj.org.uk/about/nuj-code/) to review how they gather material - including the use of moving and still images of course - in the course of their work. I'll not comment on the Code per se, nor how it might sometimes be interpreted in a particularly 'free' way; but it was a useful insight into how journalists should behave. Also during this session we looked (and had some handouts from) Lisa Pritchard's book 'Setting Up a Successful Photography Business' (www.amazon.co.uk/Setting-Successful-Photography-Business-Professional/dp/1408125773) as there are some very good sections around copyright, different markets for photographs, as well as legal obligations and a code of practice for when shooting. [I read this in my own time and found it highly informative - even though I have no intention as such of setting up a business at this time.] An area which, I believe, came as a surprise to many of us - it certainly did to me - was around Permissions and Release forms for models and even places! I had been aware that a model on a shoot would have been paid for their time and the use of their image and thus would have signed a release to that effect. I had not realised that in essence, to 'cover' oneself and ones images you should seek the signature and permission of every person who appears in your photographs; especially if they could be identified by '5 points of recognition'. The identification of people from images is now much easier than ever, and a concerning piece of technology ('FindFace') looks set to increase this even more. To use an image for profit which includes a person without permission or a release could end up becoming very difficult legally. Thus the idea of having a release from a person in your own images seems to be both practical and reasonable in today's environment. Looking at copies of Permissions and Model release forms was informative but when we reached a section in the session where we looked at places and buildings; I realised that this had a specific connection to me. My proposed portfolio will be on '5 Trees'. The trees are in between two farmers fields near where I live and they have a pleasing aspect and potential to allow me to create a pleasing set of images. I had thought, in my idle moments, that as and when I saw a likely looking farmer, I'd mention taking images on his land and ask if he minded. I have since realised that I need to do more - I thus downloaded an app called 'Releases'. This app allows you to input your own details once within it and then provides templates and options to adjust permissions and releases from the relevant people to allow you to take the photographs (and of course retain the copyright) you wish within the law. I had never imagined that I might need permission to take images of a set of trees, but this session alone, whilst not utilising our cameras which were to hand, was a valuable lesson nevertheless. After this we went onto the entertaining area of copyright law - something I know a little about due to my previous career and being a creative type who puts his work out there for all to see, but who wishes to retain control over his work and, if at all possible, actually receive some money generated from the sale of it! The three YouTube videos we watched were interesting and outlined much of what I knew already, but the group task (where we looked at images and an explanation around what they were going to be used and had to decide what permissions they would need; was very useful. Even though it was not a camera-centred session, the time went quickly and we only had a while to look at each other's images for 'Image of the Week'. Although three hours on a Monday afternoon seems a lot, the time always seems to run away from us and often requires us to carry over a point or two to the following session! We were supplied with a very useful Homework sheet. We were tasked with creating a risk assessment for our portfolio work and to bring a few preliminary images around our portfolio subject with us to the next session. But as I also had received some very good feedback on my work thus far from the tutor, a re-write and refocus of my coursework will take up the first few days of this week! Take care all, keep snapping... |
Alan MitchellI'm always trying to capture that fleeting 'moment' in time -whether by taking a photo or writing a poem. My attempts to capture that illusive feeling, sight, sensation or sound in some way is, to me, magical. Archives
March 2023
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