OK, I was going to come up with a witty title using song lyrics about photography for this but I realized that there are a lot of really depressing and/or cheesy songs that make reference to photography/pictures! BLAH! I just don’t have that in me today so let’s get on with it.
Today is the last day of my photography class. It was a huge challenge for a couple of reasons. Anyone who has followed this blog for more than a day knows that I am not the best photographer but I have learned a lot in the last several weeks and am thrilled by the prospect of getting better images of my work to you.
I do feel a little better about past photographic sins after learning to use a camera that has full manual settings. The only camera I have had prior to this is my little Nikon “point and shoot” and I now know how many limitations these cameras have! My biggest issue in the past has been lighting and with a fancier camera you have so many options in compensating for your lighting situation that it is difficult to take a bad photo once you get the hang of the controls. That is not to say that I can magically take beautiful photographs on a regular basis but I would say that two or three of each twenty photos I shoot work well and look good with retouching in Photoshop. That is good enough for me!
My final assignment for this class was to reshoot the self-portrait I took on the first day applying the knowledge I gained during class. The first picture you see in this post is my self-portrait. I took a more artistic approach to this assignment because I don’t really enjoy having my picture taken and I am just too lazy to get all dolled up in the middle of the day for a photo shoot (plus, I have a weird rash on my face at the moment and vanity weights very heavily in situations like this).
Here are a few highlights from my class…
These were the result of experimenting with depth of field through the use of aperture settings and were the first photos I took in class that I was really excited about and that my professor gave me big complements for (he asked to use them as an example in future classes!).
This is one of my favorites. We were doing photos in natural light and I took this of my cute little garden fairy that lives under the birdfeeder in our flower bed. We also had several lessons in editing and touching up photos with Photoshop that week so I was able to really bring out the features and beauty in this little statue.
The next three are from the week we worked on photographing 3-D objects (we had taken photos of 2-D objects the week before, which is what really applies here when I am posting pictures of my artwork). I was getting a lot more comfortable with the settings on my camera and how to make them do what I want them to do.
Last week we studied a famous photographer of our choice and then after doing a research paper about the person we were to take photographs emulating their style. My choice was Linda McCartney. I love her work, especially her black and white photography. I also love how intimate her photos are and how they tend to generate the feeling that you are seeing something that you were never intended to see. It is as if you have snuck into the room and get to watch an interaction that no one knows you are seeing.
I don’t know that I was able to emulate her style exactly but I really love the way these photos turned out. I think I am going to have the ones of my son printed and framed.
Over all I must admit that I am very proud of my work in this class. I have learned so much! I think I am most definitely a better photographer for my experience and as ridiculous as it seems, I believe I have gained yet another hobby (as if I have time for that)!
