Assignment 3 Aftermath

Overall, the main feed back were as follows:

a) Some of the pictures look a little 'stiff'
b) Background on some of them is too distracting
c) Use black frames for matting
d) The interpretation on the theme was interesting

Therefore I would like to actually take a step back and re-shoot some of the photos....

Overall
Effort: 40/50
Execution: 37/50
Total: 77

These values might change after the reshoot...

As for classmates, Pauls and Steph Chias photoshoots really appealed to me.

Stephs Macro stuff was really interesting, and being a macro fan myself, I can't help but feel that it looks fantastic, the closeness of the photographs and the detail for each of them was really nice.

I'd grade it 87%

Paul actually presented his buildings. And I actually liked it. I think the face on treatment really is his style and by doing all of them the same way, there is a sense of continuity throughout. Clean crisp and vivid.

I'd grade it 89%

Assignment 3

This assignment's topic was Change. So I decided to focus on peoples perceptions of change, all of the photos have their own story and reflections. And the methodology was to actually get people to take an item from their childhood, reflect on it and give me what they felt was the expression that best fit their childhood.

All of the photos were left semi saturated instead of black and white, this allowed some of their items to appear colourful and to help give the photos this sense of reflection. Yet I did not want a sepia tone across all the photos as I didn't want to give it an 'old' sensation.










All of the photos are shot so that one could look at them without any particular order, they allow the person to view a 'snapshot' of the model's life.

This last photo however is special, a sort of rounding up photo. It shows an elderly woman(my grandmother actually) with no item but yet her arms are wide open. To sort of say that even though her memories of childhood has vanished, she still lives in the moment and is content to what life brings to her.

Aftermath - Assignment 2

Ok for the second assignments breakdown I'll take it step by step.

1. Commodification of Faith
Feed back was given that the composition was nice, and the overall look was there, but the thing is the picture was lacking in terms of colour depth. It was too silver and white, so I guess to the rest it looked washed out.

Honestly speaking though, perhaps I was trying too hard to go into the whole zen thing. Although I do like these kind of photos, and the fact that this one was deliberately kept with "cold colours" it seems that a spot of some warmness would help attract people to look at it.

Overall Grade: B+, 76/100

2. Gold Coins
Same feedback was given, composition and all were fine, just lacking in colour. This one was basically as this and the first photo were shot in the same style. Except that this one didn't have a deep meaning behind it. So I would rate this photo worse than the first. Although once again I did like the singular isolation look...maybe if I tried to improve the table contrast...

Overall Grade: B, 70/100

As for classmates, I liked Mei Mei's Alfa Romeo shot, very classy indeed. Somehow stands out in comparison to its surroundings, also the angle of the shot was very nice too.

My grade: 87/100

I liked GuanMings shot with the arches, very nice looking with the light rays pouring through, a sense of isolation yet warmth.

My grade: 80/100

Assignment 2 - Exposure

Assignment two was basically something to help us get used to the camera, as explained in my earlier posts, I actually liked simple zen-like compositions, where there's not too much going on (and of course a white background always makes things even nicer.)

After playing around with a few shots I came up with these two.

Commodification of Faith
(ISO 200, 5600K, Shutter 1/80, Aperture F5.6)

This work is basically a set of keys, representing of course our material needs and desires today. Sometimes it comes to a point where even faith (represented by the cross) is commodified and no longer taken to be what it is. This photo represents a sad reality, where materialism is ever increasing.

I took this picture also because of the play between the extreme black of the casing and the silver of the keys, my goal was also to create an illusion of depth on a small object which is why I chose the angle of the shot. At the same time, the whiteness of the table helps with the illusion too.

Gold Coins
(ISO 320, 5000K, Shutter 1/60, Aperture F5.6)

There was no specific meaning behind this. The photo was basically playing with the exposure and aperture to create a sense of depth. This was also and outdoor shot so its all natural lightning. Whats more interesting was that the shot was controlled such that some coins seemed dull and some shiny, this was to firstly create some form of contrast. Also truth be told, all the coins were dull which is why I tried to take the shot so that some looked shiny.

If I really had to relate this to something, it would be the gold coins from Chaucers Pardoners Tale.

Here were some other alternatives to the assignment.

Black Party
(ISO 320, "Cloudy", Shutter 1/6, Aperture F6.3)

This one I thought was interesting because of the extreme colours, but the photo lacked depth in the end. Also conveyed a very strong sense of sadness (to me).

Dusty Mirror
(ISO 320, 5000K, Shutter 1/1.6, Aperture F5)

I honestly loved this one a great deal, it sort of speaks of a duality its also rich in colour and has plenty of texture. The reason why I did not use it in the end was the composition and the lack of depth. But apparently many people like it...oh and I had to use a tripod for this one.


The rest of the photos I took were not really that fantastic, these were the main candidates.

Aftermath - Assignment 1

After showing the work piece to the class I had the following comments:

It looked like a Chinese painting.
I sold it well.

Other than that well, perhaps it was because I was the last to go up so comments were probably reserved. Either that or my presentation of it stoned the entire class.

Personally speaking, I have a strong liking for zen-like pictures especially the Film strip treble cleft and the desert rose paintings, something about the contrast of strong colour on a white background that just draws me to the picture and makes me look.

I would say that my picture has a certain vibrancy to it, though not as contrasting as the two that I mentioned above, I adjusted the brightness and contrast a little to get the background clean, but the colours on the flowers were just natural, which is something I didnt really expect with the decomposition.

As for the meaning, it is more of a private memory here because it involves my family and some of the things that have been happening over the last few weeks. So I am sorry that I can't quite share it...

As for the alternative interpretation it represents sort of a life cycle. with the orange petal (actually from another flower - I think.) being something that represents new life.

Overall I would give my pic a B+ I guess something around 80/100

I would rate Pauls work as 90/100
I would rate Mikes rose as 88/100