Texture and Repetition

photo by Luis V., Graphic Communications

On Friday, September 25th, our B Week classes went on our first in-school field trip. The focus was to shoot images that highlighted texture and repetition. The day before, we walked around and scouted potential shots. We also talked about some guidelines for composition as well as professionalism, privacy and the importance of not disrupting the school environment.

It was a, "picture-perfect, blue-sky day," and your shots were wonderful! I could not have been more pleased with your efforts. You got on the ground. You looked all around. You were completely engrossed in your task. It was a great start to our year!

I will be creating a daily photo blog this weekend. Once I do, you will be able to post some of your shots and writing from your classwork.  In the meantime, the photo of the bottle cap (above) was taken by one of your classmates from the Graphic Communication shop, Luis V. Great work, Luis!

The photos are marvolus and the cookie is cool

I really like the musical birds on a wire. It was really interesting. :)

Could Your Photo Go Here?

In class today, we did an online photo scavenger hunt. Your assignment was to find up to 10 compelling photos that exhibited elements and principles of composition and write a short analysis for each. On tomorrow's blog posting, I will showcase some of the more profound images that drew oohs and aaahs from your classmates.

Chop and Crop - What do you think?

In this short September 17th essay, photojournalist, David Hume Kennerly, a former contributing editor of Newsweek, expresses his thoughts about how one of his recent photos of former Vice President, Dick Cheney, was cropped.  This story was featured in Lens, the photojournalism blog of The New York Times, which according to the website, presents, "... the finest and most interesting visual and multimedia reporting — photographs, videos and slide shows."  Read this online essay and be prepared to discuss it.  If you are registered for the blog, you may post your comments here. 

Other High School Daily Photo Blogs

One of our Essential Questions for the first quarter is, "How does technology support photography?" and the Enduring Understanding is: "Technology enables images to be captured, manipulated and shared."

As part of the sharing process, one student from each of our classes will post a photo and a short visual analysis to our Embedded Academics Daily Photo Blog. This blog will be set up by the first week in October and it will continue through the end of the year. Click here to check out what  other high schoolers across the country are doing on their daily photo blogs.

Musical birds on a wire

Remember how we talked about our vision and how important it is to our photography skills?  Musical birds on a wire is a great example of how one man's view of birds sparked his creative vision. Thanks to the Kim Commando show for sharing this in her Video of the Day feature.

Quick thoughts from a professional photographer

Award winning Photographer Kevin Burbinsky shares some of his thoughts and insights about photography. Click here to access and read the story. Then, be prepared to briefly discuss the main ideas. (photo by Kevin Burbinsky)

Learning Methods of Visual Analysis

As we learn to analyze works of photography, we will write descriptions, formal analyses and reflections. Much of the expertise and advice we will refer to originates from (lesson plans from) the J.Paul Getty Museum of Art in Los Angeles. Let's start by taking a look at Alexander Garner's photograph of Lincoln on the Battlefield of Antietim. There are three parts to our visual analysis: description, formal analysis and reflection.

Descriptions are pretty basic. A description is objective. Descriptions typically begin with the just the facts about the the subject matter. You would ask yourself: what do I see? who do I see? how are they standing? what are they wearing? what is around them?

Formal Analysis is much more involved. Now we will scrutinze our image according to The Elements and  Principles of Composition. Using this language, we will look at our image and determine which elements are most pronounced.

Unlike the descriptions and formal analysis, the reflection that we see in an image may be unique to the individual. The reflection is the overall tone or mood of the image.

Click here for some of the images we will examine a little more closely.

Photo Analysis

This wordle contains a number of terms that are associated with analyzing a photo. Jerry Glackstein, a Gallery Teacher at the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles states, "Formal analysis is an important technique for organizing visual information. In other words, it is a strategy used to translate what you see into written words. This strategy can be applied to any work of art from any period in history, whether (it is) a photograph, sculpture, painting, or cultural artifact."

Click here for the complete article.

Thoughts for Quarter One

During the first weeks of the quarter, we will learn how to describe, analyze and reflect upon both historical and contemporary photographs. As we evaluate subject matter, symbols and ideas we will learn how to put that evaluation into words.

This process will lead us down the path to discovering our own vision. Working on our photographic vision is something that never really ends; we should always be looking to evolve it. In his fabulous book, Within The Frame: The Journey of Photographic Vision, photographer David duCemin states, "Vision is the beginning and end of photography. It's the thing that moves you to pick up the camera, and it determines what you look at and what you see when you do. It determines how you shoot and why. Without vision, the photographer perishes."

Then, we will (finally!) get our hands on our cameras. As a class, we may be using a variety of camera models, nonetheless we will all come to learn the core functionality that applies across all of our cameras.

What's next? PhotoShop and SlideRocket. PhotoShop will enable us to tune and adjust our images and SlideRocket will be our presentation tool. Yes, we will be doing presentations.

Throughout the quarter, we will write and reflect about our observations and experiences and, we will also start blogging