Photography as Art

Photography as art is an introduction to the digital camera as an art-making tool designed for students at the beginning level. The course will use digital photography to help students learn and apply the basic elements of art and the principles of design. This course will also provide students with opportunities to extend their knowledge and skills in the field of photography and the use of Adobe Photoshop. Digital Photography will familiarize the student with digital photographic equipment, materials, methods, and processes. Visual problem-solving skills are explored through the use of the computer as the main tool for creative expression and communication. Cellphone photography and editing with a variety of phone applications will be infused into the curriculum.

Living life as an artist is a practice.
You are either engaging in the practice or you’re not.
It makes no sense to say you’re not good at it.
It's like saying, I m not good at being a monk.
You are either living as a monk or you’re not.
We tend to think of the artist’s work as the output.
The real work of the artist is a way of being in the world.

Nov 18

WARHOL/POP ART
Andy Warhol is known for his bright, colourful paintings and prints of subjects ranging from celebrities including Marilyn Monroe and Mohammed Ali, to everyday products such as cans of soup and Brillo pads. But behind these iconic images are some surprising approaches and ideas.

You are to make 5 Warhol-style images. Post them on a page called Warhol. If you use an image from the Internet, show the original along side your work. This is due Friday.

Nov 13

Portfolio

Using the photographs that you have made this term, create a portfolio of the best 10 images and upload them to page called Term 3 Portfolio. This due Friday.

Nov 12

Today we will learn about studio lighting.

A studio lighting setup typically includes a key light, a fill light, and a backlight. The key light is the main light in the scene, and it determines the lighting's overall effect and tone. The fill light is the secondary light, and it's usually placed opposite the key light to fill in shadows. The backlight creates a soft halo effect around the subject's hair.

Create a simple diagram of a three-point lighting setup, labeling each light and its purpose. Write a brief paragraph explaining how you might adjust the lighting for different effects or moods.

Shoot 3 different lighting setups and post them on a page called lighting by Friday.

Nov 4

Irving Penn



Irving Penn was one of the twentieth century's great photographers, known for his arresting images and masterful printmaking. Although he was celebrated as one of Vogue magazine's top photographers for more than sixty years, Penn was an intensely private man who avoided the limelight and pursued his work with quiet and relentless dedication. At a time when photography was primarily understood as a means of communication, he approached it with an artist's eye and expanded the creative potential of the medium, both in his professional and personal work.
In 1941, Penn left his job at Saks Fifth Avenue to spend a year traveling through the southern United States and Mexico, painting and photographing street scenes and still lifes. During this time, Penn still aspired to be a painter and did not consider photography his primary medium. He never fully abandoned drawing and painting in his career, using it often as preparation for (or in response to) his photographic work, especially in his still lifes. Following Penn's return from Mexico in 1942, Alexander Liberman hired him to be his assistant at Vogue. Penn's first cover, a still life, was published on October 1, 1943.



Although he was best known for his fashion photography, Penn created more than one hundred still lifes over the course of his career. These images reflect his initial training as a painter as well as his studies with Brodovitch. His objects are often carefully laid out against a simple background, replicating his signature, minimalistic style, allowing the viewer to render their complete focus onto the subject.

You are to make at least five images that represent Still Life, and upload them to a page called Still Life by Friday.

Oct 28

Explore the Ways We Move

Can you see beauty in the ways that people move, even when there is no music?
Can you find dance in people’s everyday rituals and routines? To answer this question you might go somewhere crowded — your school’s hallway, a park, a basketball game — and spend a few minutes just observing people. Do any gestures look like dance to you? What is it about these movements that resemble those that dancers might make?

For this assignment, you can take your camera around with you for a day or two and snap a photo anytime you see a movement, posture or gesture that looks like dance to you. Or, you can go to a specific place.

You are to make at least five images that represent The Way We Move, and upload them to a page called The Way We Move by Thursday.

Oct 21

Find Art Wherever You Go

How do you know when you see something that is art? What elements make it so? What does it do to you, the viewer?
Look around the space you are in right now. Is there anything that strikes you as art? Perhaps itʼs the way your jacket is draped over a chair, how light is coming in through a window, the interesting pattens created by a shadow on your desk or the shape someoneʼs face makes when they smile or frown. What about this thing makes it seem artistic to you?

Photograph candid moments and images that look like art to you.

Where can you find art in the world around you? You might take your camera out for a day and start shooting anything that strikes you as art. Or you might shoot with a particular vision in mind. Challenge yourself to capture candid moments, rather than trying to stage images.

You are to make at least five images that represent Art All Around Us, and upload them to a page called Art All Around Us by Friday.

Oct 14

Capture the Sounds of a Place

Photography might seem like it’s all about sight, but it can evoke other senses, too. How can you show what the place you live sounds like?

Study the photographs above closely. What might you hear if you were in the scene? Which elements of the image help convey those sounds? What senses or emotions do the photographs evoke in you? What story do they tell?

For this assignment, you might travel around your city or town and photograph the sounds you find. Or you might focus on a more contained space, such as your school, the skate park, your neighborhood or any other place where you spend time. You might try to capture many disparate sounds — quiet ones, loud ones, harsh ones, pleasant ones.

You are to make three to five images that represent Capture The Sounds, and upload them to a page called Capture The Sounds by Friday.

Oct 8

Look up

Most of us spend our days looking down: at our phones, computers, homework, meals. What would you see if you looked up instead? For this assignment, I invite you to photograph what you see when you turn your gaze to the sky.

Spend some time studying the images, shapes, patterns, colors, lines, light, shadows, angles or movements above you. What catches your attention? What have you never noticed before? How is this angle different from looking at something straight on, straight down or from the side? Is there anything you see that strikes you as artistic, that might make for an interesting photograph? How often do you look up? What does this quick exercise tell you about what might happen when you do?

You might approach this assignment in two ways: 1) You can carry your camera around with you for a day or several days and photograph anything interesting you see when you look up. 2) Or you might start with a specific place and idea in mind that you want to photograph.

You are to make at least five images that represent Look Up, and upload them to a page called Look Up by Friday.

Oct 2

I want you to make five portraits using fill flash. Fill flash is a technique photographers use to brighten deep shadowed areas, especially on gray days or extremely sunny sessions. As the term suggests, fill flash adds light to deep shadows cast harsh lighting. You can use fill light whenever the background is brighter than the main subject of the photo. Think of it as a supplementary light source that can reduce harsh ambient light.

Two Exposures, One Solution
When you add flash to your photo setup, you’re actually managing two different exposures:
1: the ambient exposure (the existing light, without any flash)
2: your flash exposure (the light created by your flash)
Begin by setting your camera to best capture the ambient light. This means your background should look terrific without the use of a flash.
Next, turn on your flashes and adjust them until they’re providing the right kind of light on your subjects – light that complements both your clients and the background behind them.

You are to make 5 portraits of different people. Post them to your website on a page named Fill Flash. This is due Friday.

Sep 28

Funny Photoshop Collages

If you learn how to make a collage in Photoshop or any other program it will allow you to create interesting photography projects even if you are stuck at home, or are limited in your resources and props.

Tripods are advised to make shooting easier. Otherwise you'll be pretty limited with your shooting angles. You only need to make 1 image, but make it great! Post it on a page called Photoshop Collage. This due Wednesday.

Sep 25

This week's assignment is silohuettes. I want to make a silohuette of a person in profile

Then I want you to make a portrait of that person

Then, using Photoshop, put them together

Upload both originals and the final image. This is due on Friday on a page called Silohuette.
TIPS FOR THIS ASSIGNMENT:
•Put the light behind your subject.
•Expose for the background -not the subject. You want them to be black.
•This is an exercise in reducing the photo to basic elements -simplicity is very important when composing silhouettes.
•Make sure there is nothing growing out of the subject -this will ruin the effect.
•Use your imagination when creating your photos.
•Experiment with your camera angle until the scene shows the elements in the most pleasing balance.

Silohuette Examples

Put put the portrait, the silohuette and the combined image on a page called Silohuette by Friday

Sep 20

Reproduce Famous Paintings

If you are into painting, you can employ it in your photography project by reproducing your favorite paintings.
It's up to you, to choose the level of similarity with the original, the only rule is to keep it recognizable. You can start off by simply imitating poses and general composition of the painting and slowly get to adding all of the original props to the photo. Another great option will be to change setting or elements of the photo that contrast with the original idea while keeping composition and signature details. It usually makes for a great comedic effect.

Only 1 image is necessary, but include the an image of the original painting. Put these on a page called Paintings by Tuesday.

Famous Painting Search

Sep 18

Forced perspective is one of the most creative photography techniques that uses optical illusion. The photographer can shoot the objects from an unusual angle so that they appear of different sizes or distances than they really are.
One of the most popular forced perspective photography ideas is when tourists pretend to prop the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy.

Make 5 images and put these on a page called Forced Perspective by Friday

Sep 16

We begin the term with photo illustration. Basically, you will take a photograph and replace all the content with different colors, as wild as you like! There are 2 methods for doing this, and we will explore both in class. Upload the original photo and the photo illustration to a page called Photo Illustration. For those of you who have been in the class, continue to use the same site that you have been working on. This is due tomorrow.

Sep 9

I decided that we should make animated GIFs.

What is a GIF?
GIF — best pronounced like the peanut butter — stands for the Graphics Interchange Format. GIFs are really nothing but a type of image file. And not necessarily an optimal one, at that. The 8-bit format means they can only display 256 colors. They make photos look grainy. Although they can’t contain any audio, they can still be as bulky as an MP4 video file because they’re not compressed.

Here are few examples-

How to create a GIF in Photoshop.
When you use creative software like Photoshop, it’s so easy to make a GIF. Whether you want to create a GIF animation for school, for a job, or just for fun, learning how to add motion is a great way to take your artwork to the next level. For this assignment, let’s start by doing a simple frame-by-frame animation, and then we’ll turn that into a looping GIF.

All you need to begin is a series of images. The images can be anything you like — video frames, animation frames, even still photographs. I would like you to shoot a few series of images to make your animations.

	1. Upload your images and open each frame as a layer in the Photoshop file. You can prepare your frames in advance, if you like, in another program such as Adobe Illustrator. Then, import the frames (source files) into Photoshop by going to File > Load Layers. Choose two or more files to load into an image stack, add all the frames, and press OK.
	2. Open the Timeline panel and select Create Frame Animation. With your Photoshop layers open, go to Window > Timeline and click Create Frame Animation.
	3. Convert your layers into animation frames.Select Make Frames From Layers from the menu in the right corner of the Timeline panel. This will allow you to take your layers and separate them into frames within the window.

Preview the animation by either pressing Play on the Timeline or using the spacebar on your computer. You can play around with the order of the frames by simply dragging them. Use the trash can icon to delete a frame and the sticky note icon to add a new one.

	4. Set your GIF to loop. Set your GIF to Loop by clicking the repeat menu. Within the Timeline you can adjust how long each individual frame is on screen and decide how long the GIF should loop. (Most GIFs will loop at the Forever setting.)
	5. Export your GIF and save it. Once you’re happy with your animated GIF, export it by selecting File > Export > Save for Web (Legacy). Then make sure you save it as a GIF in the proper folder.

I would like you to make 5 different animations. Create a new page on your website called Animated GIFs. Upload the images there by Friday. Remember to publish the site again.

Sep 5

Four Corners

Choose one subject and place it, where it exists, in each corner of the frame for 4 images.
Can you go to the other side of the subject? Do the same. Shoot all four sides in all four corners if possible. See what you come up with!

Make four or eight images. Upload them to a page called Corners. This is due Friday.

Aug 30

Today I want you to photograph some everyday fruits and vegetables, but make them look different. Edward Weston famously photograped a pepper but it looks like a person. Pepper No. 30 is a black and white photograph and is one of the best-known photographs taken by Edward Weston. It depicts a solitary green pepper in rich black-and-white tones, with strong illumination from above.

In the late 1920s Weston began taking a series of close-up images of different objects that he called "still lifes". For several years he experimented with a variety of images of shells, vegetables and fruits, and in 1927 he made his first photograph of a pepper. He received mixed feedback about that image, but two years later he started a new series that focused on peppers alone. He recorded twenty-six negatives of peppers taken during 1929, mostly taken against plain burlap or muslin backdrops.

Make six images. One of the images must be black & white. Upload them to a page called Vegetables. This is due Wednesday.

Aug 28

Explore color and composition by creating photographs inspired by the colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. You can find these specific colors to photograph or use color symbolically to convey stories and emotions. For instance, you could photograph red rose petals or an angry portrait using red lighting for the color red. Upload them to a page called ROYGBIV. This is due on Friday.

Aug 26

Today you will use your camera to choose a color. Make six images featuring that color as the dominant element. Find as many different ways as possible. Upload the images to a page called Color. This is due by tomorrow.

Photographing Color

Aug 21

Today we consider shadows. Light is the basis of all photography, but darkness is often overlooked. I want you to play with shadow. Shadows can add contrast and depth to a photograph, heightening the drama and feeling. Try capturing a shadow with crisp edges, then a blurry one. How does the emotion change in your composition? Shoot six examples and upload them to a page called Shadows by Friday.

Here are a few examples-

Aug 19

Today you're going on a scavenger hunt. Find and photograph these shapes and put them on a page called Scavenger Hunt by tomorrow.

Aug 15

Continue working on the pen tool assignment. Create 3 new documents, name them pentool1, pentool2, & pentool3, each 800px wide, 1000px high, with a resolution of 72. Remeber to turn on the grid. Save them as png files. Put them on a page called Pen Tool.

Aug 14

Today we're going to explore the pen tool. I want you to replicate the patterns on the samples below. Create 3 new documents, name them pentool1, pentool2, & pentool3, each 800px wide, 1000px high, with a resolution of 72. Remeber to turn on the grid. Save them as png files. Put them on a page called Pen Tool.

Aug 13

Today we're going to explore Photoshop. Download one or both of these images and open in Photoshop. We'll explore the tools and how to use them.

Aug 12

I want to introduce you to Google Sites. Every week you'll post your assignment photos on a site that you will build and maintain. You need to publish the site every time you make a change to it. Today you will publish your site and send me the url of the home page.

Next, we will go over the operation of our cameras. Most of your assignments must be shot with a camera. Sometimes we'll use your phone, but rarely. I only have 10, and you check them out on the camera sign-out sheet.



Click here for the course syllabus.

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