My First Photo Assignment

Yesterday afternoon I received my first photography assignment to be critiqued this morning in class. When my teacher introduced the task, I immediately fretted. I had to take 8 photos using only manual settings before the next class. In principal, this doesn't sound too daunting, but keep in mind that I just moved here and I don't know my way around. With that in mind, imagine having to impress a room full of amateur photographers who are much more familiar and comfortable with their surroundings than you. And then there's also the people factor--I still don't know a soul in this city, so that limits my subject matter.

All things considered, I'm very proud of myself. Below I will share my 8 photos, as well as a brief explanation of each assignment. 

All shots are JPEG, at the teacher's request.

Assignment 1: Motion

 Photo A: Frozen Motion. It was a bit dark out when I took this and I needed a fast shutter speed to freeze the motion, so I bumped up the ISO.

Photo B: Smeared Motion. The concept is using a slower shutter speed so the camera can document the motion over time. And "smeared" does not equal "out of focus".

Photo C: Panning. This was the trickiest of the three to wrap my head around. As you can see, the background is blurred, but the subject is crisp. For this effect, the subject must be moving across the photographer's plane of view as opposed to moving directly at or away from the photographer. Panning itself requires that the camera moves at about the same speed as the object, in the direction of the object's motion, over a fairly long shutter speed.

I was most worried about capturing Photo C; it would be easy to use a person--just ask them to run along the sidewalk, but I had nobody to ask, and I REALLY wasn't up to chasing cars or stalking bikers. I was extremely lucky that all the camera settings were accurate at the moment this cat darted! 

Assignment 2: Depth Of Field

For this assignment, we were told to photograph an object at both extremes of the F-stop scale to demonstrate aperture's role in photography. I used a tripod since the photos are from inside my apartment, and because I wanted to have the exact same frame set up. I kept ISO at a constant 800 (to help out in the dim lighting) and a constant zoom of 75mm. 

Photo A: F32 (very closed down) @ 1.3 seconds. The deep depth of field makes everything look crisp.

Photo B: F5 (wide open) @ 1/25 seconds. This photo shows a shallow depth of field because there is selective focus.

Photo C: Here we were instructed to keep the same wide aperture but move back 4 meters. This illustrates how although a wide aperture means shallow depth of field, the farther away the photographer is from the subject, the more sharp everything appears. 

Assignment 3: Point of View

For the following 2 photos, I had to show unique points of view. The teacher specifically warned us not to get caught up in the angle the camera is pointed, but rather where we position ourselves while photographing the subject.

For example: It's one thing to point your camera at a cool statue. It's another thing to hang upside-down out the window of the building across the street with your camera pointed at the statue. Get the idea?

Photo A: A view looking up.

Photo B: A view looking down. Don't worry--I cleaned the countertop after stepping on it with my dirty feet.

Overall, I'm proud of myself for being resourceful with these shots, for roaming around but not getting lost, for using a tripod, and for getting a positive feedback (and NONE negative!) from the teacher. 

In a group of talented people, there will always be members who are better than you, some who are at the same level (who you're convinced are better than you) and some who are less qualified than you. I need to remember this to stay in check.

Sincerely Sophie

Comments

[Elyssa]

Beautiful photographs! I especially like the panning and the view looking up one.

[Alana]

These look great! I love the cat photo- so cool!

[B]

sophaloaf

im so proud of you

youre the cutest

love,
B

[Mom]

Wow, Soph, what a great start! I loved the girl on the swing and the dashing kitty. You can see a lot of creativity as well as technical know-how in these shots. Kudos for getting only postitive feedback from the teacher (and for not getting lost!). You rock!

[Daddy]

WOW!
You are awesome!
And, I love you!

[Donna]

good job!