Assignment for this week...

So sorry that I exceeded my quota for traffic on my website... it will reset tomorrow at Midnight for the new month.. in the meantime, here is the assignment for this week and next...

You can Google the artists mentioned....

Week 3

Assignment: By the Sea

Look at Weston's work at Point Lobos, California. What kind of light did he photograph under? How did he move in and compose what ever he was looking at? For each photograph, consider the point of view Weston and the camera position.

Weston got down, got close to these rock forms on the beach. I want you to do the same

Read this short biography of Ansel Adams.Watch this slide show of selected images from his classic work in Yosemite National Park.

Look at these digital books by John Paul Caponigro.

You are to visit the beach, and look carefully at form, light, composition and line. Examine tidal pools, rock formations and sand patterns with the curiosity and freshness of a young child, say a toddler. Move in close, fill the frame. Submit your best two images on the class blog and post 6-10 or more to your online album. (Links in academic expectations below). If you live well inland and would prefer to visit a waterfall or brook with moving water, that would work too.

Week 4

Shadows and Light

Consider this gallery of photographs by amateur Greek photographer, George Christakos. Notice how the photographs are about the quality of light... and shadow.

Or this series at Smashing Magazine... which ideas can you use?

Shadows take on a materiality that is just as strong as the architectural elements depicted, perhaps stronger. Use the widest focal length setting on your lens. Look for shadows as geometric form this week. Start around your home, downtown, or anywhere your travels take you. Look down, look up, fill the frame.

Light reflecting directly off water can be interesting... throw in dramatic clouds...perhaps at sunset... convert to black and white...

Chairs, railings, your back deck, light streaming in through windows casting shadows.... shadows made by people walking downtown...

Read this short Wikipedia entry on Minor White.

Read Equivalence: The Perennial Trend Minor White, PSA Journal, Vol. 29, No. 7, pp. 17-21, 1963

How can we use light as poetic metaphor?

Submit your best two images on the class blog and post 6-10 or more to your online album. (Links in academic expectations below).

"A very receptive state of mind... not unlike a sheet of film itself - seemingly inert, yet so sensitive that a fraction of a second's exposure conceives a life in it". -Minor White

In Windowsill Daydreaming (left), Minor White has found a projection of light rather than shadow to photograph. Can you find a beam of light to photograph?