Reflections

Week 1- Reflection. Intro to Module

During this week we got an overall introduction into the module which helped me understand what will be required of us and how the assignment and weekly tasks will be laid out which helped me understand and plan myself going into this module.

The task this week was to go out in pairs and get a story which is in the Leeds are me and Ted Bromwich went to the pub Royal Park Pub in Hyde Park to investigate the effect of sports on their business and popularity, we both interviewed an employee to get an insight from them on what they see the effect to be on the pub.

Week 2- Reflection. Types of Photo Journalism

During this week we looked and analysed multiple different types of Photo Journalism which helped me learn about the different styles and aspects which are used in every type of journalism.

Our task in the workshop was to find three examples of a specific type of Photo Journalism and analyse specific techniques used, I did this on food photography and it helped me realise that for my final project I would want to do similar work to this whilst also mixing it with sports photography.

During the week and continued to research into food photography and the techniques used and learnt that I like the photographs which have the ingredients laid out around the bowl or plate of food as I believe this creates more depth to the image and makes to more visually interesting for the audience. I also liked the photographs which sometimes have 2 or more images of the process to cook the foods as it allows the audience to see all the ingredients before the final product.

Week 3- Reflection. Visual Storytelling

During the workshop this week we looked into how different photographs and images help tell a story and also how an image can instantly impact how an article is digested by the audience.

Our task was to find three images, firstly to find a news photograph that has somehow been constructed or set-up. For this task I used an image of a footballer celebrating to a photographer after winning the Champions League as it shows how it has been set up rather then an action moment. For the second image we were tasked to find a news photograph taken from a point of view that affects the story. I used an image of a little boy hiding during war as this image instantly makes the audience feel sorry for the child and have instant feeling of anger towards whoever has made him do this. The finally we needed to get an image which “meaning” was disputed, for this I used the famous bacon sandwich photograph of Ed Milliband as it was extremely controversial and the meaning was not taken in the way which he and his party hoped.

This work shop extremely helped understand how photographs can help tell the story without words as the audience will digest and create opinions based off the photograph.

Week 4- Reflection. Focus, Aperture and Depth of Field

During this weeks workshop we went out and played with our F-stop on our phones as this is something we would be using for our photos in our final project.

Firstly we took an image with the F-stop set to its lowest setting which created the affect of blurring out the background and having all the focus set on the subject which is a nice affect to have when you want your audience to concentrate on who is being photographed. Secondly we took an image with the F-stop set to the highest setting which meant that the whole photograph was crisp not only the subject but also the background which allows the image to look extremely clean. Finally we took the last photograph with the F-stop somewhere in the middle which gave quite a neutral affect but if you looked in the back in depth you would see it wasn’t as quite in focus as the lowest setting as it takes in less light so more of the image is in focus.

Week 5- Reflection. ISO and Shutter Speed

During this workshop we learnt about ISO and Shutter Speed which was an extremely important learning for me and my project as I plan on taking images of athletes during matches and training and if they are moving at speed and not a static subject then I will need to make sure I used the burst mode and adjust the shutter speed so I can capture them in focus.

Firstly I took an image of friend doing a cart wheel on burst mode on my phone which emulates shutter speed and allowed me to take lots of photos in a short period of time so that I could capture them in the movement in focus which is something I will use to get clear photos of my subjects. I also took an image of a moving subject but on Live Photo mode to emulate slow shutter speed I got multiple people to walk at once and used this affect which helped create an image where they were all blurry in the photograph which is something I won’t use in my project but is good to know as it is a cool technique to use in different projects.

After doing some initial research I saw more of these types of images and again started to understand more what types of techniques I like and may look to replicate in my own work, one of these being using the burst mode on my phone during celebrations in football as I like when photographs capture footballers celebrating in the air or as they react ton scoring as it captures the emotions of the sport and the joy when scoring really well. I also like the motion blur background if I can replicate this with a still subject and other athletes moving in the background it would work really well as it shows the intensity of their sports and would help then shift importance onto how the athletes help fuel themselves for performance which is what I am doing the project on.

Week 6- Reflection. Colour and Image Correction

This workshop we focused more on post production work and developing our skills on photoshop, we used two images which had previously taken and created an adjustment layer and played around with the effects on their to create the final image we wanted.

I firstly used an image which I believed was slightly over exposed and used the adjustment layer to bring this down and make it a bit darker and level the over exposure, for the second image I used the post production editing to create a purple affect on the players as this is the colour of the clubs kit and thought it was a cool affect to put on the image for social media use.

Week 7- Reflection. Post Production and Selection of Images

We again today worked on more post production work in photoshop to help us again develop these skills and help us hopefully make our final piece of work as high quality as possible.

We used photoshop to firstly change one our images from portrait to landscape in case we accidentally take our photos in portrait as they need to be in landscape for publication so it was good to learn a way of reversing our mistake. We also learnt how to straighten an image which is something I did not think was possible so was cool to learn how to do this as we can take an image from a slightly of centre angle and still adjust this in post production.

Week 8: To do list and update on assignment progress

For the assignment I am doing my piece of work on the different pre match meals which different athletes have before competition to support performance. I will be interviewing 4 different athletes from different sports and taking photos of them and then cook and picture their pre match meal so that the meal is put to life by the image.

So far I have taken a photo and interviewed one athlete already which is Koby McNamara ahead of his fight which was on Saturday 15th March I also interviewed him on his pre match meal so that I know what to cook and photograph to pair with his interview.

For the assignment I am currently arranging when I can get a photograph and interview Oscar Devos who is an American Football player and I will take these pictures at West Park Rugby Club as it will have the posts in the background which will give the image more context. I also took images of Dulwich Hamlet F.C players during their match using the club camera and I am just waiting for these to be sent over to me I will then filter through these and decide which one to use and interview that player in their go to pre match meal.