Assignment 1: Your Neighbourhood; Tutor's Coments

I received my Tutor's comments just before Christmas, so I have been somewhat tardy in getting back to work.  It is always a nerve wracking experience sending in a first assignment to a new tutor, but I was delighted with his comments.  Not that everything was perfect; far from it.  What I was so pleased about was the very thorough way that he had looked at both the assignment and my learning log/blog so far, and made many very constructive and helpful comments.  I was also delighted with the comments about the photographs: " This is a strong set of images.  As we have already discussed, the technical aspects of photography are something you are already comfortable with and have a clear enjoyment in......."  Where my areas for development lie are in the self appraisal of my work, research and aspects of my learning log.  I have taken these pointers on board and am beginning to address them.  I need to review and expand on my self appraisal for this assignment and also make some alterations to and expand on my learning log.

In the light of my Tutor's comments I have revised my self appraisal for this assignment and include it below.  My only concern is that I have now exceeded to recommended length:

I live in a small suburb of Grimsby/Cleethorpes which sits on the Humber Estuary.  As I spend a lot of my time at Cleethorpes and on the beaches and salt marshes that border the resort with both my landscape and wildlife photography I have decided to base this assignment on this location as it is my 'local patch'.  I also used Cleethorpes as a subject for the very similar assignment in Photography 1: People and Place.  Having decided to use the Cleethorpes area again, I began by looking through my work for P&P and was rather pleased to feel that my work has definitely improved.  I think that the technical quality of my photographs is significantly better in post processing and also composition and I think that I have developed a better 'eye' when looking for subjects to photograph.  I then put those images to one side and went out to take some fresh ones especially for this assignment.  As well as conveying a strong sense of place, I also wanted to display a range of styles of photography in order to show both my tutor and, eventually, the assessment team that have have a knowledge and command of a range of genres and techniques..

Cleethorpes is small seaside resort adjoining the port of Grimsby.  I wanted to show some evidence of its use as a resort, as this is perhaps how the majority of people from away view the town, but to me Cleethorpes and its environs mean wide and expansive beaches, salt marshes and huge skies.  The estuary is of international importance for wildlife, and hundreds of thousands of waders, geese and waterfowl migrate to spend the winter here.  I feel that it is important that my photographs also illustrate this aspect of the area.  The beach at the southern end of the resort is a well known and popular location for kite surfing and I wanted to make it the subject of some of my photographs.  It would also give me the opportunity to include some action shots.  The kite surfing takes place within sight of the Bull and Haille sand forts, part of the first world war coastal defences.  Another aspect of Cleethorpes that I wanted to photograph was the town at night looking from the beach towards the prom.  The aim of shooting from this location was to capture a reflection of the lights in either the water or wet sand.  One small claim to fame for Cleethorpes is that it is on the Greenwich Meridian and the town makes quite a feature of this, one example being the meridian itself as a strip of metal with a notice board and signpost indicating both the north and south poles and their distances as well as such destinations as London, New York and Tokyo.  Although a flat estuarine part of the coast, the area does have its wrecks which are revealed at the lowest tides and I wanted to include these.

I made several photographic visits to my location during the late summer and autumn in order to cover the various subjects and optimum times.  For the night shots I needed the lights to be on, which I discovered only happens at weekends; the tide also needed to be right.  For my wader images I needed high tide to bring the birds within camera range.  I chose a high tide which coincided with sunrise and used only a medium telephoto as the aim was to  include the flock rather than portraits of individual birds.  For my 'tourist' pictures I opted for a sunny late summer weekend when there would be a good chance of plenty of visitors being present.  For some of the landscape shots it was necessary to keep an eye on weather forecasts and visit at sunrise and sunset.  Many times the hoped for explosion of colour at this time of day just didn't happen.  In discussion with my tutor, he suggested that "If we try to make work to a preconceived idea, we may miss something new, something unexpected.  He referred me to an interview of Tod Papgeorge by Alec Sloth from July 2007 where Papageorge comments:

My argument against the set-up picture is that it leaves the matter of content

to the IMAGINATION of the photographer, a faculty that, in my experience,

is generally deficient compared to the mad swirling possibilities that our

dear common world kicks up at us on a regular basis.

http://alecsothblog.wordpress.com/category/papageorge/

It was also suggested I look at a conversation between Quentin Bajac and Philip Gefter where Bajac refers to a discussion with Paul Graham where Graham states:

This is what photography is about. It is about having an idea at first and

accepting that you’re going to be seduced, in the etymological sense of the

word, by the world you’re encountering. Some photographers remain really

stiff and rigid. They have the idea. They just want to illustrate the idea. And,

then you have the opposite: photographers who go out to shoot without any

preconceived idea and then, afterwards, try to put all the pieces of the puzzle

together and construct something from their images, which is what has

happened in photography since the beginning.

http://www.aperture.org/blog/view-judgment-seat-quentin-bajacconversation-

philip-gefter/

To an extent, I agree with this but at the same time I do try to 'previsualise' images in the way that Ansel Adams and Edward Weston did.  I usually go out with some idea of what I hope to capture, be it landscape, wildlife or any other genre, but, at the same time, I keep my eye open for any opportunities that present themselves otherwise many pictures would be lost.  The image below is an example:

 I was walking in Derbyshire at the beginning of 2012 and had in mind landscape images of the Dove Valley but the weather was cold wet and overcast.  As we left Pilsbury Castle I noticed a patch of sun sweeping down the valley and prepared to take a photograph when it was positioned perfectly.  Fortuitously a rainbow appeared just at that moment.  I pressed the shutter! 

In an interview for Outdoor Photgraphy magazine (issue 175), when asked the question about his new book 'Vision' " In the Vision you emphasise the imortance of preparation, but are there benefits to shooting spontaneously?", he answers:

Absolutely.  Some of my best photographs were taken in spontaneous moments, and The Vision is littered with them - including the cover image.  Opportunities for spontaneous creativity are more likely if we are out there in photographically promising situations in the first placed.  The final picture is often a radical departure from the original idea, due to nature delivering the unexpected - but I always need the starting point: an idea and a plan.

I feel that this is the approach I take myself.

I have chosen to present the assignment as a set of digital images on a DVD along with my  self-appraisal as a word document.  In this way it could later be easily presented for final assessment.  All parts of this assignment are also on my learning blog. I have presented the images in an order to represent one typical day from sunrise to after dark.  Although the brief doesn't as for a chronology, I am used to using my images to tell a story.  I use my wildlife, landscape and travel photographs as a basis for illustrated talks to a wide variety of groups and here the story format is important.  I envisaged that if the photographs were hung or used in a slide show format it would be better for them to be seen on a 'chronological' order to tell the story of a typical day in Cleethorpes. The image files are JPEGS at 1284 pixels longest side and 72 dpi to be suitable for viewing on screen.  When I print images I print straight from Lightroom at 300dpi using the appropriate ICC profile for the paper I use.  I have used Adobe RGB colour space as there is a wider range in the colour palette at this setting and therefore more vibrant colours.  I usually also have my camera set to Adobe RGB.

I do the minimum of post processing and like Ansel, Adams and Edward Weston, I try to' previsualise' an image and capture that image in camera. My workflow and post processing is similar for all of my photographs after capture:

·         import into Lightroom 5;

·         crop if needed;

·         adjust exposure/levels;

·         if necessary adjust the white balance/colour temperature;

·         if necessary employ the ND grad feature in Lightroom after using the highlight slider;

·         increase clarity and vibrance slightly and, depending if I have increased the colour temperature, slightly increase the saturation.

I tend not to use ND grads in the field as my cokin ones can give a magenta colour cast.  I use the ND grad facility in Lightroom 5 as I know that it is neutral.  By and large, although I will often bracket exposures ready for HDR, I do not make use of the technique preferring the effect of using one image and ND grad filters.  Having said that the monochrome shot of the wreck with Grimsby dock tower in the background is an HDR shot.

My final selection of images was made on the basis of technical quality, although to some extent this is personal and subjective; another person may well have chosen a totally different set from my shortlist.  I also selected images that helped to tell 'my story' of Cleethorpes and its varied aspects and represented a range of styles.

I feel that my portfolio matches my original aims: show a variety of genres and styles and the varied aspects of the town.  However, I feel that editing down to only 15 images perhaps didn't give enough scope to show everything I wanted.  In retrospect I may have been better sticking to one genre, in which case I would have opted for landscape. I have included the genres of landscape, wildlife, street photography, action and sports photography and night photography.  The majority, perhaps, fall into the landscape and street photography categories and, possibly, it would have been better to have gone for a more even spread.  I do feel that I have given a good picture of the resort and shown its varied aspects.  When thinking about and researching for this assignment, I gained inspiration from the work of Joel Meyerowitz in his book 'Cape Light'.  The first of my images of a Cleethorpes Sunrise reminds me of several from Cape Light such as Plate 24 Bay/Sky, Dusk, Provincetown and Plate 21 Bay/Sky, Provincetown.  My long exposure Pan image of the beach dunes and sky also reminds me of some of his more abstract work.  My street/social documentary shots remind me of some of the ones in Cape Light such as Plate 12 Ballston Beach, Truro and also Plate 8 with the same title.  

http://mikespwdplearninglog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Reading%20and%20Research%2006

I have already mentioned the link to John Hinde's work at The Photographer's Gallery in my blog from my picture of the fairground ride. 

http://mikespwdplearninglog.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Reading%20and%20Research%2001

I have long been a fan of the work of Galen Rowell and often use his work as inspiration.  In his book, Mountain Light, he mentions that he rated his  Kodachrome 64 film at 80 and Kodachrome II (ASA 25) at 32 in order to achieve the rich saturated effect in his images that he preferred.  I too like to see well saturated rich images, but nowadays we have the benefit of being able to tweak this in post processing to achieve the same result.  Nevertheless, although I take not of the histogram when I am making exposures my default mode is to set my exposure compensation to - 1/3 or - 2/3 in the same way that Rowell uprated his Kodachrome film stock.