Individual Weekly Posts
Week 7
Week 8
Week 9
Week 10
Week 11
Week 12
Self-directed project in the Individual RMIT google drive folder:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZugQwWY2NhsakgcyRzaBSy_K6BSOk5Gq/view?usp=sharing
Month: December 2020
Use of Photography Week 12 Blog
Since last time, I have been taking groups of an image in the old town. Due to the assignment’s deadline, I have to change my original plan as shooting old town, and the new town takes into account food in Canton. When shooting finishes, I have to spend two days editing and then learning how to design the book’s layout.
Shooting
My proficiency gradually rises with my anamorphic lens in the rest of the days. Still, the weather these days feels humid, and that will cause a pm2.5 increase. So it takes more time to shoot, and finally, I decided to focus on people in Canton, find some story about them, and show their lifestyle in this city. In the end, I’m thinking of using different angles to end these days of shooting. So I am using a drone to capturing the whole downtown city from a different point of view. Thanks to the night and early morning wind blow out the pollution, the clarity gets better. So far, all shoot has been finished perfectly.
Editing
Finally, I turn to the last step. The first thing is to filter images to get better photos, and I separate 3 different parts of photos: the old town, the new town, and the food. Also, I especially planned a short story as a subchapter in the food chapter. It’s a story about an office worker who finds some local food on the way back home. Hopin food can eliminate her tiredness. All these photos have to stretch to a normal ratio (Deformity correction example: Use of Photography Week 11 blog ). The last part is learning how to design and make the layout and typography look coordination.
Here I’m using InDesign as my photo book editing. It’s easy for me to create pages on InDesign. If people have high proficiency in Photoshop, it’s easy to get started with InDesign. After a few adjustments, the basic layout for the book was completed. Here is some screenshot for the book.
After finalizing the book layout, the remaining copywriting and text position is the last step for my final project. This seems to be a meaningful process, and I’m satisfied with my project. From taking photos browsing in Canton to editing the book. These give me a great sense of accomplishment through this series of processes. I learn how to create my own photobooks, which let me comprehend the arranging of the photos.
Use of Photography Week 11 Blog
After the small experiment that night, I confirm the location to deciding where to shoot, with a series of preparations, such as renting a wide-screen anamorphic lens and appointing a friend to be a model to start shooting. Because the first day of shooting I’m not used to the anamorphic lens enough due to the distortion, many images have not yet reached my expectations, but I am relieved that I have taken a few pictures that match the style of my desired theme.
I use two days for capturing in the old town:
Due to day time, the first area that comes up in my mind is the old town, more precisely, it’s a park called Liuhua Lake Park. The reason I choose here not only the beautiful landscape that attracts me but also the special history between China and western. Guangzhou had a long history of doing foreign business, most of the buildings and gardens are combined with Chinese and Western culture. The West Garden in Liuhua also has a commemorative oak which was planted by the Queen of England, Elizabeth II on her visit to China.
Next, evening in the old town. Memories of many Guangzhou people. It is also one of the famous places– Dongshankou, The place called ‘the Entrance of East Hill’. The place can trace back to the 14th century (Ming dynasty). The gathering place of famous schools is also the place with the strongest characteristics of Lingnan culture and buildings. Also, many authentic local cuisines can be found here. Besides, a story I heard recently that this place is going to be demolished. Many people feel angry but now it seems that everyone around them refuses to demolish it.
Use of Photography: Week 10
Since the presentation last week, I began to plan and research my project’s framework in more detail and then did some field shooting.
First of all, regarding the city of Canton (also called Guangzhou), in my opinion, the city center and the old city are clearly distinguished, but each shows a different style. So I plan to spend two days each to shoot the characteristics of the new city and the old city. Still, I will pay more attention to and focus on the humanities and the sense of story rather than pure landscape photos (I will try to take pictures that can tell stories Capability photos). Secondly, Guangzhou has the title of “Food in Canton” in China, (Xiaomei, 2006) which means that cooking technology has become diversified and refined. The cuisines from different places and dynasties have been introduced outside Guangzhou as well as foreign dishes. After some improvements, Guangzhou has a wide variety of food. So I plan to use three chapters from different angles to describe and typeset—the transition from New town, Oldtown, and food.
Because of a personal matter, the first shooting was set at night. I decided to shoot in the city center first because there are more lights at night in the city center. Since I have not used a film anamorphic lens, I can only use my 28-75mm focal length lens first. Therefore, I need to reserve space for the upper and lower parts of the picture in the early stage, and then I need to use Photoshop to crop the ratio to 2.351:1. The initial composition is more difficult than before, and the photos’ final usage rate is not high, but at least find out which locations and time periods are suitable for shooting. Of course, some models are needed to match certain scenes during the shooting. Not all of them are true, but at least these things have happened.
ref: Xiaomei Cai, 2006. Analysis of the Cultural Connotation and Causes of “Food in Guangzhou” Vol. 26, No. 2
Use of Photography: Week 9
In this week’s class, we finally work on our final project: a pitch for our self-directed project to make a presentation and discuss our final project.
For my project, I want to make a story about the city I have lived in for decades, but I want to express my views of this city in a different way. My subject is “CINE CANTON.” I live in Guangzhou, a city in southern China and one of the most widely spoken Cantonese cities. CINE means CINEMATIC. Inspired by the photographer Nikko Pascua, after seeing a group of cinematic photos he took in Hokkaido, Japan. He expresses his feeling through his lens and Hokkaido in his mind with cinematic feeling. I wondered if I should use this method to record the city I have lived in for a long time. I also want to use the movie’s format and technique to show the whole city to express the sense of the story since I love film expression, and I never try to combine a photo with a film before. Inspired by the previous class’s reading materials, I want to submit the Final Project in a book. After other students gave wonderful and detailed speeches on their proposals, I have a more realistic idea of the final work.
Because the theme this time is about Guangzhou’s story, this idea and subject matter may take longer than expected. I want to express this city’s story, more cultural output, and what I see differently from other places to show this place’s cultural beauty from my perspective. I will across half of Canton to find some special location between the new town and old town and collect about 25-35 images in my final project. I do not know if this is enough for me to express a whole city but I will try my best to show my sensation about this city.
Regarding the timeline, I think I will spend nearly 5 days photographing what I have researched and learned, and then use 3 to 4 days for post-production and book layout processing. This is my simple self-directed project Timeline plan.
Use of Photography: Week 8
From that perspective, photography has expanded in different directions with the changes of the times. Just as the term “expanding photography” is mentioned in the reading materials in the classroom, it represents the substantial increase in the number of photos available to the public in the past few decades, from printing to the widespread of the Internet, and thus increasing the number of images from the physical medium With the Internet and technology, photography and pictures can be obtained and disseminated more conveniently and quickly. Photography has increased the barriers to entry from expensive film and slightly more complicated cameras, but now, only mobile phones and digital cameras can always play an important role in everyone’s life. People sometimes take photos to record memories into physical things that we can see, or do it for commercial purposes, or just for fun. This is a fact that photography has developed over the years. But I think this limits what “photography” is and what genre these photos may belong to. That is when people today can call themselves photographers with their revolutionary smartphones, this concept of originality or authenticity is somewhat lost.
It is exactly the same. In this week’s class, Brian explained to us about the final homework and showed us the work of previous students. Because it is the final homework planned by ourselves, we can have a high degree of freedom in choosing the theme. I want to put aside the spread of social networks or the Internet, and explore the use of printing to treat my photographic works. However, due to COVID-19 this year, books had to be submitted online to complete the homework. When I want to make it into a book format and convert it to an electronic PDF upload method, I will also print it as physical work. This might give me a lot of motivation.
Use of Photography: W7
In what ways can photography be a narrative form?
This week we discussed the relationship between photos and narratives. According to Bush, 2019: Photography is purely descriptive, meaning that a single photo can truly describe what happened in a scene, and the page of written records still cannot catch. It is this characteristic that makes photography first used in crime scene photography and other practices, replacing the unreliable memories and incomplete notes that were previously relied on. I think that photos are not only a way to record what happened around people, but also to tell people some stories to some extent. Photos play an important role in everyone’s life. They connect us to our past. They remind us of people, places, feelings, and stories.
（Bush, 2019) During the conference, he took pictures of high-fashion crime scenes (for example, produced by Melanie Pullen and Gregory Crewdson (2003-2005) Archives of the Police Department and LA County Coroner’s Office. These photos are constructed out of effects rather than models of actual crimes. She put the two unrelated elements of fashion and crime in the same photo. I think this is a bold but innovative method that allows people to look at the photos and focus on the stories they tell. The combination of fashion and crime makes the audience look like they have entered a stage with a different world concept. I think it is not only visual art but also an art of expression.
Next, we reviewed the photos of “The Country Doctor” (1948) written by W. Eugene Smith. This collection of pictures describes a series of events that have taken place and gradually formed a climax. As part of the story, it can help photographers convey their ideas. It’s important for a group of photos to convey a corresponding story or event through a combination of photos and words. Through this photo essay, it gave me more ideas about the final task I want to accomplish.