This semester I learned the whole process of creating a photo. I had no idea that the process of developing one photo would take so long. I had never myself created a photo before so I had no idea what to expect. I didn't know that you have to put it through 3 different solutions and water in order for one photo to turn out correctly. I also learned how to create a roll of film in the dark room which was extremely interesting and also a little scary when it is that dark for so long. It was cool to have to shake the roll of film in the little canister with the solution in to because I had never done anything like that before. I knew nothing about printing photos because we always just have people at like costco develop photos for us so it was really cool to learn about this process and how some people today still develop photos on their own.
What did you learn about yourself this semester?
This semester something that I learned about myself was that even when I don't understand a concept and how to achieve something that if I take my time and put in some effort that the end result will be awesome. I am a person who tends to rush through things and when I don't grasp a concept right away I tend to just give up. With this class you have to have a lot of patience because if you don't then your photos will never turn out correctly. Often times when we were given an assignment I would go home and try it out on my camera and when the photos wouldn't turn out the way I was hoping I would stop trying. After a while I realized that I would never get any good photos taken if I didn't put some time into understanding the process of the certain project and what it would take for me to correctly take the photos. I had to start taking my time and researching on the best way to make the project work on my camera such as the blur project. I definitely learned that if you want anything in life, not just photos to turn out good and something to be proud of that you need to take your time, put in effort, and keep on going even when it doesn't turn out how you want it to after the first photo.
What do you wish we had done that we did not?
I wish we had worked more with film cameras. I had never actually used a film camera before I took this class and didn't even know how to put a roll of film in the camera. I was very interested in film cameras after our first assignment because I thought that it was cool how you have to trust yourself in taking a good photo since you only have about 24 photos to take instead of a limitless amount. I think since we live in a digital world today it would have been cool to spend more time on something not many students get to work with today.
What was your struggle?
I struggled with the light photos assignment specifically. For some reason I had a really hard time achieving good light photos. I spent around two hours figuring out how to correctly take silhouette photos. It was just a concept that I had a really hard time grasping. I got really frustrated with the ability to create silhouettes after a while because none of the photos were turning out correctly for me. It was definitely the project that I struggled the most with.
What did you conquer?
I conquered photoshop. It is a challenging program to work with but after we used it for a while I was understanding it better. I quickly started getting the hang of using it and remebering how all the different tools worked. It ended up being one of my favorite things that we did. I liked being able to edit the photos into different colors or creating new eyes on people. I was upset with it at first because it is such a confusing thing but after a while I figured it out.
