LESSON 1
Introduction
If you and I were sitting in a circle of people on the prairie, and if I were then to place a painted drum or an eagle feather in the middle of this circle, each of us would perceive these objects differently. Our vision of them would vary according to our individual positions in the circle, each of which would be unique.
Hyemeyohsts Storm, Seven Arrows (1)
This Plains Indian philosophy as described by Hyemeyohsts Storm can be interpreted in several ways. For us photographers, whether beginners, intermediate, or an expert, it means that everyone of us will perceive an image differently. If this were not so, photography images would be boring indeed.
Welcome to this photography class. This class will introduce you to the basics of film and digital photography, and continue through to some more advanced work. By the end of this class you will be more familiar with the various settings on your camera. You will be able to override the automatic settings, thus allowing you to be more creative.
When I wrote the first version of this material in 2001 it was devoted strictly to film cameras. In 2004 and 2005 it became apparent that more and more students owned both film and digital, and many students wanted to use both, or switch between one format to another during the six weeks of the course material. I have therefore revised the course material so no matter what type of camera you have, you will gain knowledge from this course material.
Some of the items we will cover are:
- Programmed or Auto mode as it is commonly called.
- Aperture-priority mode
- Shutter-priority mode
- Manual f stops and shutter speeds
- Manual focusing
- Film speeds, types of films available and a discussion of the various ISO speeds as it pertains to film and digital camera bodies. We will be using color print film for this class. You may use whatever brand name of film you desire. For this course I have used color Kodak or Fuji 100, 200, 400, 800, and 1600.
- The use of different types of lenses although if you just own one lens, most likely a zoom lens, this is just fine
- Depth of field discussion. You will be taught how to adjust your camera settings so that the subject is in focus but the background or foreground is blurred.
- Macro techniques, particularly useful when photographing flowers or other small subjects
- Composition
- Photographing of structures
- Low light situations such as indoor sporting events
- Use of filters including polarizing filters.
- Electronic flash techniques including fill in flash
- Portrait photography in a studio setting
- Other topics also get discussed, based on interaction between the students, and the students and myself
Equipment and software you will need for this class.
You should have a 35mm focal plane camera, commonly called SLR (single lens reflex). This can be film or digital. You can also use a compact type of digital camera that has a fixed lens that cannot removed from the body of the camera. On most of these you will find that they can be set to either full automatic, partial automatic, or manual modes. If you are using a digital, check your manual. Many of those units now have controls that will allow you to change settings. An electronic flash will be useful but if you don't have one that is ok as well. Most modern cameras now have a built in electronic flash. Although these are not as powerful as the stand-alone models, they certainly do come in handy, especially for outdoor fill-in-flash situations.
You must be able to upload your photographs to the web for viewing. Many of you probably know how to compose and upload a basic web site. That being the case, feel free to create weekly web pages around your pictures along with the comments. If you do not have a host you can visit
http://www.lvsonline.com/tut-htmltut/index.shtml for more information on how to create a simple HTML document. SeaMonkey is a free html editor. There is a free tutorial for SeaMonkey
HERE
Update-March 2005. I notice many students are using the services offered by "freewebs" and you can check them out at http://members.freewebs.com/. I have tested this service and it is very easy to use. If you have never composed a web site before, I would suggest you use this service as you can post photographs along with the detail notes that you have for those photographs. You do not need to own web design software as it is all done online. Be sure to elect the free service. Another suggestion is to have all your photographs in a directory where you can easily find them. I suggest a new directory on your hard drive for your class photographs, and having a sub root directory for the individual weeks. So your directory , assuming you are using your C: drive might look like this:
C:photography-class
and in that directory you would have "week1", "week2", etc. That way when freewebs asks where to upload those images from, they are easier to find.
C:photography-classweek1
Here is some typical student web site posted on freewebs and on pbase.
http://www.freewebs.com/marnsphotos/
www. pbase.com. This is not free but it is only $23 US annually for 400 Megs of storage. There is a 30 day free trail with a 10 Meg limit on storage. Dan states "I think it is the best photo storage site on the internet. Easy to use with excellent support."
And here is the link to Dan's recent site, week #5: http://www.pbase.com/danmcgo/bpwk5
The big advantage with this second one is that it is ad free and you don't get pop up ads coming at you.
If you are a student that uploads images to a free site without creating a web site page of your own that is another solution. However many of those services do not allow you to make comments underneath each photograph. This means you have to leave messages on the class board pertaining to each photograph. It will give everyone the information but it means we do have to flip back and forth between the class board and wherever those photographs are posted. My suggestion is to use a service where you can post comments along with your photographs like Marni and Dan have done.
For this course we will not use a computer graphics program such as Paint Shop Pro(psp) to enhance any the photographs you take. I prefer to see the photographs as developed, including "mistakes". However graphic programs such as PSP should and can be used to reduce the size of your scanned images to a size reasonable for uploading to your host. Please do not crop any of your photographs or enhance them in any way. You may post up to 12 photographs each week. Resize to 500 to 600 pixels size. If your scanned photograph is not a true color rendition of your print (if scanned from a print), you might mention that when you are posting. I mention this fact because sometimes when you scan a nice looking film print, the end result is not the same as what is on the print.
Here is one of the easiest imaging software's for reducing your photographs down to a reasonable size. You can even select all your images in batches. The originals will not be over written. (never over write your original images)
http://www.fookes.com/ezthumbs/ This is freeware. No cost to you.
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