Week 3 Forum

TOPIC 1: TWO PORTRAIT SUBJECTS --  Write about TWO possible subjects for your Environmental Portrait and Mug Shot.  For each subject note:

1. His or her FULL NAME
2. Your subject's "claim to fame” (What is their passion? What are they best known for? Job? Creativity? Achievement?)
3. The best environment in which to shoot this person
4. Props that would work best
5. How you plan to contact this person

For this weeks photo shoot I had originally planned on trying to contact Mikel Letelier because I had remembered that he was apart of the Student Body Council at LBCC and thought that he could have been a great subject. For that photo shoot I would have had him most likely sitting, with some sort of poster or something that let the audience know his connection to the organization. A prop that I could have had him use could have been a clip board with a pencil or something similar.

Instead, while I was out taking photos at the farmers market on Saturday, at one of the booths I met a guy named Vincent Drew and he allowed me to take his photos right there. Vincent is a volunteer for the Community Service Consortium Youth House Gardens where they work to both help young adults to complete there GED and to also teach them skills that will help them to be ready to enter the work force in the future. For Vincent, I felt that the best environment was to be right behind the row of tomato and pepper plants on sale with the CSC banner in the background. Unfortunately they did not have a spade or something similar around, but I attempted to frame him alongside as many items, such as the scale and the plants, as possible to key the viewers into the identity of Vincent.

TOPIC 2: SELF-CRITIQUE --  Now that you've been committing photojournalism for a few weeks ...

1. What is the BEST PHOTO you've taken for this class, and WHY is it your best? (Post a copy of it! AND A LINK!)

• My best photo for the class so far would have to be the photo of Mikel Letelier. I really liked this photo the best because the expression on his face was so natural and I liked the overall composition as well.

1. What is the WORST PHOTO you've posted on your blog so far, and WHY did it turn out that way? (Post a copy, or not ...)

• My worst photo so far would be that of Gayle Rushing because of the way that I framed her in her environment and was not able to capture her best expression. Also the image felt very cluttered and I did not have her posed in order to show her in her environment.

1. What SKILL do you feel you have to improve the most to raise the quality of your photos?

• I think the skill that I have to improve the most to raise the quality of my photos is to take way more photos than I think I will need. So far I have been too picky with waiting or looking for the "perfect moment" and so that limits me by restricting the options of photos to choose from.