Assignment 2: Tutor Feedback
The feedback was generally
positive (You have documented the submitted work quite well and supplied three
sets of images that show in the main that some good progress is being made on
the course). However,
issues remained concerning the technical quality of some of the images and
there was also an issue regarding my interpretation of the “Decisive Moment” in
Project 8. There was also some criticism of my logbook. The feedback on
individual projects and logbook is discussed below.
Project 3: “Experiments in
Key”
You seem to have investigated
this topic area quite well. There are some good project based images here that
evidence the nature and level of your understanding. The work undertaken
demonstrates that you have the appropriate levels of technique and application
to utilise these “key” elements where you wish to in future projects. There is
a competent realisation of your ideas that are well printed and presented.
Comment on the individual images:
High Key 1: Swans landing. The sequential nature of the
image is indeed broken but there are a lot more elements to this image in terms
of key that make it worthwhile. You are shooting into the light and the shadow
areas still have good tone. He commented that, given the high key nature of
the image, it would be relatively easy to alter the sequence of swans using
“Photoshop”. I have investigated this: see my separate post.
High Key 2: Herring Gulls. He felt that the image would have looked better with a square crop and
that it was not sharp. I suspect that the lack of sharpness may have been
partly due to loss of detail in the birds’ plumage during the conversion to
high key, but I need to keep a close eye on getting my subjects completely in focus,
because the issue of “lack of sharpness” has been raised elsewhere.
Low Key 1: Great Crested Grebe. My tutor commented that it’s a
good image, I like it and the water on the back is nice and crisp. However,
he noted also that at this level perhaps
it’s a little safe – perhaps too safe you need to be doing a little more rather
than such a simple image showing low key. To develop yourself you need to
strive for the type of excitement – or mystery etc. that high or low key can
deliver. I have taken this point on board: some of my other images that
were not selected for the assignment were action shots with more excitement,
but I was unhappy with their composition or there were technical flaws.
However, in retrospect perhaps I should have replaced the “safer” images with
these.
Low Key 2: Mute Swan.
There were similar comments here as for the other low key image. However, in
addition my tutor commented on lack of detail in the bird’s plumage. I have
studied the print closely and struggle to find areas of plumage that are not
sharp. However, despite this being a low key image some of the plumage is
rather bright, so perhaps this is a case of too much contrast and some “blown”
highlights. Either way, I clearly need to put extra effort into ensuring that
my images are sharp when they need to be. It is, however, reassuring to note
that this is a successful set that shows
the required lighting, contrast and brightness used in a suitable aesthetic
manner.
Project 5: “An Impartial View”
My tutor commented that You
demonstrate a competent realisation of your ideas in a well presented and well-judged
manner. I like the editorial approach to this work which came across quite
strongly. This is though different to documentary and you need to investigate
those differences. Also: I very much like the approach you took to
the workflow of producing the story and the story gives an
effective grasp on the ideas to be communicated – without reading the text.
This is important as a photographer knowing that the majority is communicated
visually. However, he reminded me that I should be
working in the natural history and documentary genres for the major project and
the composite image (Image 4 of the set), whilst interesting and “different”,
was editorial.
Commenting on
the four individual images presented for the text free picture story he again
pointed out technical flaws or suggested improvements in composition that have
been noted. He felt that the pier was too dominant in the opening picture,
which was attended to link the gull with the seaside (Image: see below). The image of
the gull eating the crab was not quite sharp (probably at least partly because this
was actually a heavily cropped image, to concentrate on the “business end” of
the story: I’ll not be able to do this when I’m working on the major project!)
and it was suggested that I should “feather the edges” of the cut-out sections
to improve the appearance of the composite image.
Image
My tutor was complimentary regarding my
presentation of the four page “magazine” picture story, which I have to say
required quite a lot of work to put together and, within the strict remit of
the project, was probably not necessary! Comments included: I
think you have made a really good effort here. You have a good balance and
layout of images throughout the pages. There is good visual weighting on page 1
between image and text that makes it look quite genuine and the
second page has a good wildlife feel about it. It shows natural behaviours that
are fascinating and insightful for the viewer. The ledge image and the dropping
image both show more facets of the wild gull and look to be well seen and
captured. Good balance again visually well done. Page 3 is a good contrast of
marauding mobs and the ubiquitous chip! ……. the posters ……. make a good end to the
story.
Project 8: “The Decisive
Moment”
Here, for once, praise for the quality of the images (The quality of these images jumps off the
page or screen. This was like looking at work of a completely different calibre
than that previously seen and I feel
these images are of a professional quality and you should be very pleased and
proud of them) and there were no technical issues: clearly the use of the
300mm prime lens with 1.4x converter (the combination was used for all the images in
this project) has had a pronounced effect! My main issue now is how to get the
best out of my other lenses, because there is no way that I will be able to use
the prime lens for all my work!
Unfortunately there was a problem with my interpretation of the project,
however: the downside is the decisive
moment. This is not strong at all in these images. I think you need to look at
this again in terms of how does the decisive moment affect the rest of the
image – the other people /birds things etc. in the image. Having the bird alone
just doesn’t deliver that. It therefore appears that my view of the most
decisive moment in the sequence of images of the bird visiting the feeding
station as being when the nuthatch has the peanut in its bill (or possibly when
it picks up the nut) is wide of the mark. This isn’t a decisive moment at all:
instead: in bird terms it’s that stealing
food from another moment – or escaping from a predator etc. Unfortunately I
didn’t capture any images of birds escaping (or being caught by) predators
whilst I was searching for decisive moments: if I had, it’s unlikely that I
would have been able to capture a sequence of six (or even two!) satisfactory
images. My tutor kindly gave me a link to a video clip of Cartier-Bresson
discussing his interpretation of “The Decisive Moment”, which helped somewhat
in my understanding of this phrase.
During my work leading up to the submission of Assignment 2 I captured a
couple of other sequences featuring birds that I considered using for this
project: these are discussed in other posts for Project 8 (links here and here). I would be
interested to know whether any images from either sequence could clearly be
described as representing “The Decisive Moment”.
To end on a positive note, my tutor commented that I think this has been a very good project for you in terms of
development and comprehending the differences that your equipment is capable
of. It must have been quite a revelation here in terms of the difference
between a zoom and the prime especially when it came to printing and your technique and work flow etc. have
developed well on this project.
Logbook
The logbook as a Word/PDF document was getting quite bulky by the end of
the second assignment: it was also becoming difficult to cross reference within
the logbook (I had not inserted any links) and the splitting of the logbook
into three sections (“Exhibition Visits”, “Projects not Submitted for
Assessment” and “General”) was not
working. It was also recommended that I should write up what I, as an
individual, took from the exhibitions, how it would affect my practice, what I
learnt, what I would experiment with etc. etc. As a consequence I have both overhauled my logbook and (as suggested by my tutor on more than one occasion)
started this blog, which was activated on 2 June 2014 and now includes, under appropriate labels, all the articles that are in my logbook, in addition to assessment work and tutor comments. The process has taken
about 60 hours during three and a half weeks in May and June 2014. The blog will be maintained as a
publicly accessible logbook which I hope will be used by assessors for examination. However, I will continue to maintain the logbook both as a hard copy version and as a single electronic document, with links in the latter that I will add as I go along. At present (June 2014) I am assuming that I will ultimately submit these for assessment.
Learning Points and Future
Work
I have already acted on many of
the issues raised by my tutor in his report (see above and elsewhere in this
blog). What I now need to do is concentrate on improving the quality of my
images and prints, re-igniting my creativity, learning from mistakes,
experimenting with ideas and inspiration developed from my own work and that of
others and producing a critical review that informs the work that I will need
to produce for the major project.
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