Photography Class: Project 1

I started taking a photography class over at the local community college so I could hopefully, eventually, figure out what all those buttons are on my camera. I've only had it for two years now, I guess it's time I took it off automatic. So far I've really enjoyed the class and I foresee it becoming more enjoyable the more I learn.

Last Thursday we were assigned our first project. A sort of introduction to your camera project. We were given a list of fifteen subjects or ideas that we needed to capture. They ranged from "order" to "chaos" and a bunch of things in between.

So far I've had some great opportunities to cross about 2/3 of the items off my list because in the last few days I've been all over the valley. I was previewing a house in an older, less desirable part of town and captured both old age and a street scene. And by the way, did you know that for just $2.99 a pound there is such a thing as "take out buffet"? I did not know that.

We went to Pueblo Grande, one of the few remaining sites of Hohokam ruins, and I took a picture of a petroglyph for "trace". I also took a picture of a spider but that was only because he was hanging on the door I was trying to go through and I wanted evidence of what bit me should he decide to attack.

Anyway, so we also had to take a picture of the light at sunrise and sunset. After much frustration I finally managed to get a picture of Izzy at sunrise. It took forever because every time I'd get lined up perfectly, she would pop a wheelie and try to hop over to me. Evidently she knew she wasn't supposed to be getting up and walking around and this seemed like a viable alternative.

For sunset, I decided to sit Master J down at the end of the day and see if I could do any better. Because I know that the class will be critiquing our "work", I have done a little pre-critique. I know that while the lighting in this shot is acceptable, I should have shot it in portrait and zoomed in closer. But I didn't, at least not the first shot.



However, in the time it took to snap the shot, look at to realize what I needed to change and implement the changes, the light changed. And I got this instead. Sigh.



Oh, and lest you think he's being overly compliant, here's a picture from a few days ago where he was apparently doing some sort of Elvis impersonation. I worry about the boy, I really do.



One more thing, I think I showed great restraint in NOT taking a picture of my child holding a sign saying "I am a 9 year old boy with ADHD and my Mom won't medicate me" for the example of chaos. A lot of restraint.