DPP: Assignment 2: Seeing Like Your Camera (revised) + Reflection

As reformatting all this text to fit into the blog is rather time consuming, I'm experimenting with posting jpgs ripped from the pdf of the text file.  If you want to read the assignment in its entirety, click on the text Read more » below, then click on the first page to launch a photo viewer.

The original posting included the first draft of the assignment.  This has since been deleted and replaced with my reflection on the tutor's notes and a revised assignment prepared for assessment submission.

DPP Assignment 2: Seeing Like Your Camera: Planning

The title for Assignment 2 is Seeing Like Your Camera and requires a collection of high-contrast images shot in jpg and presented without post production.  The intention of the assignment seems to be to have the camera operator create as close to perfect exposures as possible in-camera under high contrast lighting conditions.  

The assignment is in two parts.  Part one requires shooting three images in four situations (twelve images in all).  Part two requires rethinking one set and reshooting it to reduce contrast. Total images in the assignment are thus fifteen.  

While not required, my plan has been to shoot thematically.  For the past few months I have frequently returned to images of poles - such as light posts and street signs - that punctuate the urban landscape like naked trees.  This has been done as part of my SZR project, documenting the few blocks around my residence on Sheikh Zayed Road, the city’s most well-known thoroughfare, the one lined with skyscrapers, including the world’s tallest, the Burj Khalifah.  My project has been the antithesis of the glamour and glitz as typically presented in travel and tourism images.  I see myself working more in the tradition of Atget, capturing everyday life in my little corner of the city in as realistic and unaffected manner as possible.  My intention is not to sell the city or make it attractive, but simply to record what I live and what I see.  

As for poles, I don’t quite know where the idea originated, but a review of my SZR images reveals an early interest in the concept of verticality as expressed in street signs, advertising, and metal rods. These three images from June 2013 show an interest in capturing collections of poles.