Freedom to Look: OCA Level 1 Learning Log: DPP: Assignment One: Workflow

The Metro, mirror glass, and me

The Brief

The brief for Assignment One is to construct an effective workflow on a theme of choice leading to the selection of 6-12 images to be presented as an online gallery or as prints. All the steps in the workflow are to be listed and a short comment to be written against each describing what was done. An explanation of how this workflow differs from others' and personal adaptations are to be included. Finally, we are to reflect on how well this assignment meets OCA assessment criteria (essentially, grading our own assignment).

The brief is actually is a bit confusing in at least one respect. I wrote about this at the OCA Photography Forum:

Explain how you think your workflow may differ from others' and what adaptations you made to suit the way you yourself take and process photographs.

A model workflow, against which one can compare seems to be assumed. However, such a model is not described in the course notes, nor so far as I have ascertained in any of the Essential Readings. I will be doing street photography for this assignment. Is there a model workflow for this kind of image making? Or should I be researching the workflows of street photographers who publish this kind of information? (Not a bad idea, I know, but obviously more time consuming. Anyone reading this with leads, please post them here!) Or should I just be imagining how other photogs might be doing this (the inclusion of may suggests this possibility) in order to say something about how I do it?

Suggestions have included analysis (interpreting the requirements), considering how workflow may have changed, and having a look at workflow outlined in Thomas Leuthard's Going Candid (a book I read some months ago and which didn't make much of an impression).

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Discussion
We'll start with Leuthard, who conceives his workflow as three processes:

1. Training and planning

2. Image creation

3. Distribution

The subsequent discussion is weighted toward the last of these processes, which makes the book feel more like a marketing than a photography gudie. Of the first he offers some simple ideas for training the eye, as well as the suggestion of creating themed lists to focus one's shooting. On the technical side, he advocates a less-is-best approach: carry as little gear as possible, shoot in P-mode, focus on the composition, minimize post-processing. Lastly, 15 pages are devoted to how to share work on social media, primarily Flickr, with the idea of building a brand. While I appreciate Leuthard's punk-like approach to street photography, I find him a bit naïve in his just-be-positive approach to becoming a great photographer. At some point, expert advice might be just what you need to continue your process of development.

Actually, I find my workflow not all that different from Leuthard's. I usually have some plan when I set out, even if it is as general as shooting an area of my neighborhood underrepresented in my image collection. I am just now getting to the point where I have canvassed my neighborhood and may begin considering more thematic excursions, going out to shoot specific subjects such as transport, pedestrians, buildings, signs, etc. I carry little, shoot uin a variety of modes (depending on the need), and do as little post-processing as required (working only in Lightroom). Where I differ most is in distribution and sharing. I have a Flikr account and have been adding images here for the past few months, but I don't do much to let others know where to find the images. This is most probably lack of confidence.

Besides reexamining Leuthard, I have also googled [street photography workflow] to see if anything of interest might turn up. (I may be off the mark here in searching for genre-specific workflows. I'll get to that in a bit.) Canadian photog Peter Prosophos has something of a contrary opinion, stressing that his work is considered and deliberate, a bit less off-the-cuff than Leuthard:

Simply put, consistently pleasing images are, created, not randomly “snapped”. Of course, one may by sheer luck produce a good image and even a work of photographic art, but it won’t happen consistently unless you know what you’re doing.

Perhaps. But perhaps also by repeatedly snapping randomly and repeatedly paying attention to output (thus meeting at least a minimal requirement for effort), one could conceivably produce a consistent body of interesting work (rather than pleasing, which Prosophos does not define). His four posts on workflow follow this kind of speculative/philosophical approach and don't have much more to recommend them in regards to this assignment (though they may be of interest in another context).

Thomas Hawk and David Hodgson provide examples of digital workflow that might be almost generic. There is nothing about them that appears genre specific. Hawk begins with image capture, whereas Hodgson starts with post-processing. Neither discuss pre-shoot preparation. In outline form, they suggest:

1. Capture

2. Transfer (images to computer)

3. Flag: here Hodgson makes the suggestion of watching everything through once as a slideshow before beginning the processing of flagging

4. Develop

5. Keyword/Geotag

6. Export (typically to jpeg)

7. Archive

8. Publish

Since finding these net sources I have heard from my tutor, who suggests that I may be reading too much into the brief. My initial review of the materials for the course left me with the impression that the requirements are quite general. The histogram exercise in Part One, for example, was quite basic. The purpose of this assignment appears to be simply to document an established pattern for managing photographic work, as well as evidence of research into the possible components of a photographic workflow.

To that end, I will note one other source I consulted previous to starting this assignment. In his Digital SLR Handbook, Freeman outlines the following aspects of a digital workflow:

1. Planning

2. Computer needs

3. Color and Color Management

4. Monitors and Monitor Calibration

5. Temporary and Archival Storage

6. Daily Downloads (backup)

7. Captioning and Keywording

8. Software

9. Optimizing

10. RAW

11. Histograms, levels, and curves

12. Shadows & Highlights

13. Sharpening

14. Upscaling

15. Printers

16. Proof, contact, display

The first few items on the list are preliminary and not part of a chronological process of a daily or weekly shoot. The remainder follows a fairly standard sequence of processing and saving images, apart from captioning, which typically comes after processing. I think Freeman includes it early in order to suggest gathering required data that might be easily available at the shoot.

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The Plan
My purpose in this assignment is to produce a set of images of the Metro stations in my neighborhood. The Metro is Dubai's recently completed (and still expanding) light-rail commuter transport. I have for some months been documenting a three-station radius of Sheikh Zayed Road, a 10-lane highway bordered by rows of skyscrapers, including the world's tallest, the Burj Khalifa. I have in that time taken numerous images in and around the Metro stations. My intention with this assignment is to add to this collection with a series of images of the stations themselves, rather than the people around or in them. As part of the assignment, I will also include in the workflow a review of previous images. The purpose is to gain an awareness of what has already been done so as to focus on areas that perhaps haven't yet been explored, as well as to compare images from this shoot with previous work.

Preshoot: Planning

1. Review all previous photos in Lightroom. These exist in a couple of different folders. For ease of use and future reference, a Metro collection was created to aggregate all Metro folders/images.

2. Compile a list of images not represented in the current collection. There are any number of images that could be added to the collection, such as passengers, station interiors, car interiors, or passing scenery from within the train.

3. Decide on a series of images for this project. I will shoot series of exteriors of the three metro stations that lie within the range of my current shooting project. I will shoot these both in daylight and at night.

4. Consider any special needs for capturing the type of images required. A tripod and a remote release will be necessary for shooting after dark.

Preshoot: Gear-up

1. Charge batteries

2. Format memory cards

3. Clean lens

4. Get out the tripod

Shoot
I will endeavor to complete this assignment in one day starting at about 16:00. My aim is to capture day and night versions of the stations. As these structures are situated on the north-bound side of the road and built only meters from office and residential buildings, I will shoot from the opposite side for a wider field of view. It will not be necessary to capture identical images and so will shoot handheld during the day, tripod after sunset. I will try to capture all the required images within one shoot, but am prepared to visit again should this be required.

Post-shoot
This process has been fairly well described in previous exercises (here, here, and here). I will not repeat it here except to describe the actual process as it developed.

Publish
Prints: I will send prints to the tutor via a UK lab.
Online: I will publish these on my learning blog.

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The bus got in the way

The Day After
The shoot went as well as expected. I spent about four hours on the street, between 16:00-20:00, and captured 219 images, more than the handful required for this assignment.

There were two issues that I hadn't properly anticipated. One was how to include traffic in my images. The two first choices were 1) waiting for breaks in traffic to avoid shooting vehicles or 2) shooting whatever passed by. Once that choice was made, there was another: 1) freeze the cars (using high shutter speed), or 2) shoot them as ghosts (daytime) or light trails (at night). If I chose to freeze the cars, I then had to decide whether to 1) release in continuous mode to create a large collection of images out of which I could later chose one with the best arrangement of elements, or 2) try to anticipate and capture arrangements as they presented themselves. I ended up using a combination of these choices, waiting for breaks in traffic during the day and freezing when that wasn't possible, and shooting light trails at night.

The other issue was angles, or set-ups. Sitting at my computer writing my notes I imagined a straight-on view for all three stations. But with plenty of daylight hours, I played around and shot the stations from a number of angles. This turned out to have been a lucky decision, because after dark I was unable at one station to shoot from the daytime position because of buses parked in that area. With the alternate views, I could still complete my mission of capturing similar looking pairs. Moreover, some shots didn't come out as well as they looked on the LCD, but with the additional set-ups I was still able to produce three usable pairs.

One amusing result of the different set-ups can be found in the Financial Centre Station images. It appears as though light posts have been planted between the day and night photos! I had to go back and look at other photos from this set to confirm this was simply a result of a small change in position.

Import: Beginning the following morning I opened Lightroom to copy these files to my laptop hard drive and to the LR catalog. Keywords relevant to all images were included at import. The files went into a folder named for this assignment.

Sort: I then viewed all 219 images, flagging those I thought were of interest (not all of them related to this assignment). As I was using continuous release to capture many of the station images, I used LR's stack feature to create virtual piles of similar images. Once this was complete, I had created 9 stacks, deleted 44 images, and flagged 25.

Develop: I then began working on the six images that I would need for this assignment, following this sequence of actions:

1. Auto-correct: I often do this to see what the software will suggest and then tweak those results. If the image looks good already, I'll make adjustments without using Auto-correct.

2. Highlights: I sometimes reduce a bit to bring back more of the sky.

3. Clarity: to add a bit of contrast and definition.

4. Graduated filter: when necessary, often in high contrast images, to return color to the sky.

5. Lens Correct: most often the new auto function is sufficient, but sometimes a manual correction may be required.

6. Detail: adding sharpening and reducing noise

Export: I then added keywords specific to each image before exporting full-sized, 72-ppi jpegs to submit for this assignment. A second-set of smaller water-marked jepgs for posting to my learning blog were also exported. Finally, a set of full-sized 300-ppi jpegs were exported for printing.

Publish/Archive: Print files were uploaded to Digitalab. Glossy, 12 x 8, white-bordered prints were ordered and will be delivered to the tutor for inspection. Images related to the Metro were copied to the new Lightroom Metro collection before all image files on the laptop hard-drive were archived to external storage.

And so ends this assignment. There are a number of images left from this collection to develop and these will be included in my ongoing collection of SZR (Sheikh Zayed Road) images.

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The images

Emirates Tower Day

Emirates Tower Night

Financial Centre Day

Financial Centre Night (corrected)

World Trade Centre Day

World Trade Centre Night

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Outtakes
The following includes one uncorrected image from the original submission, plus three images which might have been used had I been able to capture similar day or night views.