Visual Dictionary

For this GIMP assignment we were suppose to define words through visual images. At first I really did not like this assignment but after a while I got into it, and enjoyed it. It was cool to see how these turned out after all of the editing and work put into them. At first it took me a long time to make one, but today I made my last one in about 10 minutes. I am finally starting to get used to using GIMP and it's not as frustrating as I used to think. I think these turned out a lot better then I imagined. Serene and elegant are my favorite because they are the last ones I did and I was definitely getting the hang a little bit better. Overall, I am happy how these turned out.

Photo 6; Architecture

Shutter Speed: 1/100
Aperture:f/8.0
ISO:80

This week for photo assignment 6 I shot some pictures of Architecture. I walked around downtown  Ann Arbor and then downtown Saline in order to find some cool buildings to shoot. I actually really enjoyed shooting these pictures. If was fun to shoot buildings from a different perspective and see how the pictures turned out. I definitely think that this week was one of my best, if not my best. At first I had a little trouble because I thought pictures of buildings were flat out boring. I finally actually got into what I was shooting and I think it shows in my pictures this week. I liked this one the best because of the colors and the perspective. You don't see a lot of pictures of buildings that are shot looking up. This was sort of a unique picture and that is why I chose it.

Portrait

This week we did the Portrait assignment. I actually really enjoyed this assignment. We went out and took pictures of our friends then came back and did some editing on GIMP. I think I like shooting people better than just still objects. The picture on the left is an example of window/natural lighting while the one on the right is the studio lighting. I personally think they both turned out well. I didn't have to make that many adjustments to the camera in this process. It was fun to just take a bunch of pictures and see which one turned out the best. I tried to make their personalities show and i think they portrayed that pretty well. Overall, I'm pretty happy with this assignment.

Event

ISO:80
Aperture:f/13
Shutter:1/80

This Sunday I spent the day at the Michigan Softball Game. It was a big game so there was a full house. I thought it would be cool to almost capture the event in just a couple pictures. I got a few good ones of the players, but i was behind a net, so it kind of took away from what I was trying to capture in the image. Out of the ones that didn't have the net, i liked this one the best. I liked it because it showed to intense fans, and you could definitely tell the event that I was at. This was not my favorite picture that I took but it was the best quality one. It turned out better than I expected. This week I learned that you can really capture an event just by taking picture of the spectators.

People

ISO:800
Shutter speed:1/80
Aperture:f/2.7


This week I chose to shoot people. I had my friend Kenzie come over and pose in the most random spots for me to take a picture. I didn't want just normal pictures, I really wanted her personality to shine through. She would do the funniest things and say "Laura take this picture!". We had a really fun time trying to see what kind of pictures we could get out of the weird things that she did.  I was trying to think about the rule of thirds as I was shooting all of these pictures, but for some of them, it was hard. I took quite a few throughout the night. I liked this picture because it was unordinary. It kind of told a story, it's not just her smiling. I had a few to choose from but this one stood out to me.

School Context

Our GIMP assignment this week was school context. We had to take a picture around the school and then edit something/someone into it to make it look unordinary. We had to make it look as real as possible.I found this assignment kind of frustrating. Its hard to make something look real that is not real at all. However, I'm glad we did it because this is something I might be able to use later. There were so many different tools that we used to edit the picture. In the end, I think mine turned out okay, but not the best. It is definitely a learning experience so that next time it will be easier. I decided to take the ordinary school hallway where everyone walks in and out. My catch was that I edited some Super Heroes into it. It was fun to see how they turned out because we all did something really different.

Motion Demo

Today we did a motion demo. The point of this assignment was to teach us how to capture motion while the background is blurred. The key to this was the ability to pan with our cameras in order to catch the moving object. At first I had trouble with not panning, so Mr. Bush was in blur while the background was clear.  I had to find a way to flip-flop the two and i figured out that I just had to move the camera at the same speed as Mr. Bush and just follow him the whole way. We had to set our shutter speed fairly quickly in order to catch this moving object. It was really neat to be able to capture the moment because I have never really learned how to pan properly. I used to think that in order to capture motion, you just had to be lucky. This class is slowly proving me wrong. From here on I would like to see that cool pictures i can get from using this technique.

Macro Photo Assignment 3

For this week's photo assignment, I choose to shoot macro. This was a challenge for me because I had to find something that would be interesting to shoot from very close up. I walked around my house for a while not knowing what to shoot and being very picky. As soon as I actually started taking pictures, the whole thing became easier. Something i learned this week was just shoot pictures, don't worry about what they look like until they are on the computer. Shoot as many as you can, you are bound to get some good ones. Also, this week I learned that things close up, could look very different from far away. Some of the things I shot i thought would look dumb, but when I actually looked at the picture, it turned out pretty good. I think each week my pictures are getting better because I am learning new things things about my camera everyday. I think throughout this course I am becoming more creative and looking at object more in depth. Its cool to see what I can produce every week.

Panoramic

This week we did a new GIMP assignment. Our job was to go out and shoot 3 pictures of a wide object, in order the merge them and create a panoramic photo. The picture taking was kind of difficult because we had to make sure we overlapped the three pictures. Once we got our pictures we had to learn how to put them together. At first I didn't think it was going to turn out the way it did. I guess we learn something new everyday! It was really cool to see the end result. We had to use many different tools to create the picture we did, and at times it was confusing but it turned out okay in the end. Although this was a little frustrating, I'm glad i learned how to do it because now I can use this to make some more interesting pictures. One thing i do regret about my picture is the fact that i didn't capture the whole wall. Now I think that it look unfinished, but I can't change it now. I thought one of the most useful things i learned was the eraser tool in order to get rid of the lines separating my 3 pictures. Overall, I'm glad we did this assignment, and the fact that i got to learn all of this for the future.

Nature

ISO:125

Shutter Speed:1/160 sec

Aperture:f/2.7

For this week's photo assignment I chose to do nature. At the beginning i was a little stuck on how to make a flower look interesting but by the end of the day, it wasn't very hard to do. I chose nature because recently all of the flowers have been starting to bloom and the grass is finally turning very green.  I thought shooting nature was really fun because there were endless possibilities and I love the colors that show up in the pictures. This was my favorite picture because the flowers were nice and in focus and I thought it was really neat how there were rain drops on the petals. I got a few interesting pictures throughout the week so it was pretty hard to choose, but this one won. I think this week went much better than last week now that I am getting the hang of things a little better. I'm excited to see what next week will bring.