Elements of photography on display

Getting the details all wrong

Who knew there was so much to know about taking pictures?

A lot of people, probably.

I’ve never been a great detail person. I tend to look at the big picture, and view the specific details of most processes as needless minutiae, with the express purpose of annoying me. As though my time is worth too much to concentrate on the smaller details.

And details are what photography is all about.

In the past two weeks, I learned a lot about what it takes to shoot great photos. That isn’t to say I can shoot great photos, but I do have a better understanding of how to start. It really started with the realization that cameras do not record moments; they capture light. From that understanding, my own camera become more approachable.

In my high school, I do not teach the introductory journalism classes. I only advise one of the production classes. My colleague has lots of pictures hung in our room about manipulating a camera: ISO numbers, and f/stop numbers and shutter speed numbers. Numbers, numbers, numbers. I did not know what any of them meant. The sight of those numbers sent me into a flashback/nightmare about math class. I think I avoid anything related to numbers for that exact reason.

In any case, this week I learned that ignoring those numbers has worked against me. The ISO was the first number we covered in class. It just controls the camera’s sensitivity to light. The brighter it is, the lower the ISO. The darker it is, the higher the ISO. You don’t want to mess with the ISO too much after you have set it for an environment, unless it suddenly clouds over. Easy enough.

The next item I learned about was how the aperture works. The aperture, of course, is the opening in the lens, and it can be opened wide (f/4) or narrowed (f/22). The wider the opening, the more light comes in, but the more out of focus the fore- or background will appear. The narrower the opening, the less light comes in, but the fore- or background will be more in focus.

Finally, I learned about shutter speed. It works in combination with the ISO and aperture settings. The faster the shutter speed, like 1/4000 of a second, the more likely you are to freeze motion without blur. But that means the shutter is open for such a short amount of time that it can’t let much light in.

There are ways to compensate and play around with the settings, such as the rule of reciprocity (if you move the aperture four stops one way, you should move the shutter speed four stops the other way), but I’m still learning how to manipulate those.

My photo slideshow will be up for you to peruse shortly. Which brings me to what else I learned this week; don’t procrastinate when it comes to posting your work online. Because now, under the gun, I cannot for the life of me get my photo slideshow to imbed properly.

Luddite in rapidly changing world

“I have been called  a Luddite,” Kurt Vonnegut, my favorite writer, said in his collection of essays, A Man Without a Country.

He went on to explain that Luddites are individuals who largely shun technology, thinking that the old ways are better. I could also be described as a Luddite.

My old-school tendencies show up in the way I advise student media. For four years, the staffs I have advised produced wonderful printed newspapers that would fit right in to the scholastic journalism of the late 90s.

So, when I started exploring the first module’s assignments in Teaching Multimedia, I discovered a lot of new ideas. A few of the most important ideas came from Mindy McAdams in her blog about redefining multimedia journalism.

McAdams included a list of suggestions regarding the function of multimedia storytelling. While the entire list is helpful, three ideas truly struck me:

• compliment, don’t repeat;
• immersive experiences rule;
• and good journalistic judgment is still needed.

The different tools used to tell a multimedia story shouldn’t all be a reiteration of each other. If the video is just a visual version of the text, or if the still photos do not add anything new, or if the audio files are a rehash of already known information, then the package is not truly multimedia. News consumers want to have their senses stimulated, and putting together a package that immerses them is key to the experience.

This cuts to the heart of why I could be described as a Luddite: I do not have the skills needed to put those packages together. Likewise, I do not know how to advise students to create them. But McAdams’ last point gave me hope. I still know how to teach students to develop good journalistic judgment.

And so, I started to explore the examples of great multimedia storytelling. I discovered my favorite—a combination of video documentary, text and interactive map about the Cronulla riots in Australia—through the Fauna corporation website. This opened my eyes to the potential multimedia storytelling used by my staff.

Instead of an online photo gallery for a girls basketball game, the staff could create a multimedia package. It could include video for highlights or player reaction; an interactive map of a drawn-up play explaining the roles and motion of the players; a textual recap of the game; and a slideshow of photos narrated by the photographer. The only problem the staff faces is that their adviser is a luddite, and does not know how to teach them to assemble and integrate those pieces.

Vonnegut went to his grave shunning a lot of modern technology. I don’t want to continue to advise student media doing the same thing. I want to gain better technical knowledge of how to help students orchestrate stunning multimedia packages.