Self Evaluation Report

­Self Evaluation Report – Laura Parkinson

This unit has definitely been a test for myself, especially for having to stick to a definite deadline and forcing myself to go to new places to capture photographs. For the past four years, I have been juggling photography with other subjects, so doing photography full time has been new to me. In this unit, I think I have performed well, as concentrating on a solo project has broadened my horizons and allowed me to capture people and places that I never thought I could. I think my studio shoot worked better than I imagined. I turned up feeling very unprepared, but realised halfway through that everything I had planned was working, and the project seamlessly came together alongside editing techniques.

When I received the brief, I found the shutter speed and aperture assignments very dull and bland. Having these assignments, however, has made me go out and try to capture normal, everyday life using these two incentives. Starting off small has definitely made me think more about my composition and strategy when photographing. I was pretty clued up about shutter speed before I started, but the aperture assignment has given me some knowledge that I didn’t previously have.

My shutter speed images definitely helped me learn more about shutter speeds and what I could capture that was new to me. I always thought about light and movement when photographing using slow shutter speeds, but felt I still stuck to this rather than trying new things like water and landscapes.

Assignment one of the aperture brief educated me a lot, too. I knew the basics as to the concept of the aperture, but never gave it a second thought as to the effects that could be obtained through varying the aperture. However, I found assignment two (foreground to background) especially difficult, as I felt I was just sticking to landscapes, rather than experimenting with photographing things close up as opposed to landscapes and cityscapes.

The studio workshops were a massive help to me, I was a complete novice to studio work, and so had no idea what half the stuff was that John was talking about. However, I soon picked it up and managed to grasp all the basics, and necessary knowledge, before my Barry M product shoot.

My studio shoot went well, considering it was my first time photographing a product. I chose to photograph a product for this reason, as I had previously concentrated on a lot of portrait work. What’s the point of being at university if you stick to what you know for three years? I found the lighting was quite easy to master when I had the guidance of John and the help of my assistant. The typography worked well too, and I now know how to place business logos onto photographs to make them look genuine thanks to a few online tutorials and friendly advice!

Going ‘back to basics’ has definitely helped me grasp new knowledge of shutter speed and aperture, I think that if I had jumped into the deep end and tried to produce something amazing, I wouldn’t have learnt so much photographically. However, I feel like my time setting skills need improving, as I found myself attempting to produce the photographs for most assignments within a short time frame (i.e. one photo shoot). Going out more than once, which I realised was needed later on, helped me understand the assignments more and made for better photographs. I also need to improve my organisation skills, as I have had to spend a few hours organising files into sections to make my work more presentable electronically as I have a habit of chucking my work anywhere because I am so keen to edit.