Trick of the Light

(Alternate Title: Photography Course, Part I)

In spite of how often I find myself taking photos - for my family, my school, and (of course) this blog - I actually have very little training in photography.  And by "very little," I mean practically none.  I've read a thing or two here or there as part of my lesson planning, but I tend to trust in my camera, because it almost always knows what it's doing better than I do.  And that's probably okay for a casual photographer, but as a teacher it kind of bothers me.  After all, if I don't know what I'm doing, how can I teach my students?  So the fact that my master's program included a photography elective made it pretty appealing to me, and when it was finally offered this term, I signed up as soon as I could.

"Soft-focus Slaughter" - pinhole photo drawing on the theme of the body

I planned to get as deep into the process as I could, but then I woke up and realized that I hardly knew the first thing about developing and printing and I don't really have the resources to mess around with it.  Someday, I want to learn all of it, but this is not that day.  Instead, I ended up sticking with digital photography, for the most part.  Before this semester, I understood the general concept of exposure, and that it was affected by the light going into the camera, but now I can actually explain focal length, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO (I'm still working on white balance...it wasn't as big a factor in the class).

"Gaijin Sadako" - self-portrait exploring focal length and aperture

Like most of my art over the last two years, I wanted to include elements of Japanese culture and imagery in my photography projects.  But that was easier said than done; I didn't have a clear idea of what that was going to look like in a final portfolio.  As I created my initial projects on themes prescribed by my professor, I seemed to come back to horror a lot, but I actually intended to go about my portfolio in a very intellectual way.  Our readings exposed me to ideas about the reality of unfamiliar places as opposed to the picture postcard version, and I had toyed with attempting to show this aspect of Japan in my body of work.  I just couldn't get excited about it, though.  The thing is, living in Japan has been, at least for me, more about escaping reality than embracing it.

"Sinking Ship" - long exposure light painting using glow sticks.

It wasn't until we were exploring shutter speed via painting with light that I figured out what DID excite me.  By creating longer exposures I could make lights and other objects appear to float in the air, or turn transparent.  As a pink-blooded otaku, I've watched a LOT of anime about ghosts and other spirit creatures.  The supernatural is kind of my jam, so what better subject for my photography portfolio could there possibly be?  So I sat down with my sketchbook and started brainstorming how I could bring all it all to life.  But those photos will be the subject of my next post.

"Raise Yo' Freak Flag, vol. 3" - cyanotypes using manga imagery and kanji

For now, I'm not sure that I'm a better photographer than I was before.  I still think my Big Gun knows what it's doing better than I do, most of the time.  But as a teacher, at least I have a deeper knowledge, can explain what a camera does better than I could before.  And, well...  I ended up earning another A, so there's that.