Project #1 Elements and Principles

http://s1064.photobucket.com/user/Ryjstockton/library/



Reflection of Project One 

When I first read that our first project was a photography assignment, I was quite exited to get started with it, being that I am formerly a photography major. With that being said, for the creative process involved in this project, there wasn't much thinking involved at all because I had done this exact same assignment in high school, which made understand the expectations very well. As for the technical process involved, that was very new to me, this is actually the first time I have ever used Photobucket and I actually found it quite confusing at first. Once I finally mastered how to use the website I was pretty well set with everything else involved in this project. For my photo taking, I spent most of the day searching around my house for things to take pictures of, and actually found myself staging quite a few shots, which is my specialty. 

To quickly run through my photos that you can see in the slideshow above, I’ll first start with line, I used fake branches against a white backdrop to really show off the shadowy dark lines. For value, I used clear glass balls against a white backdrop and drained the color from the image to give it that light and dark effect. For shapes, I took a picture of a glass mosaic chandelier in my computer room, which when lit really shows off the individual glass squares very well. For forms, I took a picture of some old books that were stacked up in my bookshelf to show three-dimensional shapes with length, width, and depth. For space, I emptied off another bookshelf and places just two different colored artificial planters to show the area or space in-between the objects. For color, there was no staging involved, I simply took a picture of a bunch of colored shells I collected in Sanibel Island. For Texture, I took a picture of three different textured pillows, with the three of them being fur, leather, and beaded. For balance, I placed the same two colored artificial planters on a white backdrop, nearly creating a mirrored image with two different colors creating a balance between the two. For contrast, I used an artificial branch and green leaves, contrasting the dark brown branch against the green leaves in the background. For movement, I took a picture of my dog running around shaking the snow off herself, which allows your eye movement to be directed around the photo by the contrasting colors of the golden dog and white snow. For emphasis, I placed a blue glass ball in a white coral bowl, creating contrasting colors which directs the viewers eyes to the blue ball in the middle of the photograph. For pattern, I took a picture of one of my chairs that had a very unique pattern, which clearly has a repetition of shape and form across the fabric. For proportion, it honestly took a while to come up with this one, I placed two giant shells that I found on the coast of Aruba behind much smaller versions of the bigger shells which I found in Florida, which are much different in scale to each other. And finally for unity, after staging two boat paddles on top a bamboo backdrop with jute rope overlapping the two paddles, I was able to create an image with a sense of unity by contrasting textures, patterns, and colors to create a sense of balance and unity within the composition. Overall I really enjoyed doing this assignment and was glad that I was able to get back into the swing of things and got to stage a few photography sets, which I always enjoy doing.