Final Project: Water Polo Game

Yes, I admit I got inspiration from my digital Final Project, but, even then, I personally think it turned out amazing. I'm sure my digital project helped me find the best images, but, in the end, I think my digital final was better. Digital just has a very large buffer space for bad pictures, plus the ability to see the actual image without having to process film. Plus you can delete it if it is bad. You can do none of this with film, but this is about my film, so that's what I'll talk about. First off, I would like to give some back story to this game. This game was my little sister's junior varsity championship match, and I had to say I was a photographer for the team to get in with all of my equipment. Due to the fact we were early to the game, I shot some of the game before as well. It was men's varsity 3rd place match. But, back to the project, I think every one of my images are very strong and help tell the story. There is a good variety in my images, telling the story about everything instead of focusing on just the players or just the coaches. Even without special sports shooting equipment, the images still turned out just fine. My personal favorite is the one of the dive tank with two balls on it. The toning for it turned out perfectly and the image is very strong. The soft edge is not really detracting from the image, and it is one of my best images. Another one of my favorites is the team jumping in. The toning for it worked well for the image, and the image was strong already. The others worked well for the story of a game. The image of the fight over the ball was very telling of the fact water polo is, in fact, a contact sport. It is a telling image, and the lighter toning for it brings out the warm feeling of an outdoor pool in summer, even if it was shot in the spring. A second telling image is the team photo with the trophy. Again with the summer toning, even though it is the smallest bit overdone, and the fact it was taken from the side instead of the front, where they were posing, lead to a strong and definitely different image. This assignment was a great chance for me to come out and shine. I also think the Saturday lab session was a real savior for this, plus the fact I gave myself time to tone. You really need to put more of those in, you might be surprised at the results. But, in conclusion, this was my best assignment ever in film. They do say to go out with a bang, so, good-bye photo, been nice knowing ya.

Photographer Research: Lucian Perkins

Lucian began photographing in collage at the University of Texas. After graduating, he returned to the University of Texas to teach. While teaching, he studied photography under Garry Winogrand. After this, he took an internship at The Washington Post. He stayed there for 27 years. Shortly after joining, his interest in shooting international conflicts grew. He won "News Photographer of the Year" for his shooting in Russia, plus some fashion photography. Related subjects, no? He also won a Pulitzer Prize for a four year project on the effects of poverty and crime on a family living in Washington D.C. He won a second for a portfolio of Kosovo refugees. The Kosovo Conflict was a very personal time in my life. My father was in the Air Force during this, and he was sent over to fly refueling tankers. Because this photographer shot the conflict, it was one of the reasons I selected him to research. He tends to focus on people, mainly refugees and military members. He now works as a freelance photographer in D.C.

This image is the one which made him famous. It is of a refugee boy staring out of the back of a bus. This image helped him win a Pulitzer, and characterizes the Kosovo Conflict in a picture. The child has nowhere to go, because his home is destroyed or he is being hunted. The pure hopelessness in the child shows the state of Kosovo after Milosevic and and the NATO bombing. From the looks of it, he is trying to break out of this decending spiral the war pushed him into. It is not working. It is a true war photograph. It shows the actual face of war, no propoganda what-so-ever.

This is one of the oddest photographs I have ever commented on. Blinky, from pacman walks down the street on Halloween. Sounds like something which would show up at my family's Halloween party. I can see nothing wrong with the composition. While this image may not relate to th overall topic of most of his images, which is war, it's just funny.

This is one of the photographs which allowed him to be accepted as an intern for The Washington Post. The woman was one of the first group of female seniors in the United States Navel Academy. This image shows the senior woman chewing out a group of freshman, in this case for messing up the menu. Lucian was able to take a shot at a very historic point for the academy. The first co-ed class in the 132 years of the school, it was a turning point for women in the military. The composition is perfect. It must be easy to shoot stock-still recruits in white uniforms. They look almost scared.

Assignment 7: Life and Death

This assignment was a bit odd for me. I eventually decided on my favorite place to shoot, the pool. The lifeguard room and the scenery at the pool and center provided a good place to take pictures. The light was good and I was able to get some pretty good shots in. The weird part was my camera rewound the film before I shot all 36 frames. This left me with a bit of a shortage of images to use for the project, but I pulled through. My personal favorite is the close-up of the tree branch. The light from over the building represents hope and life from above. The rest of the tree is the rest of the world, filled with life, but the branch is the most important. The branch is the sole individualism of life, standing out from all the others. Just a symbolic picture in my mind. The contrast of the trunk is absolutely phenomenal, and I do not think the light could have been better. Another interesting occurrence was the glare on the Pool Rules sign. Rules keep you safe, they keep you alive, and they have a spirit to them. The glare on the sign acts as that spirit in the picture. I will admit it is slightly blurred, but still it is a very interesting picture. Not my best, best work in the world, but it hits the top ten on my assignment list. I could not hit the creative milestone the "Fish Out of Water" allowed me to make, but I still rather enjoyed it.