The Shadow Catcher

Edward S. Curtis was born near Whitewater, Wisconsin in 1868, later moved to Minnesota, where he learned how to take pictures and print them. When he moved to Seattle, Washington, he took special interest in the native Americans, and took pictures of them. One of Princess Angeline won him first prize in a contest. Because he took such an interest with them, they began to call him Shadow Catcher. For thirty years he took on this challenge, traveling all over North America and in 1930, completed the compilation of 20 volumes, each with 75 hand-pressed photos and 300 pages of text. He died on October 19th, 1952 of a heart attack.

This photo, titled Indian Chief, is one of his works. This has an amazing composition, with just enough negative and positive space to draw the eye in. His face is gently shadowed, as opposed to harsh lights and shadows, and it seems as though everything has a shadow and a highlight- nothing is left out.

This one directs the eye to the right and down, since they are both looking that way. It gives a sense of completeness, since your eyes travel across theirs'. The difference between the dark clothes on the lady and the white bundle the baby is it gives it a nice contrast and balance.

Since they are looking away from the camera, it again draws the eye around the photo, and also gives it a bit of a more candid and personal feeling; They are centered in the photo, giving it a nice composition.

Creepy Creep

This assignment made me experience a whole new level of creepiness. I know what it's like to admire people from a distance or to eves drop creepily, but hunting down people who are just minding their own business and snapping them in their natural habitat was somewhat unnerving, even for me. They would notice and give me a strange look, slow down in their walking, and just ruin the immersion. I attempted to hide behind doors and around corners, but that just added to the creepy factor, and I found myself apologizing often. After being joined by Paula, Ferrah, and Trinity- the last of whom was unafraid to ask these mysterious beings if we could take pictures of them, I finally got a few. We even asked the hall cop if we could snap one of him, but he just sent us out to the tennis courts to take pictures of the gym class. I was reluctant to take any pictures out there, since the camera settings were off.

This pretty girl was pretty unnerved by the line of girls snapping her picture, but she just continued along like a trooper. Frau Paganetti in the background upsets me a little, but what can you do.

And THIS pretty girl was more than willing to help, and started to laugh when she heard the shutters of our cameras.

Intentionally Bad Photos

 

 Damien is caught off guard in this camera-shaky abomination.

 Walker's lookin' good, despite the glaring back light!

 Is that a cat or a bad composition? Both? Both.

 I seem to have captured Walker's ghost among this terrible white balance!

Walker got impatient when I kept waking him up to take bad pictures of him. Fortunately his exit got me a great subject blur photo!

Notes from Sept. 9th

Aperture adjusts the amount of light reaching the film or sensor. A large opening allows the most light to pass through the lens. The smallest opening allows the least amount of light to pass through.
-the button is the AV button, and you hold it and rotate the wheel to select a number.

ISO speed is the sensor's or film's sensitivity to light. The higher the number the faster it is and the less light it needs for a picture. 100-200 if outdoors, 400 or up in dim light.
-This can be found as the ^ button, and you navigate through and select the number you want.

The shutters open and close to control the length of time that light strikes the light-sensitive surface. This is already selected on the screen, and you have to turn the wheel to change the number.

Chasing Light

Chasing light was a good exercise, using the tool to see a composition and figure out how the light would would be cast was helpful. I noticed that taking a picture indoors often produced a bland photo, light wise, that not many interesting shadows were cast. My house is also a bit darker, as my mom likes to use dim light bulbs and curtains are the greatest accent to any room decor, so getting a decent picture in that lighting has always been difficult and will continue to be a struggle.
Natural light is much better for these sorts of things. Dynamic shadows and compositions could be made between nature and architecture, and it made for much more color and interesting subjects as well. Although, we won't be using color, grey scale can also be very expressive.