Session 1 - Basic Principles of Photography

Light
 - A source of light is required in order to take a photography. Whether it be natural lighting or artificial light, there are four terms for lighting that can be used: Reflected light, Transmitted light, Soft light and Hard light. The difference between hard and soft light is about how many shadows you want in the image. Hard lighting will cause an abundance of shadows while there will be significantly less in soft light.

Medium
 - Throughout history, the format on which an image can be saved onto has changed. Film was the default until digital cameras were released and since then photographs have been saved as files that can be used on computers.


Aperture

 - This is the part of the camera in which light passes through, leading to the sensor or film depending on the type of camera. The size aperture can be changed by the photographer in order to let more or less light in, depending on the desired shot.

Exposure
 - The exposure is the moment that a photography is taken after being exposing the sensor to specific light for a specific amount of time. The exposure can be controlled with settings on the camera, specifically the size of the aperture, the shutter speed and the ISO. There are multiple settings on the camera that will allow the photographer to change the exposure which are setting the camera to Fully Auto (in which everything is automatic), Program (in which everything is manual), Av (Aperture Value) and Tv (Time Value). These settings can be picked based on which is the section of the exposure that you manually want to change. In case you wanted to take a specific effect or image, other settings such as Portrait, Sports and Landscape can also be picked.

Lens and Composition
 - The lens of the camera and the part of the camera that focuses the light in order to view the image before taking. Using a different lens will give the photographer a different image. A DSLR camera has the ability to change the lens. The composition is what is actually seen in the image. The composition of an image is about how the shot looks and how the objects/subjects in the image are organised and put together. The photographer can also change the focus of the image. They can use focus to emphasize the subject of the image as well as blur the background. Cameras have the option for either manual or auto focus. Auto allows for an easier time with photography with manual focus more useful for film.

Saving the Image
 - With digital cameras, it is now easier to save an image you have taken however it cannot be viewed or printed without first being transferred to a computer. Images can also be edited or enhanced on software available on computers such as Photoshop. Photographs are now saved automatically to SD Cards placed inside the camera which is the main way of transferring them to computers.

Image Task:
 - For our first task, we had to taken profile images of our peers conveying different emotions and also using different angles.

 Link to Session 1 Photos

This was our first time using the cameras in lesson and it was a good exercise to incorporate the basics that we had just learnt as well as refresh our photography skills that people may have had before the topic. I only had minimal experience but I knew what to do based on the topics we learnt.

We were also tasked, outside of class, to take images of objects taking on the form of letters.

 'L'

 'P'

'X'

'i'