More about Portfolios

This year with our portfolio, Photo ll will be producing promo cards. It can be a single card or double sided, or it can be a little folding mini-folio.  Here's some examples:

The top one is 7" tall and 23.75" wide. It has five folding panels, but you could also make one with three panels. To do this, you make one initial document on photoshop, then expand the canvas size to the desired overall size, then copy and paste additional images into the document. Don't forget to match your images in size and resolution, in other words, if your first image is 300 ppi  5x7", make sure that the other images match.

Our resident Photoshop Giant, Jasmine A. did this. How did she do it? Only her and Jojo know.

JOJO's Travels

Finally, we are getting pictures of Jojo and his amazing travels. Jojo has an interesting history that will be fully revealed later. Jojo is an itinerant plastic man that has been mailed around the country from one artist to another. His travels are documented on flickr, and one day, we will be able to see them all...Jojo is a for credit assignment, so if you have not made photos of Jojo yet, please get busy. Here's Tati M's,  Jojo was being menaced by an elbow but we saved him by using the crop tool! Remember that Jojo is small, so get close!  Above Tati's pictures is Clare's road trip photo of Jojo visting some interesting roadside architecture, above that, Tori's picture of Jojo's new FWC (friends with convertibles)

A message from Stieglitz...

Stieglitz, also known as the History Building Possum, is a little cranky, due to recent events. Stieglitz finds it more difficult to access his favorite places, especially the box marked "photo supplies" that he likes to use for naps under the History Building.

There's mold, construction, finals and other unexpected and unexplained situations. The darkroom is closed until further notice too.


Stieglitz understands that others may be cranky too, but requests everybody to keep making art, because it nourishes the soul.

Recreating an iconic photograph

To recreate an iconic photograph, first you need to decide what photograph that you would like to recreate.
Please keep it simple and safe: You could even make a reproduction of a famous painting as Nazgol G. did last year...We really like these recreations of Rosie The Riveter from WW II, and at least one of us has experience in playing Rosie. This is due Feb. 1st, and should be mounted or matted on board.

If you have not yet made a picture of Jojo, or done a community service project, there are slightly more than four months to go before the year is up...It might be a good idea to have all these little projects cleared so that your final months can be spent on the most important project of all: The Final Portfolio!

Large Format Again!

For those of us who like the amazing detail that large format gives us, it's time for one more 4x5 assignment! During the next few weeks, we will be working on a tilt/shift/ architecture assignment. This is to familiarize us with the tilts and swings that a large format camera is capable of! Tilting or swinging the back or front of the 4x5 camera straightens the lines of a building or structure, while making the same picture with a 35mm camera usually results in distorted lines (The building appears to tilt backward or forward).
This is actually a two part assignment, as you will be turning in two completed, mounted pictures.
One picture will be of a building or structure, and will use the tilts and/or shifts to straighten out the lines in the building/structure.

The second photograph can be of anything, and will simply use the tilt/shift function to DISTORT your subject.  It may be fun to make a closeup picture of something for this.

It is best to work in pairs for this assignment, as toting a giant camera and tripod around campus is a bit of work. (Also, it is important to have a person "spotting" to make sure passers by don't trip over those tripod legs.) As always, it is recommended that you load two sheets of film in a film holder and make at least two pictures.

There is a book in the Photo ll bin that details how tilt and shift work, and there will be a demo, but here are some helpful links as well:

http://www.toyoview.com/LargeFrmtTech/lgformat.html

http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/camera%20movements.html

Update: As of 1.18, the darkroom is closed which makes it hard to process sheet film, so this assignment is on hold until later in the year.