Which essay from the assigned chapter spoke to your own experience the most? Summarize the main points of the essay and give a personal anecdote that elaborates on why this article spoke to you the most. Which essay made you think about photography in a new way, or spoke to experiences you may not have been as familiar with? Again, summarize the article and explain why this essay has reshaped your ideas about photography. Write your 200 word (minimum) response below. Make sure to put your name in the comment.
10/15 Hunter Island
10/17
10/22 Kenjinique Davis
PHOTOGRAPHY CHANGES THE FOODS WE CRAVE
ReplyDeleteby Lauren Shakely
In this essay Lauren explains that originally cookbooks simply had line drawings in to depict what a recipes final dish would look like. As technology developed, magazines and cookbooks changed out the drawings for black and white images. At this point the technology wasn't strong enough to incite much of a response, as the images were low res and not very enticing. It wasn't until the 1960s that photographs of food were much more compelling and better accompanied recipes. By the 1980s the advances in printing techniques led to cookbooks creating better quality images in color of their recipes. By the 1990s cookbooks/magazines had photographs of food that were almost glamorized portraits. Dishes would be set in the finest looks plates, a beautiful scenic background behind them, and beautiful props like flowers and fabrics were set to flourish the scene. The affect of photography was that it enticed readers to want to replicate the dishes they'd see. A stunning cake could almost be tasted just by being seen, and thus lead to images being the norm of all cookbooks/magazines.
Even today the trend has continued, with cameras and photo editing software at everyones disposal, even the trashiest of meals can look like a piece of heaven if photographed right. This has spawned a genre even known as food porn. It's interesting to see how food once could not visually appeal individuals, and now it's almost impossible to imagine how else food/recipes can be sold to audiences without that visual awe.
-Daniel Adame
The chapter I chose is Photography Changes Photography by Andy Grundburg. I found this chapter very interesting because it told of how in photography, especially after photography became widely popular, is starting to be on a loop and originality is scarce, if not impossible, to now come by. For example, Grundberg referenced Richard Prince’s Untitled where it was a series of imaged depicting men looking off to the side. Interestingly enough, those pictured were photographs of photographs from magazine ads. Typically, if you ask anyone about photographing a photograph they might say that it is cheating or fake work, but for the time it was a brand new idea that Prince captured. Thus the term postmodernism came to group Richard Prince and other similar photographers together. Today, taking photographs of pictures can actually be a career. To prevent selling only original paintings and to make their work more easily purchased for the average consumer, painters will higher a specialized photographer to take photos of their painting to become a print. Thus in affect, taking a picture of a picture. In a way it is almost a funny thought, but the process is quite difficult and the equipment needed is highly expensive to do correctly and without a great loss of quality.
ReplyDelete-Rachael Brasovan
From Chapter 4, the essay that spoke to me the most was “Photography Changes How We Read the World” by Sharon J. Washington. In this essay, Washington describes an experience in her childhood, where she observed what she said was a “mom and dad and their kid” riding a motorcycle near the car she was in. Her mother then corrected her, explaining that what Washington “perceived” as (a mom, dad, and child) was different from what she actually “saw” (a lady, man, and child). She only assumed they were related because of her perceptions of family. In other words, Washington learned that what we see is influenced by the individual perceptions that we have come up with up to that point in our lives. Now a teacher, Washington uses this same idea to invite students to question how we as observers could use our own perceptions, coupled with the possible perceptions of others, to unfold the different messages images could convey.
ReplyDeleteIn her essay, Washington used a photo of a person in a wheelchair positioned in front of a set of stairs to portray that idea. While there are a number of ideas to be found behind the photo, including the idea of barriers to be broken through, opportunities to better care for the disabled, or raising awareness for their needs, what’s fascinating is that all these can be derived from a single photo. This essay reiterated to me that photos are indeed capable of conveying a numerous amount of messages, and that is something I find very fascinating.
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ReplyDeleteThe article that stood out the most to me in chapter 4 was "Photography Changes How We Communicate". I found it interesting because the author Philippe Kahn tells of how in 1997 while his wife was in labor he pieced together what is considered the "first camera-phone photograph". He rigged together his Toshiba laptop, Motorola Startac, his digital camera and some supplies from the RadioShack, to capture a to capture the birth of his first child. He uploaded the picture online and sent out a mass email with the link to share. After the photo was released responses poured in asking about how he shared the photo so quickly. Thus he founded his company LightSurf and assisted big name phone companies in the quest to make a camera phone.
ReplyDeleteI found this article interesting because it made me think of just how much photography has effected our ability to communicate with others. My whole life I have grown up around cell phones and can very vaguely remember the time before my parents had camera phones. The progress we have made in the last 23 years has been remarkable. We can share photos with anyone in the world, instantly. It has offered us a whole new way to communicate, and I hadn't really thought of that before.
-Madison Morrow
I chose Photography Changes and Democratizes Visual Expression by Steve Hoffenberg. In this article he describes how visual expressions has been democratized over the years. He starts off by talking about how camera and film became accessible to anyone who could afford to buy it. He claims that about eighty billion pictures were taken by consumers per year in late 1990s. From film photography he goes on to include how digital photography increased those numbers because of the memory cards. The memory cards ability to store and erase content easily made it where consumers no longer had to worry about conserving film by limiting on taking pictures. He continues to mention how digital cameras have become more popular over the years resulting in two hundred billion pictures taken in 2008 worldwide. Digital photography might have changed how often people take pictures, but Steve suggests that digital cameras didn’t change who takes pictures. Then he goes on to mention camera phones and how they have impacted photo taking in comparison to film and digital cameras.
ReplyDeleteI chose this article because it talks about how visual expression has become more accessible to everyone. Gives people the opportunity to save pictures for themselves or share them online. They have the chance to share the things they love and/or feel strongly about. The evolution of photography has changed how we express ourselves visually. From saving physical photos in photo albums and hanging them on the walls in our homes to show to family and friends who come visit to saving photos in our cellphone galleries and sending them to family or even posting them online. With the ability to post online we can show more people how we like to dress and what we find visually appealing just by the photos we share.
-Kenjinique Davis
Photography Changes What Artists Do by John Baldessari
ReplyDeleteBaldessari how he kept looking at photography and painting as two separate things and using one to inspire the other. He would go out and take photos of things that he would love to turn into a painting and hang up the photo to keep the inspiration. He got to a point he was thinking that there was more to art than just painting and sculpting based on his photographs. While living in National City, California he drove around in his VW bus, holding his camera out the window, snapping pictures of buildings without looking, and then wrote down the addresses of where he had been. Pretty soon, he wrote, that he was using photography as a quick way to implement his ideas and using it alongside his painting. Together they started working hand in hand and aiding in the creative process.
There are times that I cannot escape the divisions and sections that make up art. My mind puts them in boxes and the boxes never cross. This article really opened up my eyes with a different perspective on how some things that you love can work hand in hand. Not as separate things, but as one whole thing. There is a mental block that I have sometimes about how things like photography and drawing are in their own area and not cannot influence each other. On the contrary, they can be used as tools together to make one whole creation come to life.
-Claire Rodgers
In the article, Photography Changes Who And What We Can Stare At, author John Waters hits the nail on the head about something we all, as humans, can relate to: voyeurism. Voyeurism is defined as the practice of gaining sexual pleasure from watching others when they are naked or engaged in sexual activity, but it can also be defined as gaining pleasure from looking at something specific, such as car crashes or mountains. Waters explains that he has always been interested in car accidents, ever since he was a child, and even has photographs hanging in his office as of today.
ReplyDeleteWaters talks about how we can be ogling something specific in a movie, and no one would ever know except yourself. This is not necessarily something to be ashamed about, too, as everyone has something that interests them. It is just a matter of human nature that we react this way to specific things in some ways more than others. With the technology of photography-taking and movie-making constantly changing, it will also change the way we look at people and things as well.
-Olivia Teague