Help!! First Time Photographer..

t_dun

Hi, I am a 2nd year student studying Office Information Systems but have picked photography as an elective as I thought it would be fun, little did i kno I would be given the theme of "Women" for my project.

I am required to take 10 photos a week for the next eight weeks on the topic of women but am at a loss as to what the content should be..

I am also required to get each model to sign a release form so would hope to keep the the amount of people to a minimum!!

Any ideas and advice would be greatly appreciated.:D

Thanks
t_dun

dave66

What equipment do you have? What photo experience/knowledge do you have?

What restrictions do you have in terms of the 10 photos per week, can you take 10 shots of the one woman?

How about:
(A) women at work? Bus drivers, gardai etc
(B) Women in your life? mother, sisters, aunts, nieces etc

smash

Take a photo of some sandwiches!


Joke... relax...

t_dun

Hi Dave, thanks for your reply..

I take photos occasionally with a digital camera, but not on a professional level. College will provide us with cameras eventually but have to learn the theory first!! Zzzzz At first i understood id have to use all different women to get interesting photos but apparently i can use one or two.

That's an interesting idea about women at work but i wonder how eager they would be to participate..personally i wouldnt pose for strangers photos. Any other ideas greatly appreciated. Thanks!!

And Smash...we laughed!! I will be sure to say it to the lecturer when i meet with her tommorrow to vent my anger at this silly theme.

pullandbang

t_dun wrote: »

I will be sure to say it to the lecturer when i meet with her tommorrow to vent my anger at this silly theme.

Why is it a silly theme? Most of us here love taking photos of women......:p

dave66

t_dun wrote: »

Hi Dave, thanks for your reply..

I take photos occasionally with a digital camera, but not on a professional level. College will provide us with cameras eventually but have to learn the theory first!! Zzzzz At first i understood id have to use all different women to get interesting photos but apparently i can use one or two.

Why the zzz about learning theory first? You need to understand what you are doing or how to achieve the results you want.

Being able to use the same few people might make it easier to get victims, er, volunteers.

t_dun wrote: »

That's an interesting idea about women at work but i wonder how eager they would be to participate..personally i wouldnt pose for strangers photos. Any other ideas greatly appreciated. Thanks!!

You'd be very surprised how readily strangers will pose for you and it's not really that hard to ask them, just remember that the worst they can say is no.

t_dun wrote: »

And Smash...we laughed!! I will be sure to say it to the lecturer when i meet with her tommorrow to vent my anger at this silly theme.

The theme isn't silly, it's meant to exercise your mind. If your lecturer is a woman ..... well there's your first shot!

t_dun

pullandbang, unfortunately you don't see women like that in Kerry!!:p I know I should be more open minded on this theme but what would you recommend the women in my photos be doing.. (remembering it is for college haha) any ideas would be great as I need alot of photos

dave, I know you're right, i'm being quiet negative about it but it's a time consuming task for someone that signed up for a business course. Exercise my mind it certainly will!! My lecturer is a woman and she agrees with you that it is a very compelling theme, guess I just need to get creative!! And I'm sure I will soon find out how willing people are to pose.

Thanks again for replies!

pullandbang

t_dun wrote: »

I know I should be more open minded on this theme but what would you recommend the women in my photos be doing.. (remembering it is for college haha) any ideas would be great as I need alot of photos

Why do they need to be "doing" anything? Why not take portraits of them? What about environmental portraits (in their workplace etc).

t_dun

Well I can see no one here shares my view and ye are clearly more creative as photography is no doubt your thing but yeah I will get images of women in the workplace and at home and I guess portraits might work if expressions are captured correctly..

Thanks!!!

The Snipe

Dont just base it on women, themselves as people; think outside the box and use things that you'd associate with women. (No that does not mean you go into Tesco photographying Tampons on your phone! :P)

t_dun

Good point,was thinking the same..fashion,shoes,make-up etc.

The Snipe

Exactly!

t_dun

t_dun wrote: »

Well I can see no one here shares my view and ye are clearly more creative as photography is no doubt your thing

I share your view. If you're doing a business course, then ten photos a week is very excessive, especially if you haven't even learned the theory yet, and you need to do this theme for eight weeks.

I always have a camera hanging off my shoulder. No matter where I go, and I've taken a lot of photos. I'd struggle to get ten interesting photos involving the theme of 'women' every week for two months. If i were doing a business course it'd frustrate the life out of me even having to think about it.

How can you focus on a business course if you have to have this knawing away in the back of your head the whole time? Personally I'd tell them to cop on; their curriculum is heavily flawed and needs sorting out, fast.


That's just me though (I'm not a big rebel or keyboard warrior, but I do a genuine hatred for this silly bullsh*t that accomplishes nothing, but that the education system seems to love).

Buceph

Out of curiousity, why did you decide to ask on the boards.ie forums? Did you know about us and boards already, did someone point you in our direction or was it from a Google search?

Only you're the second person from the ITT (I'm guessing) course who has relatively few posts here and came straight to asking about photography.

DutchGuy

As others have suggested, I would suggest thinking of the theme being about women, rather than just thinking of shots of women. For example their changing role in society or women at work as previosuly suggested, this should also allow you to use more photos of objects in addition to portraits.

On the discussion that this is too much work for someone studying office information systems; if you choose an elective there should be an assumption that a proper project is required. I would argue that if they had just told you to go out and take some photos and submit them the lecturer would not have been doing their job and would have taken a very lazy approach.

(Not sure why the model releases though unless there's a commercial brief though, as my understanding was they're not required for artistic and editorial work)

MiissTL

Buceph wrote: »

Out of curiousity, why did you decide to ask on the boards.ie forums? Did you know about us and boards already, did someone point you in our direction or was it from a Google search?

Only you're the second person from the ITT (I'm guessing) course who has relatively few posts here and came straight to asking about photography.

I assume you mean me! Out of curiosity what difference does it make to anyone why I chose to come on here and ask for suggestions? Is that not what boards.ie is about?

t_dun

Deleted User wrote: »

I share your view. If you're doing a business course, then ten photos a week is very excessive, especially if you haven't even learned the theory yet, and you need to do this theme for eight weeks.

I always have a camera hanging off my shoulder. No matter where I go, and I've taken a lot of photos. I'd struggle to get ten interesting photos involving the theme of 'women' every week for two months. If i were doing a business course it'd frustrate the life out of me even having to think about it.

How can you focus on a business course if you have to have this knawing away in the back of your head the whole time? Personally I'd tell them to cop on; their curriculum is heavily flawed and needs sorting out, fast.


That's just me though (I'm not a big rebel or keyboard warrior, but I do a genuine hatred for this silly bullsh*t that accomplishes nothing, but that the education system seems to love).

Thanks KKV,well said,it is always in the back of my mind but I guess I will just have to put up with it until Christmas, u'd never know might even grow to love photography..

t_dun

MiissTL wrote: »

I assume you mean me! Out of curiosity what difference does it make to anyone why I chose to come on here and ask for suggestions? Is that not what boards.ie is about?

I second that!! :eek:

t_dun

DutchGuy wrote: »

As others have suggested, I would suggest thinking of the theme being about women, rather than just thinking of shots of women. For example their changing role in society or women at work as previosuly suggested, this should also allow you to use more photos of objects in addition to portraits.

On the discussion that this is too much work for someone studying office information systems; if you choose an elective there should be an assumption that a proper project is required. I would argue that if they had just told you to go out and take some photos and submit them the lecturer would not have been doing their job and would have taken a very lazy approach.

(Not sure why the model releases though unless there's a commercial brief though, as my understanding was they're not required for artistic and editorial work)

Thanks for your ideas..:D

Yes we are being given very little support or direction apart from the fact we need to submit photos on our particular theme.

You are right about the model releases I failed to mention that we will be submitting our photos to and organisation that supply photo packs to schools..for little or no profit from what I understand!! :rolleyes:

Buceph

MiissTL wrote: »

I assume you mean me! Out of curiosity what difference does it make to anyone why I chose to come on here and ask for suggestions? Is that not what boards.ie is about?

It's that two of you started posting about the same project at the same time. Both of you had few posts on boards. Both of you have relatively little idea of what goes into photography. Both of you seem to be interested in photography purely as an academic pursuit rather than having any grá for the endeavour.

I was wondering if your teacher recommended the site to you, and said it was full of advice and great for learning, and we'd all help you out.

I don't have a problem helping anyone. I don't have a problem with helping people do their homework, especially as people could develop a love for photography that way. I very much do have a problem if a lazy teacher is offloading some of their work onto other people. And a picture has been painted of an instructor and institute that has no scruples or morality when it comes to using and abusing people.

MiissTL

Buceph wrote: »

It's that two of you started posting about the same project at the same time. Both of you had few posts on boards. Both of you have relatively little idea of what goes into photography. Both of you seem to be interested in photography purely as an academic pursuit rather than having any grá for the endeavour.

I was wondering if your teacher recommended the site to you, and said it was full of advice and great for learning, and we'd all help you out.

I don't have a problem helping anyone. I don't have a problem with helping people do their homework, especially as people could develop a love for photography that way. I very much do have a problem if a lazy teacher is offloading some of their work onto other people. And a picture has been painted of an instructor and institute that has no scruples or morality when it comes to using and abusing people.

No the lecturer didn't recommend this site. I use if often if I am looking for answers to things. Usually somebody else has already asked the question and therefore I don't have to, hence why I have so few posts. I recommended it to the OP.. People generally tend to be helpful on here, so it was worth a shot, to me!

And yes the "interest", if you could call it that, is purely for academic reasons. Basically I just want to pass the semester!

Buceph

MiissTL wrote: »

No the lecturer didn't recommend this site. I use if often if I am looking for answers to things. Usually somebody else has already asked the question and therefore I don't have to, hence why I have so few posts. I recommended it to the OP.. People generally tend to be helpful on here, so it was worth a shot, to me!

And yes the "interest", if you could call it that, is purely for academic reasons. Basically I just want to pass the semester!

That's fair enough. I was just getting very annoyed on your behalf because it seems like a terrible setup they have going on there. And it wouldn't have surprised me that they told you to head here for your learning.


If you're looking for ideas on your themes just walk through a day of being unemployed/a woman. Go through the typical things someone would have to do during their day. Unemployed person will probably take their children to school rather than the working mother (so a picture of a dour father dropping them off amidst the mammies.) That'd work for the female assignment as well. Lots of Mammies taking their kids to school. They have the morning off, so they might go to the Fás office, and run through that for their day. Then think of special days they might have, something where there was a big event that makes it out of the ordinary. And work through that. So the unemployment theme could have anything from a dole queue right up to a picture of a bank (foreclosure on a mortgage/house.) Then think of the physical things associated with unemployment: social welfare card, buses over cars, etc.. Then think of the feelings that would be felt with all those things and events, and extrapolate from their. So a guy taking a bus back from a Fás office might be disheartened from not finding anything to do, and even moreso from the long walk from the bus stop home: so you go for a picture of a tired looking guy walking home, etc..

If you spend your time walking through what would be happening in these people's lives you'll find your theme will come easy to you.

t_dun

Thanks Buceph for your interest and replies!!;)

SinisterDexter

Gill_Murphy, from your course, started a thread and the same issues have come up. Here is my reply to her thread, and it is aimed at you aswell.

This post!