Photographic Research Practices

Photo Tutorial Mark 6 October 9-12h

* Bring a photography camera or a cellphone to make photos (note the apps in preparation page)

In this unit we shift our focus to photography. The composition of your shots will be crucial for conveying relationships between people, objects, and spaces. The tutorial will guide students through a series of exercises that encourages them to explore the photographic frame and the significance of different compositions. These will help students record an impression of material culture and non-verbal interactions that will prepare them for their field studies.

In-Class / Field-trip Exercises

  1. Photo making
    1. Ten elements: Explore the expressive qualities of the image. Try restricting yourself to one location.
      1. Light & Shadow
      2. Lines
      3. Shape, Form
      4. Negative space
      5. Size
      6. Color (WB)
      7. Pattern
      8. Texture
      9. Tonality
      10. Noise
      11. Motion blur
      12. Depth of Field
    2. Ten of One: Make 10 unique shots of 1 discrete subject, changing camera angle, position, perspective, etc.
    3. Four Corners: Choose one subject and photograph it in context, including relevant background. Make photos from each corner of the frame for 4 images. You must change camera-position.
    4. Triad Series: Make two series that build a relationship between images through different framings approaches. Engage two different human subjects (not in our class) with you camera and make the following framing series:
      1. subject: face, hand(s), and an object they are using
      2. situation: context, whole body, detail
  2. Photo captioning: After returning to class, you will be prompted to write captions for some of your photographs (1-3 courtesy of Martin Saxer).
    1. Image Description: describe what is visible in the photograph
    2. Beyond Image: describe what is outside the frame, thus invisible in the photograph
    3. The Gap Between: describe what happened in the space separating 2 photos
    4. Series Captions: Write a single sentence for each of your triad series that describes respectively the subject and the situation.

FSA 3 Peer Review Due date: 16 October

Peer reviews must be completed before 23:59!

For the Field Study Assignment, assess both the photo-survey and the photo-essay according to these criteria, which have been adapted from the Writing with Light photo-essay journal’s reviewer rubric; Link ➙

  • Formal Requirements: 10 total images (up to 3 hand drawn). Title describes set, introductory description, and each image has a descriptive caption (approx 10-20 words/each).
  • Contribution to Anthropological Knowledge: What is the contribution to anthropological theory and/or ethnographic knowledge? Does the author make reference to and build upon broader discourses in text, photography, and/or film? Does the author show an explicitly anthropological understanding of images, text, representation, and the cultural context under consideration? Does the use of the photo-survey format allow for theoretical discussions that would otherwise be neglected?
  • Inquiry: Does the photo-survey build a clear, compelling, and original survey of cultural and social patterning? Is their depiction appropriately conveyed through the image–text configuration provided?
  • Production Quality and Theory of the Image: This criterion is intended to challenge notions of the photograph as mere description, i.e., an unmediated look into a given social world. Photographs require technical skills and artistic ability and, as such, the author should show a strong understanding of the photograph as an aesthetico-political form. Are the photographs compelling as independent productions? Do they show a cognizance of framing, lighting, and color? Does the photographer articulate his or her technical approach in a way that might compellingly challenge a viewer’s way of seeing?
  • Image-Text Relationship: Do text and image work as accomplices? What is the relationship between text and image? Is this relationship generative? Primarily, we are concerned as to whether the author recognizes that images and text convey different kinds of information and that they have sought to maximize the affordances of each media in their photo-survey. Submissions should not rely on either media, but especially text, in order to make their arguments. Instead, the juxtaposition of text and photographs—and therefore the photo-survey itself—should be greater than the sum of its parts.
  • Ethics and Politics of Representation: Ethics and the politics of representation are guiding principles for any anthropological work. We intend to consider if and how the media-maker understands power relationships and inequities in the production and dissemination of images. An ethically and representationally sophisticated approach needs to show knowledge of how images are likely to be read. Photographers should show that they have considered reflexivity, positionality, rapport, the building of trust, and consent as part of their methodology.
  • Page-Layout: The Photo-Survey provides a unified series that foregrounds individual images. The Photo-essay employs montage techniques to create critical combinations of images and texts within the confines of the frame/page.

Field Study Assignment 3 Due date: 12 October

FSAs should be submitted to Pitch2Peer (P2P) before 18:00!

Photo Series: The images should give significant attention to framing and composition and be generally attentive to camera techniques and aesthetics. While Freeman’s criteria for individual photographs should guide your selection of images, your main task will be to think in image-series that develop an idea through combinations.

Part 1 – Photo-survey

The first series asks you to collect a series of images that provide a survey of cultural and social patterning and is primarily motivated by a documentary impulse. Use Colliers’ method for making a photographic survey/inventory (handout). Produce a series of 10 images from field studies that attempt to create a collection of items that constitute some sort of set. In addition to photographs, you may include up to 3 drawn depictions and/or video stills. Place each image in a slide presentation. Give equal attention to each individual photo by making each image the same size and placing only one image per slide/page. Title the series in a way that describes the set, write a short overall description of the collection (approx 25 words), plus a descriptive caption (approx 10-20 words/each) for each image. Save as a PDF to lock formatting.

Part 2 – Photo-essay

The second series asks you to employ a narrative or argument-driven logic that structures a series of photos as a progression that employs montage as a dialectical method and is motivated by conceptual thinking. Consider Sutherland’s description of a photo-essay and review the Writing with Light peer review rubric (see below) in the making of your assignment. Your photoessay should include a series of 10 images from your field studies, and may combine object and location photographic studies with up to 3 drawn depictions and/or video stills. Create a slide presentation with your photographs. You are encouraged to juxtapose images, contrast sizes, and experiment with different styles of page layout by considering how the images relate to one another. Include introductory text and accompanying captions (500-800 words total). Save as a PDF to lock formatting.

Meta-commentary: All assignments must be accompanied by a brief written reflection (200-300 words max) that provides a ‘meta-commentary’ about the student’s intentions with the assignment’s selection.

Photographic Research Practices Complete by 13 October

Watch these lectures

Seminar

Read these texts

Sutherland, Patrick
2016
The Photo Essay. Visual Anthropology Review 32(2): 115–21. Link ➙

Search online for these Documentary Photographers

Henri Cartier-Bresson
Alex Webb
Ed Kashi
Gueorgui Pinkhassov
Moises Saman
Venetia Dearden
Jessica Dimmock
Donald Weber
David Alan Harvey
James Nachetway
Lynsey Addario
Alexandra Boulat

Adam Ferguson
David Monteleone
Christopher Morris
Rena Effendi
Bruno Barbey
Harry Gruyaert
Susan Meiselas
Steve McCurry
Dominic Nahr
Trent Parke
Raghu Rai
Marcus Bleasdale

Antonin Kratochvil
Maciek Nabrdalik
John Stanmeyer
Stephanie Sinclair
Tomas van Houtryve
Lana Slezic
Stanley Greene
Nina Berman
Pep Bonet
Andrea Bruce
Alixandra Fazzina
Yuri Kozyrev

Write journal entries to these prompts

In addition to your general entries/reflections on tutorial exercises, field studies, and method reflections, respond to the following module specific prompts.

  • How do different framings and compositions impact your feelings toward an image?
  • How formal aspects of image making impact the relationship to the content?
  • How does the camera make you feel? Reflect on your positionality.

Photographic Research Practices Complete by 6 October

Watch these lectures

Tutorial

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    Rosanne van den Berg
  • Photographic Thinking (exercises completed in class)
    Mark Westmoreland

Read these texts

Sutherland, Patrick
2016
Extending the Frame: some notes on learning documentary photography and constructing photo essays from groups of photographs. VAR Supplements. (November 1, 2016). Link ➙
Botticello, Julie
2016
From Documentation to Dialogue: Exploring New ‘routes to Knowledge’ through Digital Image Making. Visual Studies 31(4): 310–23. Link ➙

Prepare your equipment

This module requires that you make photographs. With the variety of tools available, you may easily fulfill this task by using the camera function on your phone. If so, you may want to download a camera App that allows you greater control (see below). If you have access to a DSLR then you will be able to engage with the manual settings more readily, which will ultimately improve your skills.

Photo Apps

Android

DSLR Camera Pro
Camera Zoom FX
Footej Camera
Manual Camera
ProCapture
Camera FV-5
Open Camera

iOS

Manual
Halide
VSCO
ProShot
ProCam 5
ProCamera
Camera+ 2

Mobiel

Whatever you chose, be sure you know how to adjust the controls. Following Rosanne’s video module, practice adjusting these photographic settings. The goal is to make your camera discipline as skilled as possible, so you can do it without thinking about it.

  • Experiment with the Exposure Triangle: ISO, shutter speed, aperture
  • Experiment with Shutter speed and its effect on motion
  • Experiment with different apertures in combination with zoom or different lenses to test depth of field. Try Short & Long Lenses, keeping the object the same size.
  • Photograph a face close up on WA and Standard Zoom
  • Experiment with Backlight (what criteria defines your technical choice?)
  • Experiment with light sources (low, natural, bright) adjusting ISO, test image noise.

Photographic Research Practices 30/9 – 20/10

Photographic Research Practices Overview

We hang pictures on the wall, post them on social media, watch them on flat screens, see them on billboards and flip through them in magazines. As ubiquitous as images may be, they are always bound by a frame — there is an edge where the image ends and we cannot see what is just beyond. These are very geometrical frames — squares and rectangles — that predispose us to portrait and landscape modes of recording. With the verticality of the cellphone screen, the conventions of cinematic composition breakdown, which were influenced by theater spatial dynamics — stage right / stage left, the 4th wall.

But frame also suggests a particular perspective within a larger context. The frame provides clues about the person behind the camera. These can be very subtle gestures or interactions with subjects on screen or they can be quite obvious attempts to be self-reflexive by entering the frame, perhaps even by reflection in a mirror. When used in a developed manner, one’s approach to image ethics can be presented within the structure of the film.

Both Judith Butler (2009) and Georges Didi-Huberman (2008) have pushed us to take seriously the ‘frames of war’. In a place that has encountered mass violence (past or present), the production of images will be highly charged and needs self-awareness. But every context of someone filming another person is a political context — a negotiation of rights and privileges. These traces of the author are also informed by one’s personal affordances with citizenship, wealth, education, etc. If we only look at an image’s contents, we may miss its larger message.

Photo framing