Explorations

Introduction

For the Explorations Project, I will be exploring night photography and improve my skill of understanding the settings to adjust for different scenes. I will also improve on the 21st Century Skills self-direction, creativity and risk-taking because in past projects, I often observed myself relying on the opinions of others guide my project. Yet, with going by myself in very dark settings, I was able to set a specific direction for myself on where I wanted to go, what I wanted to capture, and the tools necessary to complete this. My desire to take on a topic such as night photography was from my past experience attempting it through the usage of devices such as a phone or a simple camera. When I wanted to take a picture of a beautiful moon or how the stars laid in a secluded area, I constantly ran into the issue of the device I was using not fully capturing the scene. Therefore through practice, I wanted to develop my ability to capture a night scene using a professional camera. The night sky is often undermined in our society for its beauty, therefore this project I hope my research and pictures are capable to shed light on it.

Process

My process consisted of me going to various places in the bay area that I felt could capture the night scene I wanted. I went to the city for its beautiful nightlife and the contrast between the night sky and the multiple colored lights. This contrast appeared in my photos and was able to reveal the relation between light and dark especially in the city. The process was a handful. Aside from creating an outline with specific tools, places, and shots I was gonna take, I didn’t have enough time. On the weekdays I would be either working or have homework. When I wanted to take photos on the weekends, I only had a memorial weekend and even then I barely had time. When taking photos, I encountered various obstacles. My battery died, the wind kicked in at times resulting in many of the photos being out of focus or blur because the tripod/camera would shake. When I wanted to go and take photos of the night sky, I went three various nights because the other two were overcast and the scene of the moon among the stars wouldn’t appear. 

Final Production

Below are the final photos that I took edited with Adobe Photoshop-

The Bay Bridge:

Other Perspective of the Bay Bridge:

The City View:

 

 

Infographic

Besides the final production of our project, we were assigned to create an infographic in digital media to showcase the research we conducted for our project. When researching, I focused on the specific tools and camera settings necessary for proper night photography. Therefore, my infographic covered the settings and tools needed for different night scenes I was capturing.

Below is my infographic:

Below is the screenshot highlighting my process creating the infographic using Adobe Illustrator:

 

Presentation

For the end of our explorations unit, we had to present our projects in front of the whole junior class. This Presentation would include a capturing opening, an explanation of our reason for the topic we chose, our research process, the process itself creating the project, the product and the lessons we learned. While I was extremely nervous, I was beyond fortunate for the amazing community of classmates I had that made me open up and not feel any judgment.

Below is a link to the video:

 

Reflection

Overall, I attempted night photography and while I did not fully succeed, it was the effort that matters. From this project, I learned that when exploring a topic such as night photography, the outcome might not be as expected. I really wished I had captured a beautiful night sky in my photos, yet unfortunately, from various obstacles, that wasn’t able to happen. But I am not entirely down because I took a risk and challenged myself with a topic I wasn’t familiar with at all. I was able to succeed in some spectrums of it, and that is all that matters. It was a lesson worth to experience and when I attempt night photography in the future, I will understand what to do differently and possibly gain more understanding. 

Experimental MUSIC

For my  Experimental Music Production, I worked with one of my close friends and fellow freestyle classmate Jordan Sharkey. We created a 4-minute song through the application Pro Tools that included piano, singing and various sound effects such as reverb to edit the instruments we had emplaced. It was a great experience to work with Jordan and the song was able to include all of the skills we gained through initial practice Mr.Flo assigned with Pro Tools.

Below is the song Jordan and I created:

Below is a screenshot of the process creating this song using Pro Tools: