Assignments

The class is split into two parts. Asst.-Prof. Elke Reinhuber will teach until recess week. All short term assignments have to be submitted by March 8.

After this, Visiting Assoc.-Prof Meridel Rubinstein will take over and provide you with the outline of the second half.

Both parts count equally to your final grade as well as your participation.

These are the requirements for the first part:

• Contact sheets from a minimum of 5 rolls of film, 35mm and 120 colour film
• 5 minute in-class presentation of a photographer of your choice and submission of a written essay on the photographer and your opinion on the work / the influence on your creative process.

• At critiques you must bring contact sheets, work prints, final prints and ideally a digital version

• submission of 10 photographs from assignment 1-5 (digitally and printed)
• Attendance and enthusiastic participation

It is recommended to keep a process book of your work, the camera settings, description of set ups – but also of your ideas, concepts and inspirations.

You are responsible of supplying your own 35mm and 120 colour films, negative and reversal film, external hard drive, high quality inkjet paper (A4+A3), film processing fee. Estimated costs 200-300 SGD.

Grading and Assessment:

40 %       assignment and projects

20 %       class participation

40 %       final portfolio

Outline

Week 1

Introduction to the course

Presentation of your previous work

In class:

Colour modes, pixel vs. vector

Assignment #1: Déjà-Vu

Analysing, re-constructing and improving

Bring at least five photographic images of your family with you. If possible, bring some older images, shot by your parents or grandparents.

We will analyse the images and you will try to re-shoot them in a contemporary setting.

Taking an additional image, how would you compose it today with special regard on composition and light?

Shoot at least one roll of 35mm colour film. Process the film and bring the negative to our next class.

Week 2

In class:

• Scanning, contact prints –
• Discussion of assignment #1
• Introduction to OSS

Assignment #2: The Colour of Light

Shoot images with a slide (reversal) film, e.g. Fujichrome Provia or Velvia in different light situations, indoors, outdoors and try to mix different light sources. Write down where you took the image and the settings of your camera.

-> note: Slidefilm-processing will take at least one week.

Please bring one roll of 120 film to the next class.

Week 3

Check medium format cameras out and bring them with you.

In class:

Introduction to medium format cameras

Lens selection, focal lengths, light metering

Bring sunscreen and insect repellent – we will go on a short excursion.

Assignment #3: Monochrome composition

Choose one colour and shoot at minimum one film with only monochrome images

Week 4

In class:

The camera is your creative tool

We will have a closer look on the possibilities to create and influence images with the different settings of your camera

Assignment #4: Freedom of Choice

Change the appearance and the character of one subject in a series of images. Try different settings, direct, diffuse, various directions of light, change your position, low, high; try different focal lengths, shutter speed, aperture and perspectives. You may also work in black – and-white, if you prefer to. A minimum of 3 final prints which present the subject in a different way are expected.

Week 5

In class: The Colour of Light

Assignment due: presentation and discussion of assignment #2

submission of #1-4 including contact prints and 6 best images

Mid-term presentation and discussion of assignment 5.

In class: Color photography in digital age

Important buttons and functions

Color management

Reproduction of colour

ICC profile

exif data

Digital workflow

Assignment #5: tba

Week 6

Joker week – e.g. Gallery Visit or excursion (the week might change).

Week 7

Presentation and discussion of assignment #1-5

I, of course, retain the right to change any of the above.

Readings

Textbooks:

Langford’s Basic Photography by Michael Langford, Anna Fox, Richard Sawdon Smith, Focal Press

Exploring Color Photography by Robert Hirsch, McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages.

Suggested reading:

John Berger: Ways of Seeing

Roland Barthes: The Camera Lucida

Susan Sonntag: On Photography

Walter Benjamin: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

Liz Wells: The Photography Reader (A selection of must-read essays)

Lev Manovich: The Paradoxes of Digital Photography

Competitive Photography and the Presentation of the Self