some nights . . .

So I did find this assignment pretty challenging. Not only was it hard to find the perfect subject, but since I don't have a tripod, I had to find a way to set up my camera as well. Once I was able to get all of that fun stuff worked out, it wasn't too horribly hard. I mean, I just had to press the shutter button and wait. Even though it took a lot of time and I think my hands almost froze off from the cold night, I really enjoyed this assignment. I felt like I learned a lot just going out and taking the photos. I'd never tried taking photos at night of things other than people, so it was a very different experience. Anyway, enjoy! :)

NATURE

LIGHT MOTION

MANMADE

MONOCHROMATIC

RANDOM

it feels like a perfect night

AAAAAAAH! PROM!

So, OHSU's prom was yesterday and I was fortunate enough to go with my wonderful brother and his date, my best friend, Jizelle. The entire night was an absolute blast!

The prom was held at the state capitol building, which is BEAUTIFUL. We got there quite a bit early so we decided to take some photos! Michelle, Jizelle's mom, has a fabulous camera and was kind enough to let me steal it from her for a bit while we took the photos. Some of them are pretty dang cute so I figured I'd share them with y'all on here. Let me know what you think! I felt like I was taking engagement photos, tbh :)

I think I'd have a cubomani-attack

So this week we learned about cubomania photos and had to make our own! I actually found this assignment really fun and challenging. I decided to use a photo that I took of my friends at ballet because I thought that their tutus, legs, and feet would make a super interesting photo. It was definitely a big task to try and cut up the photos (I used color and black & white!) and put them together to create the effect that I wanted. After a little while I got more comfortable and was able to find the perfect place much easier. To begin with I was lining up each piece, but then I decided to try mixing it more. I ended up doing tons of different shapes and sizes of squares and rectangles.  I personally really like the finished product, but please let me know what you think in the comments! :)

BEFORE

AFTER

food, glorious food!

It was actually surprisingly easy for me to find food that I wanted to photograph this week! My mom brought treats for her cute little class on Sunday and she made extra for our family, so lucky for me I had the perfect subject for this assignment!

While I was taking photos this week I came to understand how important the lighting and angle is for food photography. If there was any kind of shadow on the food something looked off and if the angle was too straight the photo simply looked boring. I really grew more of an appreciation for food photographers as I realized how hard it actually is. I did enjoy myself, though! It was fun to see my younger brother's mouth water while looking through the photos and I liked being able to "play with" my food. ;)
 I chose these five photos to upload because I thought that they were the best portrayals of this particular treat. I liked that some of them had funky angles, while others didn't, and that some had a more shallow depth of field than the others. Overall I just really liked playing around with my camera for this assignment and seeing what I was able to create. I hope that you saw something that you liked (if you're nice I might let you come over and have some of these lovely treats with me)! Give me some feedback in the comments! :)

all those SHADOWS almost killed your LIGHT

This week we had to take photos of "creepy shadows". Obviously, that is not something I generally take photos of, so I was a bit skeptical of my own abilities going into this assignment.

When I started taking the photos I tried to not let my natural instincts take over, which helped a lot. I will admit, I took a ton of photos that I hated, but after awhile I did start to get more comfortable and I was able to create images that I actually really like. So I hope you like my not-so-creepy, but very oddly lighted shadowy photos! Let me know your thoughts in the comments! :)

This is actually a glass of hot cocoa that I thought would be interesting to photograph. Lots of people take photos of the foamy part of hot cocoa or coffee, but I wanted to see what would happen if I turned on only a small light in my kitchen. The shadows that the glass created by having only the one light are very different and have a unique look to them. I focused my camera on the glass and ended up with this image, which I actually really like.

This one is almost funny to me, because this little cat is a cookie jar that my grandparents have had for years and my cousins and I are always discussing how creepy it is! For this photo I turned off all of the lights and aimed a flashlight at the cat. The light wasn't directly pointed at the cat, so it created a ton of shadows and I think overall this photo definitely has a "creepy shadow" feel.

I used the flashlight again for this photo and I thought it was amazing how completely different this photo was compared to the other. In this one the light is shining almost directly on the photo, which gave it much harsher shadows. Whereas in the other photo the light wasn't hitting the cat at a direct angle. I thought it was interesting how different the shadows in the two photos were just by changing the angle of the light.

Look! I finally figured out what to take photos of! Because of the lighting for this photo, I wasn't able to focus on the flower as easily as I had hoped, but I think it actually worked better because of that. The flower is in focus in areas, but as it gets closer to the edges it begins to blur. I thought this gave the photo a more dark feel and I ended up liking it better that way.

I like that this one has much darker shadows, so much to the point where they almost take over the photo. It's the exact same flower as the photo before, just a different angle and a slightly different perspective. Comparing these two photos really helped me to see how much the cameras perspective can change the photo.

This is possibly my favorite photo out of them all. Again, perspective. Instead of standing in front of everything and looking at it directly, I stood behind the vase and focused only on the sparkly purple twig thing. Since the light is coming from below everything around and behind the twig is dark. I love everything about this photo. The color (it's my favorite color, oh my goodness), the line of the twig, the way that everything is so dark, and how the sparkles catch your eye because they are so bright. I just love it!

who I am inside

This week our assignment was to think about what "home" is. My initial thought was family, but after I thought about it some more I realized that although that is true, there's more to it. My family is "home" because they make me happy and I feel like I can be myself when I'm with them. I came to realize that even though I can be myself more easily around my family, the one time that I can always let my walls down is when I'm dancing. When I'm dancing I let all of my emotions out, I am truly myself, and I'm always happy. Dancing is where my heart is, and as many wise people have said before, home is where the heart is.

VP for Very Pretty

Well, this weeks assignments was to take photos of the 9 Rules of Composition. I knew that I was going to Charter School Day at the Capitol, so I asked Jizelle if she would model for me! We had tons of fun doing these and I really like how they turned out. So I hope that you enjoy these photos of our beautiful and "serious face" VP. :)

PS: I loved getting to meet a lot of you! I hope that even more of you will come to the other activities!

Rule of Thirds

Jizelle isn't centered in this and her face is in the top right of the image, so obviously this is my rule of thirds photo.

Avoiding Mergers

I chose this for avoiding mergers because I had to position her and myself in just the right place to make sure that she didn't look like she had a light coming out of her head.

Rhythm/Repetition

The repeated pillars and lights in this create repetition and the line of pillars is then broken up by Jizelle.

Balance

I really liked both of these for balance. The first photo is very close up on her face and has no negative space which gives it a good sense of balance, while the second photo is also very balanced out because of the stairs on one side and Jizelle standing on the other side.

Leading Lines

I love all the lines in this photo! They all point towards Jizelle, but in very different and intricate ways. The railing of the stairs points to Jizelle in an obvious way, but the lines on the railing behind her, on the floor, and in the small piece of railing from above also point to her.

Framing

I love converting photos to black and white so I was really surprised when I preferred almost all of the photos from my shoot with Jizelle in color. I did like this photo better in black and white, though. I always like to find different and exciting ways to frame people, but sometimes I like to make the framing very obvious. These little arches at the Capitol did just that. There are so many layers to the arch that gave the photo a really cool feeling.

Harmony

I felt like these were good representations of harmony even though they don't have multiple things in them. The lighting in both of them helps to create a harmonious feeling and the simplicity to the photos also gives a feeling of harmony.

Perspective or Point of View

Obviously, this photo is very different. By having only the area of the railing closest to the camera in focus, you are forced to look at the photo from a different perspective than is normal or natural.

Simplicity

I think this is my favorite photo from our entire shoot. I just love it! Not only does Jizelle look gorgeous, but the photo is so simple! I really tried to put emphasis on her eyes and there isn't anything in the background to distract you from the main focus.

So that's it! I absolutely loved this assignment and I really hope you liked what I did. Let me know what you thought, in the comments!

zomg jez, can you make me pretty like you? alchemy works, yes? you gorgeous asian, you.