What was the Pictorialism Movement in photography?

The Pictorialism movement represented a photographic style and a set of rules that defined photography as art. Pictorialists considered themselves true amateurs, pursuing photography out of a genuine love for the art. Their focus was on capturing the beauty of subjects through composition, tonality, and subject, rather than simply documenting reality.

What was the straight photography movement in photography? Why was it popular amongst photographers?

The Straight Photography movement became popular amongst photographers because it focused on capturing subjects in a direct and unmanipulated way. It celebrated the beauty of everyday scenes and emphasized composition and lighting. By presenting unaltered images, it aimed to convey truthfulness and authenticity while establishing photography as a legitimate art form separate from painting.

How have Edward Weston and Aaron Siskind (above) been influenced by the Straight Photography Movement?

I changed one of the photos because I found out that the photo that I changed couldn’t fit in a black-and-white set, so I decided to change to a photo that is black-and-white.

These are the three photos I chose for the abstract, I chose these because I think they are the most abstract photos that I took. These are three very different things but all show abstract.

What is the purpose of rules in photography?

It helps people to take more compelling photographs, some of the rules can draw attention to the important part that the photographer wants others to pay attention to.  Or just make the photographs naturally balanced.

What are (some of) the most important rules in photography?

-Clear Structure

-Rules of Third

– Balancing Elements

-Leading Lines

-Symmetry and Patterns

-Viewpoint

-Background

-Depth

-Framing

Define and Inquire

I decided to build a remotely connectable Bluetooth stereo as my toy. The energy shown in this toy is converted from electrical energy to sound energy, as well as light energy. My Bluetooth speaker mainly uses the internal Bluetooth control panel to connect to the phone, and then the battery allows both speakers to emit sound at the same time. The users of my toy are mainly children who can control their own cell phones; because my toy does not cause a lot of harm or influence, the sound emitted by the speakers is not enough to make children’s hearing damage, so it is very safe and applicable to a wide range of people.

The only and biggest impact of my toys on the environment is the use of lithium batteries, batteries are extremely harmful to the environment, and the battery is a consumable, a Bluetooth stereo will use more than one battery so it can lead to serious impact, but as long as we manage the battery properly and not just throw it away, the harm can be reduced. Secondly, our other materials are made of wood. Because wood is renewable, unlike other building materials (such as steel, plastic, metal, etc.), it does not deplete the resources provided by nature. Wood is a resource that can be sustainably grown and collected because it essentially exists on its own. However, since the wood used in our toys is not particularly heavy, this may also lead to the possibility of cracks as well as breaks in the wood over time, but these are the consequences of prolonged and irregular use of Bluetooth audio, if people use Bluetooth audio normally and replace the batteries, my toys are viable in terms of durability as well as safety.

I discovered on YouTube that I could actually make many technological products, and they were all very cost-effective, so I chose a moderately difficult Bluetooth stereo to make.

We kept the product original because besides the purchased control panel as well as the speakers all other works were made by hand, including soldering, cutting, graphic design, etc.. Making more interesting audio without comparison can show originality.

Develop and Plan

Explain how you used design practices to complete this iteration of your toy/device.

Develop a detailed plan for creating a preferred design, including success criteria.

The design I am creating is a Bluetooth speaker. The energy conversion shown for this toy is the electrical energy to sound energy, and the success criteria I came up with is that my Bluetooth speaker can successfully connect to my phone and play sound.

Some additional plans and information:

Material list:

15 cm wooden board x 4
10 cm board x2
superglue
Hot glue gun (instead of superglue)
Wood drilling machine
Ruler
Pliers
Scissors
Laser cutting

Create & Improve

My product is comparable to what I expected in my plans and blueprints. Some advantages are that the toy was able to show a clear energy conversion. Another advantage is that by connecting the phone, my product was able to successfully play sound. But once I put the control panel in the box, I would find a very messy layout inside.

Pros:

“The appearance of your product looks very sturdy and secure.”

“I think the design is really creative.”

“The wood used for all of it is very environmentally friendly.”

Improvements:

“You can make a cover above your Bluetooth stereo to facilitate the replacement of the lithium battery, and set a nail at the back as a fixed so that the top can also be opened.”

I am very satisfied with the overall of my product. This Bluetooth audio, by connecting to Bluetooth, shows the change from electrical energy to sound energy. When the user turns on the Bluetooth influence and connects to their phone, the battery in the box makes the speaker sound. One of the sciences I learned from this product is that soldering is very important, if the soldering is not good, there is a high chance that the sound will not come out of the speaker because the electrical conduction is not in place, so I was very careful in every soldering afterwards.

I think overall I did a good job. My prototype did meet the success criteria. Our strengths are that we can be very safe as well as the materials are very environmentally friendly and the user can play any sound. But the disadvantage is that the playability is not as high as other players, and the Bluetooth influence does not diversify the playability.

My toy definitely meets the design specifications because it shows clear d energy conversion. The toy also has a pretty cool and creative look that we hope will attract the attention of kids and many other users. In addition, our toy is also environmentally friendly because we decided not to use any plastic, but wood, branches and paper, which are renewable and biodegradable for the environment.

I am very proud of the way I handled things in an emergency situation. I often welded somewhere else during the welding process because my hands were shaky, but I used my welding skills in time to clear the excess elsewhere. The most challenging part for me was when I had a broken wire, I also used soldering to make up for it but this time it was very challenging, both wires were very mobile, so I had to concentrate and take my time with the soldering.

I chose this set of images because I overlooked the amazing tool. This tool uses a red lamp with a lot of irregularly turning glass to make the lamp form irregular shapes on the wall. I decided to take a picture of the irregular shapes every time they appeared. In this way, I have a number of unmistakable, irregular, abstract photographs.

Although I was not inspired by any individual artist in this group of photographs. But I have drawn on the work of many artists who are good at using light. Their use of colour in coloured light is very worthwhile. But I have not studied the work of others in particular in terms of the overall construction and design.

I started out with the idea of shooting the group from the front, but during the first shot, I found that the irregular colours were squeezed together. It didn’t show the layers that were supposed to be there. So I tried again from the side and this time it worked because the side showed the different layers of colour from black to light red.

But when I took the photos and put them on the computer, I found that the colours I wanted to show were not as experienced by the camera. So I also made changes in the colour palette. I wanted the colours in my photos to be very sharp and the layers to be very distinct. I wanted people to be able to clearly distinguish the different colours when they saw the photos. So I adjusted the contrast and the saturation to get the final result.

This photo is in the abstract because I thought that this colour overlap would not appear in normal work. Each time the colour and the light will turn out to be different. And I don’t show the meaning of the photographs in an obvious way so that many people who see my photographs will have a different understanding and a different feeling and emotion about them.

In this photo safari assignment, we are given 12 drawings of different elements. Then we need to recreate them with real photos.

Abstract photography is a style of photography that uses creative, weird ways to present objects and deliver a message, usually, authors doesn’t tell the message they want to tell us directly.

How can photography change our relationship the to things?
Abstract photographs tell us to look at different things from multiple perspectives.

What is pictorialism?
Pictorialism is a way that emphasizes beauty of subject, tonality, and composition instead of the documentation of reality.

What is abstract photography?

Abstract photography is a style of photography that uses creative, weird ways to present objects and deliver a message, usually, authors don’t tell the message they want to tell us directly.

Write a (very) short biography of Albert Renger-Patzsch (just 1 or 2 sentences).
Albert Renger-Patzsch is a German photographer who lived from June 22, 1897, to September 27, 1966. His photographs often focus on making ordinary subjects in a creative way.

From looking at his images above, What types of subjects do you think Albert Renger-Patzsch preferred to photograph?
From looking at Albert Renger-Patzsch’s photos, I think he preferred to make natural things or views and plants as his subject.

Why do you think he entitled his famous book, ‘The World is Beautiful’?
The book “The World is Beautiful” was entitled to its name because, in the book, there are all natural views of the world around us every day, trying to tell us to discover the surrounding beauty.

Why do you think Edward Weston moved away from the soft focus of pictorialism to the new Straight photography movement? – the idea that ordinary objects and scenes can be photographed to reveal their beauty
In his career, he didn’t stay in one place the whole time, because there were different cultures in different places where Edward stayed, and it affected his idea to change differently over time.

Give examples of one of his pictorialist images and one of his straight images.
Pictorialist: The Photographer’s Father

Straight: Pepper No.30

How has Aaron Siskind (above, been influenced by the Straight Photography Movement
It let him get interested in detailed photographs of surfaces with special textures, shapes, and lines and let this to be the style he best known as.

Name some other photographers that have been influenced by straight photography
Paul Strand, and Ansel Adams.

What makes the work of Andreas Gursky and Uta Barth abstract. Are they straight photographers? Why?
These two photographers’ works are abstract because the photos were not taken like ordinary subjects, and also didn’t pass the message directly. However, I don’t think they are a straight photographer because they didn’t actually show the detailed subject, instead they still showed the blurry kind.

Explain what the phrase Formal Elements means in photography.

Formal elements are elements that compose a picture and what makes a picture interesting.

Describe each of the 6 elements discussed so far (line, shape, pattern, texture, tone, focus)

Lines can be straight, curved, horizontal, vertical, and converging. They can be seen everywhere in our world.

Shapes are also nearly everywhere. It shows more than what an object’s like; it also tells us the weight, size and height.

Patterns can be used very creatively, making us see from a perspective that we normally do not notice.

Textures are usually observed on the surface of an object. It is usually three-dimensional and it looks more interesting.

Value and tone are a bit different; value is the range of light and dark, and tone is a mixture of color, not completely a pure hue.

Focus is if a particular area in a photograph is clear or not.

Give an example that emphasizes each element –

Lines: Paper Tubes – Vangelis Mc Ris

Shapes: Spotted Apple – Keith Carter

Pattern: Exchange of Plates with Kristjan II – Ola Kolehmainen

Texture: Jerome, Arizona 21 – Aaron Siskind

Tone: Salvage Series – Dan Ferro

Focus: Untitled – Ralph Eugene Meatyard

4. Can an image show just one element at a time? Justify your answer.

I think it’s hard because lots of elements already contain other elements in it, and I think any subject in this world won’t only show up one element. The element pattern already contains different so it will be hard for photographer only using one element.

When might it be a good idea to deliberately break the rules?

To do the opposite side of the rule will be the easiest way to break the rule, but still, we can just do the different thing and only save a little bad connection to the rule also work for breaking the rules.

Do you think it is possible to break rules if you don’t know they exist? Give reasons for your answer.

Yes, I think that is possible because I think all people have a fixed aesthetics, which means in our mind we probably know what is right and what is wrong for a picture, in this case you can just

Can a ‘bad’ picture ever be ‘great’? – How important is context in photography? (context= why a picture was taken, when or where it was taken and what message you were trying to make)

Personally, a “bad” picture can identify as a great picture. This is because if you have the right idea to take a picture without the rules, you still can have design or ideas on that picture which still will look good, but it is just without some rules. The context is important because photographer don’t randomly take all of their picture, when you are looking at the picture, a photographer don’t want you just look at how great is the picture, they also want us to know the meaning and the background story of this picture. We need to “feel” the picture, which let the context to be important.

My biggest success
I think my biggest success it to make this product in a limited time with limited materials. As covid started to getting serious again, lots of material I needed can’t arrive in the limited time. I only can use the materials arrived before and anything that I can use at home. Though without lots of materials, I still made the product out to solve the problem about food waste.

Advice I’d give a future student doing this project would be
I think one important advice will probably be, make sure you have all the materials you need before you start to build your product, maybe after you finish the designing you can start to getting the materials. Limited materials really can’t let your product be as perfect as you think before.

My biggest obstacle
Instead of my limited materials, the biggest obstacle is that I don’t have a platform to let the for stick to be stable at the beginning, because they are too thin glue didn’t work out, so I used more stick under them to make them more stable and can handle more weight on it.

(For some reason, pic just didn’t show up, i will email to Mr.Layman)