#assignment four

I feel that I really need to address how I build on responses/experiments. I find it difficult to make multiple variations of the same design/idea, more often than not I tend to make a design and then start on a completely fresh idea for the next thing I work on rather than trying to expand on the previous idea.

When we look at a photograph, there are many things that affect how we perceive the image.  For example, if there is simply a picture of an apple with a white background, and that’s it, the focus is simply on the apple.  On the other hand, if we look at a busy landscape picture of downtown New York City, there would be more to take in and absorb, giving the eyes more areas to wander.  When initially looking at a photo, we tend to first look at what is in focus, but we don’t instantly think about the attributes we read about in Shore’s chapter about the depictive level.  Mentally, I feel like I tend to look for a subject first (but not on purpose), The photograph focuses our eyes to a particular area or possibly nothing specific.  I would be curious to know if there is psychological study about how we mentally break down an image.

As I read Shore, I tried to think critically about the photos that I've been making.  I feel comfortable exploring depth and frame: even if I haven't mastered their storytelling uses, I know that I've experimented with them.  One thing that I'd really like to play with more is the use of time.  I think if I took more pictures of people, then I might be able to get more familiar with this.  Of course, the other obvious solution is to take pictures of objects in motion.  I've played with focus a little, too, but not as much as I'd like to.  As I work more with the DSLRs, I would guess that that familiarity will come.

Sapphire and Steel: Assignment Four

Although Emerson's use of "divine" in a god-derived sense turns me off to his point, I define the word more in a sense of truth.  The truth that we stifle in ourselves needs to be set free.  Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay seems filled with great idealistic points but they don't feel new.  This idea of non-conformity is something that revolutionists have been portraying for centuries before Emerson's time.  Perhaps he is just doing what he talks about in being the first to write these common thoughts down.  Besides the point of my own questioning however, I agree with Emerson throughout Self Reliance.  If the entirety of the human race would agree (in a sense conform) to be nothing but his or her self, the world would be a better place.  I too, along with Emerson, believe that most humans are good at heart.