“This introductory course to black and white photography integrates visual design with the technical aspects of the camera and photographic image making. An emphasis is placed on the photograph as an art form, as well as camera operation, and darkroom techniques including film processing and printing. Project assignments include photographing people and the natural world. Discussion and critique of student work will be an integral part of the course. Prerequisite: You must have access to a 35mm camera with a functioning light meter and that allows the manual selection of shutter speed and aperture. The department has a limited number of loaner cameras that are provided on a first come first served basis. Please contact the instructor before the first class with any questions”

This class takes an older fashioned approach to photography, giving you a delicate black and white camera and teaching you how to properly handle it. Learning how to put film in it, figuring out the proper exposure, and how to overall develop the film in the darkroom. Not only do you learn how to use the old camera, but you need to learn about how to take photos such as landscapes, portraits, and overall just challenging the creativity one can make while being on campus.

A Picture from my Assignment Called People I know

Sadly, this class didn’t get to last with the darkroom. As school got shut down we had to switch to other forms of media. This is a photo of my mother with our dog Anubis, something I learned about portraits is that it’s often not the moment when both the dog and the human is looking at the photo, but the seconds in between when they may be having a moment or trying to adjust themselves- making it look real.

A Self Portrait of Taking a Selfie From the Assignment Called Self Portrait
Another Self Portrait From the Assignment Called Self Portrait

These were also sadly made at home because of the epidemic happening, but I found making self portraits rather fun. I had never worked with mirrors before of any kind, so everything I had done was a complete experiment and something I would love to do again some time. With this I’ve found I want to do more types of art with mirrors in the future, not just photography.


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