Entry 1: Background of art
Art is very expansive and takes in different disciplines. The basic aim of arts is to express life, events and happenings that surround humanity. Arts date as back as civilization and this is evident from information collected by archaeologists and historians. During early years of evolution, man did paintings on the wall not only for the purpose of decoration but also as a way of recording events in life. Apart from this, the early man also appreciated bodily decorations. As time went by man continued to develop arts by adding new styles and techniques. This saw the diversification of arts into what we see in the contemporary world. Art diversified from just paintings and drawings and accommodated new aspects such as carving, creation of sculptures, photography, music, fashion and architecture among others. Something that has seen arts being revolutionized is the development of technology that has made arts more appealing and eye-catching.
Of more interest to me is photography. Photography has over time developed from simple stationary images to moving images (videos). “A picture is worth a thousand words”-this a common phrase in photography and indeed we can all come to a consensus on this. Photography immortalizes precious moments in our lives and acts as a chronological account of important happenings in our lives.
The camera is all known to us and thanks to Thomas Edison for this important device. The Camera has since its invention, undergone modifications and improvements in order to enhance the capturing of life, nature and its beauty. The beauty of photography as a branch of arts is that it is very interesting, wide and hugely accepted across various age groups and societies. This explains why photography was my big idea in blogging.
Entry 2: Audience and relevance
I cannot point at a special group as audience to this blog. Every person starting from children, teens to adults appreciate photography. It is therefore important to consider posting content that satisfies the needs of all these groups in terms of information, knowledge and entertainment. For instance, for adults a caption on wedding photography would the most plausible. On the other and, for children and teens photography on sports, birthday parties and celebrities would be most plausible.
Entry 3: Reflections on Growth as a Photographer
My desire to excel in this genre of art has motivated me to hone my photography skills by partaking in various activities. When I first ventured into photography, I realized that there were a lot of things that I needed before I could become a full fledged photographer. I was definitely amateur but over time, my desire to continuously learn has enabled me to realize massive growth, both personally and socially.
For instance, my first camera was a cheap Cannon T70 that I inherited from my grandfather who was also a well known photographer. I used to venture outdoors taking random pictures which I would then take to my school and show my classmates.
At that juncture, I was particularly not very interested in the positioning or even the posture of my photograph objects. I just wanted to take pictures that I would shoe to my classmates. As time went on however, I started becoming more and more obsessed with the positioning, posture and even the framing of the photographs that I was taking. I realized capturing a perfect picture take a lot of effort since one has to identify the perfect moment to take the picture.
In 2006, I applied for admittance into a two year photography workshop that was taking place in my home town. To enter, one needed to submit a couple of unique pictures capturing various elements of nature. I was overjoyed when I heard because I thought I would definitely get into the workshop with my ticket being the various photographs of nature that I had been taking for some time now. I was however in for a rude awakening when one of the judges dismissed my photographs calling them “mediocre”.
After this rejection, everything changed. I embarked on a personal journey and exploration of the reason why I wanted to become a photographer. I realized that for me to be taken seriously as a photographer, I needed to come up with a personal style that incorporated consistency in terms of them and composition.
Entry 4: My Growth journey
It was at this juncture that I started witnessing a change in my photography work. I noticed that my work was not only changing technically but that a personal trend was emerging with the images that I was taking.
I have to admit that the following year was the epiphany of my photography journey. There was a general and an abrupt spurt in the manner in which I viewed photography, people and the world at large. I was still a student at this time and my vision change started being reflected in my class assignments and subjects, particularly those related to photography such as graphic design. I became more of a freelancer and started taking a brand of images that I could call my own. From hence onwards I have been following this ‘personal brand” and it is what has catapulted me to the pint that I am currently in today.
Entry 5: Seeking inspiration and advice from peers
I have realized that the best way to gauge the quality and uniqueness of my photography work is by making comparisons with other professionals in the field including the veterans of this field. Photography is a genre of art characterized by a lot of enthusiastic stakeholders who are always willing to help their compatriots. As such, I have made it a priority to attend various photography workshops where I can exhibit my art and make comparisons with others.
For example, one of the photography aspects that I have conceptualized and that have earned me a lot of praise is animation of some of my still picture. I will delve more into this issue in another post.
Entry 6: Borrowing tips from other bloggers
Very many bloggers also share the same interest as me in photography. Subsequently very many bloggers offered important tips towards developing a blog. I was able to borrow various aspects from different bloggers in order to make this blog unique in terms of graphics, galleries, content, visualizations and other effects. Just to name a few, the foto journal, photography blog and the photography concentrate offered me great insights in this journey to create a blog. In terms of content and graphics, I found these blogs very resourceful and this explains why I borrowed a lot from these Website Logs. One important aspect I leant from these sites is the importance of color in a blog page. This blog is on photography and consequently should be able to appreciate the role color plays in appealing and attracting audience. The color effects and the background of a blog mean a lot to the audience. As I learnt from the bloggers, photography is fast growing and is quickly housing innovations. A good blog has to go beyond just photography in order to remain relevant in this fast growing world of technology. For this reason, I opted for animation. Animation is a modification of photography that is taking the art of photography to another level
Entry 7: Blogging as a media platform; Photography and animation
In the event that I had taken a lot of interest in photography I went a step further. Conceptualizing is all about getting creative and innovative and finally putting your concept into real life situations. Animations are creative images meant to create a scenario that a blog viewer can identify to a particular real life event. They give the blog an aesthetic and entertaining view away from the more serious real life images that I began with as initial entries. These animations also help me reduce need for explaining events using written content. This helped me put into use multiple emerging technologies used in artistic design. Animations are more likely to be understood by viewers from diverse environments. This increases its acceptance by the users and subsequently its value approaches its peak.
Despite the successful implementation and acceptance by the majority of viewers initially, continued use of animations as blog entries led to increased criticism. People are entitled to translate and conceptualize the idea in a blog animation as they wish. In this sense, some animations were criticized as going overboard and touching affecting the emotions of some of the blog users. There were several criticisms too about being too fancy while using them. Most critics argued that they expected to learn a lot from the blog site but were frustrated to learn that the blog has utilized so many fancy animations that make it look more of a toy than a portfolio for learning. Nevertheless, being artistic is about touching the emotions and translating an idea into different forms. The blog user has the liberty to translate as they wish.
Viewing my blog post as a media platform, animations have given me the platform to be able to make public announcements that most viewers have seemed to identify well with. They provide a unique way of delivering a message away from the conventional methods people are used to. The current dynamic world trends inspired me to venture into using the animations as a media tool. People are always associating with the most current innovations and animation in the art and media business is turning out to be a haven for most artists.
Entry 8: Selecting portfolio content
One question that has been persistently popping up in the photography discussions with my peers and classmates is how to I chose the content to include in my portfolio. My general answer has been that I chose the content that I am proud of and that appeases me. The purpose of personal blog is to present a platform for one to express himself/ herself. This means that a portfolio should have a personal touch of vision as well as style.
Although many people tend to come up with portfolios that have specific themes, mine is a general portfolio that showcases various photography features including general stories, photo stories, pictures and still images. A fellow photographer once told me that reviewers will only remember the worst images and it with this in mind that I have made a point of ensuring that I only select the best of my works to appear in my portfolio. Additionally, I make sure that the content in my blog is one that every society member can relate to in one way or another. This means that I have to take extra efforts to seek and even produce content that transcends common social barriers including gender, age and even sexual orientation.
One of the most revered content in my blog that has recently been witnessing a lot of traffic is the early pictures that I used to take with my grandfather’s Vintage camera. Up to now, I am yet to understand why visitors of my blog of the attracted to these images that I myself have despised for quite some time. I am however starting to think that the basic innocence of the pictures themselves and the fact that the photographer did not really understand what photography was at that time is what has attracted people to this particular content. I have therefore recently been engaged in frantic efforts to upload more these pictures with the hope that traffic will be even higher.
Entry 9: Ethical considerations
For any serious blogger, it is important to observe the various codes of ethics that govern the world of blogging. A good blog is supposed to provide content meet both ethical and moral standards. For this reason, I took it upon myself to research on the different ethical issues that a blogger needs to observe. This headed me to an article that contained information about journalists’ codes of ethics in blogging. Although I am not a journalist, I found very vital information on the ethical issues to observe. Just to mention a few is cultural sensitivity. Every blogger should cultural –sensitive and posting that seems to cross cultural boundaries should be avoided. We have and of bloggers who cross their boundaries and post content which seem to attack different personalities and cultures. In my journey to create a blog these codes of ethics guided everything that I had to post. This is not only aimed to upholding my morals but respecting humanity in entire and avoiding to rub shoulders with law enforcers
Entry 10: Blogging and its legal consequences
Blog sites are viewed as platforms that can be manipulated easily due to their increasing numbers on the worldwide web and the lack of stringent measures to limit or control the kind of content they sometimes post. Cases of defamation on blog sites are most common especially in cases involving anonymous bloggers. Before I undertook the bold decision of posting my first few entries I consulted a legal expert who advised me on the terms and conditions under which blog sites operate both on national and international level. I usually subject my entries to a metric that this particular media legal expert gave me before entering them. Illegalities involving blog content can be costly and with grave consequences. Accordingly, I also registered my blog site with the relevant authorities so that users could identify with the owner without feeling being duped regarding any information they get on my blog site.
Entry 12: Safety
Being a blogger is putting your life on the line. Blogs post entries that relate to personal lives of individuals. They divulge even the private lives of prominent persons and underhand deals involving powerful people and criminal gangs. Online insults and intimidation by blog viewers is an issue I have had to deal with. Although I have utilized the Bloggers code of conduct to handle online intimidation and threats, it is possible that people can still identify you and cause physical harm.
Entry 12: The ugly side of photography
I believe that the original essence and intention of photography was to capture life and its precious moments. Creative businesspersons turned photography in to a source of livelihood that is something so commendable. However as there never misses chaff in grains we have people who have turned photography into an immoral art. Unscrupulous businesspersons have continued to avert the entire society from the original intent of photography which was cemented on strong grounds of morality and righteousness .A typical example of how photography gas been used for wrong reasons is in pornography. This has been the root of sexual immorality currently witnessed in the world. However, as a lover of photography I am committed to fighting for the use of photography for a good course.
References
Helping Students Create Successful Portfolios — Learning & Scholarly Technologies. (2013.). viewed October 14, 2013 http://www.washington.edu/lst/help/teaching_guides/successful_portfolios
Legal & ethical issues | Blogs, Twitter, wikis and other web-based tools. (2013). viewed October 14, 2013, http://research20atimperial.wordpress.com/compulsory-content/legal-ethical-issues/
Photography Equipment - Photography Tips - Photography Technique | OutdoorPhotographer.com. (2013). viewed October 14, 2013, http://www.outdoorphotographer.com/
