The end of unit one

I really haven updated as much as I would like but there have been various reasons, beyond, a lack of motivation. Through December and January I was completely focused on getting my essay completed, along with trying to put together. As well as trying various different thing with my photography project, along with writing my journal to go with the project and create a presentation. All to be handed in on the 26th January.

The main issue throughout this was the essay. It was always going to be my nemesis and so it proved to be. I was never very good at writing essays and whilst I think I did made a decent attempt with this essay it is certainly my weakest area and the one that I am sure will hold me back, when it comes to results.

I had started planning my essay early, as I new it would be a problem and with the issues of my ADHD medication, getting the motivation to write proved to be challenging. Made worse my my issues with reading large bodies of text.

I soon realised that I would need to focus on one area, with my MA and I chose colour. There were many reasons, why I chose colour. The main reason is because I am mostly known for my black and white photography and I wanted to improve my colour photography and knowledge of using colour.

Choosing colour for the essay turned out to be great for improving my colour photography, as I spent time learning about the meanings of colour, what colours work together, the effects of lightness and saturation on colour and how that effects who the image is seen.

It also gave me an insight into photographers who I had never considered before, such as Soul Leiter and Earnst Haas who I now have a much bigger appreciation of.

Putting together the essay proved to be a slow and frustrating process, with me staring at books, which I would have to go through and putting together the essay, knowing that I would have to read them but also knowing that whatever I ready wouldn’t necessarily go into my brain, the first, second or even third time.

Christmas was spent looking at a screen, trying to figure out what to write. I was hoping to have my first draft done by the 3rd January and to have finished by the 9th January but it was only on the 11th of January that I managed to finish that draft and there were many changes I would have to make between then and the hand in date.

My style of writing is very much to create a flowing story and this does not work well with creating an essay, where part of the essay is to create that story but then I have to challenge that story, which breaks the narrative and I found this extremely hard, particularly because many of the ideas I was challenging are well established in professional photography.

I will be a few more weeks until I know the results of the essay and whilst I am proud of what I achieved, I still don’t think I have done very well but what I have learnt from the essay will serve me well long after I finish university.

As for the other areas of unit one. I think I met with varied success. Early on with the practical, I focused on movement and trying to learn the Broncolor lighting system, particularly, the Broncontrol app, which turned into a disaster. With me setting up the lights to do one thing and the lights doing something completely different and it took three sessions to work out what the issues were and by then I know that I really wanted to focus on colour.









It also didn’t help that I was having health issues, during the early stages, partly down to the ADHD medication I started and then the side effects of coming off that medication after a short time and then followed by a rather nasty bout of flu and then me tripping and severely injuring my elbow, which put my right arm out of action for weeks.

That was followed by the move and then once I had moved, leaving Reggie for more than a couple of hours proved to be challenging. So by the end of term, I had done far fewer shoots, than I had hoped and hadn’t managed to experiment nearly as much as I would have liked.

Due to issues with insurance. It turned out that whilst the university was open for two weeks, it was not possible to shoot in the studios during that time. This proved to be a big issue, as I had planned to take that time to do much of my testing and to catch up with what I wanted to shoot. This led to me, creating an emergency photo shoot planned the day before, which wasn’t ideal but worked out well.

So by January, I was well behind and needed to catch up. I brought in Skins to model for me than this proved to be a blessing. He knows, what I was and is always willing to help and give advise (which I generally consider). He is much more practical than I am and whilst I still probably have the edge in certain areas, he does know his stuff and is a much better photographer than he was when I first met up. Easily up to a high professional standard and I can proudly say that I was an influence on that.

Overall, I was generally happy with the practical work I did, I did push my ideas and created some interesting work, that whilst not at the top of my portfolio is decent and interesting.

During the whole practical side, I had to create a research journal and this is where I think I could have done much better. I don’t think it worked nearly as well as it should and in retrospect I missed out talking about various things, which I should have added and many a time thought about but became side tracked and didn’t add.

I was very much hoping that I would create an improved research journal for the second unit but it turns out I don’t have to provide one, though I have started one, just to help with my presentation.

The last part of Unit 1 was to create a presentation of between 10 to 15 minutes. This proved to be incredibly hard, as I had learnt so much and I couldn’t put everything in that I wanted, so it was very much a barebones presentation, that goes along with the research journal.

By the 24th January, my brain was done. I can’t say I was happy with everything and I am sure I could have taken those two extra days to change some stuff but I was done mentally and handed in my work early. Checking the next day that I had got it handed in correctly.

Overall, I had been a interesting experience coming back to university twenty years later. I have learnt a huge amount about essay writing, much of which I wish I had know twenty years ago. Whilst I have a lot of complaints about the course and University, I much say that the way they prepare you to hand in work is exceptionally good.

Yesterday, I was given the brief for unit 2, which is where I will be working on my final project. As well as having to create a 4000-5000 word essay. This is rather daunting but nothing compared to the task, I have set myself for my final project. Which I will share in future.

As for the images from the last unit. I will write about them in my next post.