Corridor Exhibition

Its time to change the corridor exhibition and I wonder if you are the student and your's is the group to do this?
Look through everything you've shot to date on the course and bring a small selection to the practical day/s to select from.
Once selected you will have to produce a print to size to fit in the frames.
Are you up to it?

Oor Wullie!

First image on the blog and its not a photograph!

Things not done on Thursday 8/11/2007!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2 important things were not done by the group.
1)A back up was not made of all the 'Alice' shots.
If you shoot something digitally this must be done before you walk away from the section/camera etc..
This is the most important 'professional' thing you should do at college or elsewhere.
Please make sure this is done on monday 12th ASAP
2) I did not collect the group notes taken 1st thing. My omission but there were distractions.
Can the secretaries please ensure these are given to me ASAP Monday morning also so I can copy them and distribute them.
Thank you and have a good weekend.
Lambolini!

4 Polarised light - stress polarisation on plastics

I am going to change the order of the studio lighting exercises. On Thursday I learnt that some students had difficulty getting their 120 film processed and printed in time for the deadline last year. This is probably because of the unusual (professional) film format and the moves towards digital printing.
We will shoot the polarised images as soon as practicable to enable printing by the deadline.
If you are in the studio group you can bring in small clear objects to construct a picture on the lightbox. The brief says plastics for safety reasons but polarisors can also have an effect on glass.

If you find this request confusing don't worry it should clarify once we have seen the demonstration!!

Now is the time for Night photography

With Nov 5th fireworks and the darker nights that are around now you should try night photography.
You'll will need something to rest the camera on, a tripod or bean-bag (pkt of rice in a cloth bag?) perhaps and should use a cable release. (e.g. http://www.thedarkroom.co.uk/products_class.php?productID=866
or for the eos 350d
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-EOS-RS-60E3-Remote-Switch/dp/B00004WCID

N.B. Remember, if you are photographing fireworks in the sky use the 'B' shutter setting and turn Autofocus off. Focus manually probably on infinity if they are a long distance away!!!

Suggested exposures for difficult (dark/night) subjects
Subject	Film speed (ASA/ISO) 64-100 400-800 1000-1500
Candle-lit scenes	1/4 f2.8	1/30 f2.8	1/30 f4
Indoor Christmas lights	1 f4	1/30 f2	1/30 f2.8
Brightly-lit city streets	1/30 f2	1/60 f4	1/60 f5.6
Neon signs	1/30 f4	1/125 f5.6	1/125 f8
Shop windows	1/30 f2.8	1/60 f5.6	1/125 f5.6
Floodlit buildings, monuments, etc.	1 f4	1/30 f2	1/30 f2.8
Skyline at night	4 f2.8	1 f4	1 f5.6
Skyline at dusk Moving traffic (streaked headlights)	1/60 f 4 20 f 16	1/125f8 10 f32	1/125 f 11 5 f32
Fairgrounds, amusement parks	1/15 f2	1/60 f2.8	1/125 f2.8
Fireworks (hold shutter open on B for a few bursts)	f8	f 16	f22
Lightning (hold shutter open on B for a few streaks)	f8	f 11	f 16
Campfires	1/30 f2.8	1/60 f5.6	1/125 f5.6
Outdoor night sport, athletics	1/30 f2.8	1/250 f2.8	1/250 f4
Moonlit landscapes	30 f2	4 f2	4 f2.8
Moonlit snowscapes	15 f2.8	4 f4	4 f5.6
Indoor sport	1/30 f2	1/125 f2.8	1/250 f2.8
Galleries, museums, etc.	1/8 f2	1/30 f2.8	1/60 f2.8
Stage performances	1/4 f2	1/30 f2.8	1/60 f2.8
Hospital delivery rooms	1/30 f2	1/60 f4	1/60 f5.6
Star trails (hold shutter open on B for at least 5 minutes)	f4	f5.6	f 8

Canon EOS Discovery

Canon have free workshops to introduce their latest DSLRs in Westminster Friday 9th and Saturday 10th November. Should be worth a look with Christmas coming up.
Register here :-
https://ed.canon-europe.com/canon.html?country=en&page=location

New Assignment and Camera Instruction booklet

These have now been uploaded to learn.westherts.ac.uk
The address for the manual is:
http://learn.westherts.ac.uk/mod/resource/view.php?id=8511&subdir=/Other_Docs
We will talk and show the process this week but the Adobe Acrobat file may be useful if you need further description.

1st Year ND Photography Review Thursday 18th October 2007

9.15 Laura Bond

.30 James Power

.45 Mary-Kate Williamson

10.00 Sarah Bland

.15 Sophie Louise White

.30 Dominic Goodman

.45 Laura Townend

11.00 Danny Gardiner

.30 Carina Hassell

.45 Alex Sawtell

12.00 Christopher Ingram

1.00 Tara Watts

.15 Lucy Johnstone

.30 Joanna Kenny

.45 Adam Meehan

2.00 Emma Kew

.15 Robin Lambert

.30 Layla Marshall

.45 George Pearson

3.00 Danielle Mason

.15 Lauren McDonald

.30 Melanie Meader

.45 Madeline Pouard

4.0 Eleanor Scanlon

.15 Hayley Williams

Watch out for this series BBC4 October:-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/photography/genius/#startcontent

Paperwork for the 1st Assignment

It is essential that you submit the 'diary' pages (targets set at beginning of class etc.), summary evaluation sheet (as well as an evaluation of each process) and a feedback sheet with your name on.
You will receive a 'referral' grade if these are not in your submission.

Time for some images.

I thought all this text needed some visual punctuation and so a few days ago I asked Neil Burgess UK rep. for those Queen pictures by Annie Liebovitz if I could use them on the blog for educational reasons (www.nbpictures.com). His reply was no without payment but suggested the link:

http://www.britainusa.com/sections/articles_show_nt1.asp?d=0&i=41099&L1=0&L2=0&L3=1&a=46309&pv=1

Some of the images are new to me.
Albert Watson photographed Prince Andrew and Fergie's wedding by the way.
Obviously you've made it when you are asked to photograph royalty.

I see the boss of BBC1 has left his job today because of the documentary editing. Great publicity (& more publication/income) for Annie.

Who reads this blog??

For this blog to work your student group have to read it. The option is poor communication and long lead times for activities.
Whenever I can I'd like to relate directly with 'the photography business'. It often works on surprisingly short lead times.
Ideally you should read this late on the day before the college day to see if there are any important communiqués.
Under comments can you enter your name to confirm who is reading the blog? Thanks.
See you Monday, Alistair

Photo exhibition in the Harlequin Centre

For one week only the members of Watford Camera Club, the biggest in Hertfordshire, are exhibiting in the gallery space. Don't miss it!

Photography Competition - Tetley Tea

There are many photo competitions that students can enter but we have never given them much attention. Partly because they don't often fit into the assignment schedule and partly because we like to believe you have enough to work on.
You can enter either by making sure your assignment work is suitable or by shooting for them in your own time.

The current Tetley brief has possibilities and would be worth entering for several reasons, among them (In no particular order):
a) The brief is fairly open
b)Deadline 14 December
c)I believe we have Tetley Tea/Mug samples
d)You can upload images straight to the competition
e)If you win the college gets a D200 outfit

I've put a link in the 'Have a look at!!!!!!!!!!!!' section.

I've also uploaded a copy of their brief to learn.westherts.ac.uk under ND1 briefs.

Latecomers!!!!

As you know there is a lateness policy which will be implemented if necessary.
People coming in late miss information and disrupt the class generally so I would like them to give something back as a benefit to photographic learning for the group as a whole.
If anyone arrives after the start of a lesson they will be asked to introduce an interesting and new photographic fact to the group before they take there place.
I suggest that everyone undertakes some research so they are prepared to meet this challenge if required.

Marks on negs?

Now that most people have the hang of processing at West Herts the biggest problem seems to be drying marks.
There's enough theory around to keep the nerds busy and I'm not sure which is the best (cheapest!) way to stop them.

When I did a lot of processing I used a Kaiser film wiper and never had a problem.
http://www.thedarkroom.co.uk/products_class.php?productID=787
but you have to keep it clean etc.

Some people dry the back with a tiny pece of chamois leather kept in a film pot.

Its caused by impurities in hard water mainly but I am very nervous of:
1) Wetting agent thats been in an open container for ages. As the water evaporates it leaves salts from the solution.
2)Old film wipers (could scratch the film)

ILP forms

At last weeks tutorials I didn't collect the ILP forms as I need to do!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Can all this weeks tutees bring their ILPs and hand them in......

Can last weeks tutees hand their forms in by end of learning on Thursday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Film/Paper Costs

2 MATERIAL SOURCES
-----------------------------------------------------

www.7dayshop.com

Channel Isles so + postage

100 sheets 10x8 £22.50

35mm HP5+ £1.89/roll £35.99/20 roll pack


----------------------------------------------------

RK Photographic, Potters Bar

http://www.thedarkroom.co.uk/

120 sheets 10x8 MGIV £22 35mm HP5+ £3/roll

They will deliver if enough is ordered (discuss?)

Welcome

Hi All,
I decided to put this blog up so that we can all speak to each other outside of WestHerts. The college elearning link is not working for me at the moment and although this is text based rather than visual it helps us all communicate.
Flickr seems a good way to share imagery if we need to but lets start with the blog. Post anything you feel might be of interest to us all.
See you Thursday,
Lambolini

Likely change to Mondays

In case anyone hasn't realised we will continue to run the Monday classes for the foreseeable future! I will be with you on both days your in until early in the New Year as per. the most recent timetable.