Emulating a professional photographer
Project by Bhavin Gala
For this assignment, I examined Indian photographer Raghu Rai, and a small collection of his photographs. Raghu Rai's focuses on social, political, and environmental photographs of India. He is part of Magnum Photos and he also has worked for Time India. His photos capture everyday Indian life. Some of his more famous works include photographing Indira Ghandi, Mother Teresa, and the Bhopal Gas Tragedy. His photos fall under the explanatory photograph category as Rai's photographs aim to encapsulate what is and has happened in India over the years. After reviewing Raghu Rai's photography, I learned how powerful black and white photographs can be. Mostly all of Rai's photographs are black and white, and this helps him capture the actual events in the picture and the emotion of the picture rather than the colors. A lot of the photographs that I have been taking this year have been of aesthetically appealing scenes or objects that I have seen. Rai's photographs focus solely on capturing events which help explain India at it's current state. Rai's portraits are full of emotion, and there is a story behind each one. I think I missed this aspect of portrait taking during assignment 4. Rai's photographs showed me that you do not have to have interesting poses colors to make a portrait. He has inspired me to really look into taking photographs to capture facts instead of capturing aesthetically appealing photographs.
For this assignment, I examined Indian photographer Raghu Rai, and a small collection of his photographs. Raghu Rai's focuses on social, political, and environmental photographs of India. He is part of Magnum Photos and he also has worked for Time India. His photos capture everyday Indian life. Some of his more famous works include photographing Indira Ghandi, Mother Teresa, and the Bhopal Gas Tragedy. His photos fall under the explanatory photograph category as Rai's photographs aim to encapsulate what is and has happened in India over the years. After reviewing Raghu Rai's photography, I learned how powerful black and white photographs can be. Mostly all of Rai's photographs are black and white, and this helps him capture the actual events in the picture and the emotion of the picture rather than the colors. A lot of the photographs that I have been taking this year have been of aesthetically appealing scenes or objects that I have seen. Rai's photographs focus solely on capturing events which help explain India at it's current state. Rai's portraits are full of emotion, and there is a story behind each one. I think I missed this aspect of portrait taking during assignment 4. Rai's photographs showed me that you do not have to have interesting poses colors to make a portrait. He has inspired me to really look into taking photographs to capture facts instead of capturing aesthetically appealing photographs.
Your Photographic Voice
Project by Jon Cox
About The Final Project
Daudi Peterson, Jon Cox and Richard Baalow worked closely with a committee of Hadzabe Elders in Tanzania, to give an unprecedented inside account of one of the world’s last hunter-gatherer societies as seen through their own eyes. Over thousands of years, the Hadzabe oral history unfolded as elders narrated their stories around countless fires in their bush camps of the remote Yaeda valley. Building on years spent working with and accompanying Hadzabe in the field, Daudi and Trude Peterson and Jon Cox photographed hunter-gatherer daily life, culture, and knowledge, from digging tubers to collecting honey and medicinal plants, hunting game and making tools out of just about everything. This documentary rich with photographs and illustrations is an innovative approach to documenting one of the world’s most unique remaining indigenous cultures.
View the Dorobo Fund Site to find out more about the Hadzabe Book
Course Goals and Achievements
I took this class to learn more about how I can use photography to express myself creatively. I wanted to learn about the effects that photography can have on the viewer and the basics of how to create an effective composition using color, light, and line. I achieved my goals through this course by learning how to compose a photograph in the Photo 16 Challenge Project. I now know how a photograph can effect the viewer because I learned about the photographic categories and how they influence the purpose of a photograph. After taking this class, I plan to use my smartphone camera for much of my photography because it takes great photographs and is always handy. I also plan to work toward producing ethically evaluative photographs for social change.
About The Final Project
Daudi Peterson, Jon Cox and Richard Baalow worked closely with a committee of Hadzabe Elders in Tanzania, to give an unprecedented inside account of one of the world’s last hunter-gatherer societies as seen through their own eyes. Over thousands of years, the Hadzabe oral history unfolded as elders narrated their stories around countless fires in their bush camps of the remote Yaeda valley. Building on years spent working with and accompanying Hadzabe in the field, Daudi and Trude Peterson and Jon Cox photographed hunter-gatherer daily life, culture, and knowledge, from digging tubers to collecting honey and medicinal plants, hunting game and making tools out of just about everything. This documentary rich with photographs and illustrations is an innovative approach to documenting one of the world’s most unique remaining indigenous cultures.
View the Dorobo Fund Site to find out more about the Hadzabe Book
Course Goals and Achievements
I took this class to learn more about how I can use photography to express myself creatively. I wanted to learn about the effects that photography can have on the viewer and the basics of how to create an effective composition using color, light, and line. I achieved my goals through this course by learning how to compose a photograph in the Photo 16 Challenge Project. I now know how a photograph can effect the viewer because I learned about the photographic categories and how they influence the purpose of a photograph. After taking this class, I plan to use my smartphone camera for much of my photography because it takes great photographs and is always handy. I also plan to work toward producing ethically evaluative photographs for social change.
* This is a sample student website that you can use to see how to set up your own website. It contains work from multiple students.