My first quarter of being a full-time photography student is over and that spells relief! After being away from school for more than ten years it was difficult to adjust to schedules, expectations and learning new things - made much harder because that ever-present fear of not doing it right was hard to let go of. I had to keep in mind that I was there to learn and not expected to know the material beforehand. It is all about being willing to trust the process and to feel confidant that the missing pieces would be taught and monitored during the course of the term.
I learned how to design my photographs and believe that skill will lead me down the road in ways that are hard to imagine. Right now I'm learning to get comfortable with my own style and vision, regardless of what other people think. That is probably the toughest hurdle of all - to put aside what other's think in order to be true to myself.
Other than what I learned in the first few weeks, I didn't get much out of the experience. I spent a lot of time trying to teach myself and didn't get feedback until after it was all over with. This is disappointing and a bit hard for me to admit - especially since I put so much effort into the classes. And the feedback that I got felt like it came off the cuff and from left field - and it didn't contain examples of how to do it different or better. Unclear expectations. I had this one print that everyone loved and talked about quite a lot - it was a black and white of a single flower for my still life assignment. I worked on that project for two days and took maybe 400 shots while trying to find the vision that was inside of my head. He said it was "excellent" but when it was graded, I was marked down for the photo not being as complex as what he was looking for. Now, that really came out of left field. No one told me that a still life had to be complex, or that it was a requirement for the assignment. What would he have done differently? What could I try? How about some suggestions? Those would have been my questions, had there been an opportunity to ask them. I might have wondered if an O'Keefe still life wasn't adequate because it was too simple. It is all subjective, I know, but when in design school we got feedback as we went along. We weren't expected to do anything without hands on teaching from the instructor. They worked with us and guided us - and I always had a clear understanding of what was expected. Here it almost felt like whatever was good for the day. We were supposed to hand things in on a certain day and present them in a certain way, but that didn't happen much. There was no consistency. I felt crazed by how the expectations continually changed and how we would come to class expecting to do one thing, only to have it change.
I don't mean to sound like a grump about all of this but I put a lot of stock in going back to school and wanted to learn so much more. I didn't want to spend my time trying to teach myself and wondering if it would be okay - or how I could do it better. I flew by the seat of my pants and that is never good.
Perhaps I expected too much.
Now that it is done with for now, someone just told me that my photos don't look like they've been processed correctly. He says that the photos are good but that I'm ruining them during the edit. Now this is heartbreaking because I have worked so long and hard, been in school for the last six months and no one has ever told me that the colors and tones were off. But this person says that he can't comment on them because they look so bad. I am beside myself. I keep looking at them and wondering how they can be that bad. I look at the prints that I've had done and most of them look terrific to me - though there are a couple that don't look quite right. But not every one of them, or even most of them. My instructors have done nothing but commend me on the quality of the photos - so I don't get it.
So, if anyone else is experiencing displeasure by looking at how my photos are processed, I'd sure like to know about it. I don't want to be patted on the back and told I'm doing well. I want constructive criticism and advice - how else would I grow and get better?
Well, that is my confusion, condensed into a nutshell. I'm a little tired, a little emotional and feel a little let down by having 13 assignments graded four days after classes were done and not knowing either what they were graded down for, or what I could have done better. At the same time, I was given some excellent grades - A+ grades - but don't know why. Perhaps I'm never happy.
But I feel pretty darned happy about being alive and life in general, over all. I just wanted more education out of my education. I'll always be striving to do better and that is a good thing.
Okay then, on to more photography...and writing.
