Here is my Photo Safari. Looking at the requirements for the photo safari was very daunting at first. I honestly didn’t know if would be possible to pull of! I delayed doing it all of this week, because I think I was apprehensive about actually doing it. Well today was the day! By the time I decided to do the safari it was getting dark outside so going outside for all of it wasn’t really an option in my mind. (I thought it would be dark, but actually it turned out to be pretty light, although my mind was at this point set on doing it inside of Eagle Landing). I decided I would start my Safari with a picture of the time on my stove, and then I would run out of the room and get all the pictures I could in 15 minutes before returning.

It went a lot better than expected. I knew I wanted to take most of my pictures in the rotunda located in Eagle Landing, because I find the location pretty ascetically pleasing. So I left my room and started headed in that general direction. For the first half of the safari I really felt as if the pressure was on, I was rushing around trying to capture the best possible pictures in the shortest amount of time. I skipped a few of the hard ones and saved them for the end. (The other person’s shoe, and interesting shadow for example). When I got through almost the whole list, and looked back at the time It was only seven minutes! I was evidently going a lot faster than I thought I was. I think that it helped my speed that I had printed out the list of photo subjects and was carrying that with me.

I think my two favorite images were the “unusual angle” and “the abstract photo”. Here they are respectively:

What an odd angle…

What is even happening? Is this a photo???

For the first one I set a timer of three seconds on my phone and placed it facing camera up on the rotunda floor. My intention was to get out of the FOV of the camera, however I failed to do that so you can see me a little bit in the photo. I think it detracts a little form the photo, however I really like how the lights are a little blurred. I think in all that was a really interesting photo. For the abstract photo I put my phone in the pocket of a pool table, the mesh created an interesting kind of masking effect of the carpet beneath! The final effect I really really enjoyed!

The photo I had the most difficulty with was “move the camera to create motion” one. No matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get the photo to look really good, however I posted my very bad attempt:

Its moving!

I think the main problem with the way I was trying to take the photo was that the background was too much in focus. If I had more time I would have tried to take the same type of photo, but with a little object like a figurine setting on something out of few of the camera so the figurine appears to be floating. Then moving the camera would have had made a better effect, in that the background would be out of focus. I think I will probably try this, and then make this into a visual assignment. That could be cool, of course dependent on how it actually turns out.

Throughout a lot of the photos, especially the ones involving patterns, I attempted to incorporate what in graphics programming would be created using Mipmapping. It’s the blurring of the image in the plane as it moves further from the viewer, seen in this image:

What is even happening? Is this a photo???

For what ever reason I really enjoyed how that image turned out also! I want to go back and retake that photo with more planning, as to eliminate the view of the underside of the pool table. I think it would look very interesting if only the carpet was visible!

Overall I found the assignment to be very enjoyable in the end. Although I was initially afraid of tackling the challenge to begin with, in the end I found it to be very fun! The whole time I was trying to apply the ideas from the articles we read in the start of the class. With these images I was trying to convey a story. Not all of them together, but I think some of them could be put together to perhaps form a story, that’s something I would like to think about more! In the end I think this assignment has certainly taught me a few more things about photography, and perhaps even led me to some more creative ideas!