Student of the Month Interview

Questions:

1. Did you suspect that you would be awarded this and who did you think would win?

2. What was your reaction when you found out?

3. How did your family react to the news?

4. Why do you think you got the student of the month award?

5. How do you think this will affect you?

6. Do you think anyone will treat you differently because of it? How so?

7. What do you think caused you to win?

8. How did your friends react to the news?

9. What is your favorite/best subject in school?

10. Do you prefer academic classes or electives and why?

11. Are you involved in a lot of extracurricular or outside of school activities? What?

12. How do you manage your homework load along with every day life?

13. What are your strengths in school?

14. What are your weaknesses in school?

15. How are your grades in your classes and what do you do to maintain them?

16. What do you think it would feel like to be awarded this accomplishment multiple times?

17. Will you try to win student of the month again? What will you do to accomplish it?

18. What was the entire experience like for you?

19. Has your attitude towards the award changed since you won it? How so?

20. What qualities do you possess that help you in school?

Learning How to Interview: Assignment #1

Topic: 

School Uniforms

Sources: 

1. The principle of the school

2. The teachers of the school

3. The counselors of the school

Questions:

1. How do you feel about the new policy of enforcing uniforms?

2. Do you think it was a good idea and why?

3. Did this come as a surprise to you and how long have you known about the policy change?

4. What changes or difficulties will the students face with the policy in place?

5. Is everyone on the school board happy about the change and who is not?

6. Why do you think the school board decided to make this change to the policies?

7. Do you think the rule will be followed by the students?

8. When does the new policy begin in the schools?

9. How does the policy make the students feel?

10. What are the uniforms going to look like?

11. What caused the district to change their policy?

12. How will the rule of uniforms be enforced?

13. Why do you think the students might be against the new policy?

14. Why do you think the students might be for the new policy?

15. How will the policy affect the staff of the schools?

16. How will the students who are against the policy be handled?

17. Do you foresee more district-wide changes in the future and what would they be?

18. How long was this topic debated before the policy was put in place?

19. What are the good things about this policy?

20. What are the bad things about this policy?

Architecture Shoot

Details

Light

Patterns

Angles and Shapes

Surroundings

Portfolio Analysis

Part 1 - Portfolios 

Alyssa Schukar

General focus: Stories

Problems: not enough close up pictures; not enough strong singles; the not so great pictures took away from the great ones

Likes: they liked the few strong images, especially the singles; the images with new/different angles 

Impression: My overall impression of the photographer was not great. She had some very good pictures but for the most part her image were all very similar and not as interesting to look at as some others. The story was also sad, which made it not as fun to look at as well. I did like a few of her more optimistic pictures, but the majority of the images I did not really like.

Sam Adams

General focus: sports and every day life/photojournalism

Problems: the pictures did not "do" anything for the judges; not great lighting; compositions are not that great; distractions in the background and foreground

Likes: good ideas behind the photos; good silhouette pictures

Impression: My overall impression of the photographer was not great but better than the first one. I liked the ideas behind his photos, but he just did not quite capture the moments right. The one thing I could not look past was all the distractions in the background and foreground that took away from what could have been a cool image. I did not like how the picture story did not really follow a story. The photographer has the right idea, but he just needs to take better images to capture the moments in the best way.

Jordan Murph

General focus: sports

Problems: repetition of photos; lack of subjects/players in some images; not strong enough pictures; pictures that did not belong in the portfolio were there; artificial action

Likes: the liked the sports images and the angels chosen; good lighting and composition; good singles

Impression: My overall impression of the photographer is pretty good. I enjoyed viewing his single photos and I liked their compositions are use of lighting. The only downfall in his images were his picture stories. They were not good at all, did not use good lighting, did not use good compositions or rules of photography, and overall were boring to look at. His picture stories did not tell a story which was pointless. Besides his stories, he had extremely good photos that were very interesting to look at.

Dustin Snipes

Strengths: shooting at the right angles; good compositions; the people in the photos were all doing something; nice blurs; captured good moments; creative photos; right in the middle of the action

My take: Some strengths that I saw in the winner's portfolio were good use of composition and lighting. I thought the photographer had a well thought out story behind each photo and they were all interring to look at. Another strength was how the photographer managed to capture a bunch of key moments in the perfect way. One weakness that I saw was how some images were too photoshopped. Also, I did not like how many pictures were mostly blurred because to me it took away from the subject of the photo.

Recap Video

Choosing process: To choose the winner the judges looked at all the portfolios and discussed what they liked and did not like and then they would eliminate the ones they did not like. They talked about it and heard each other out, and then came to an agreement. Each judge was completely honest and this helped the process of choosing the winner. They narrowed it down to two portfolios and discussed each one in detail to choose the winner.

Part 2 - Individual Images

1. One photo that I agree with the judges on is the tennis photo from part 2 of the person in red rejoicing. Both the judges and I liked this image because it was cropped nicely and it tells a story. Also, I liked it because the story it tells is emotional and overall the image is very interesting to look at.

2. One photo that I do not agree with the judges on is the goose photo from parts 5 and 6. All the judges really liked this photo and while it is a good photo it is not my favorite. I disagree with the judges on this one because I think there were other photos in that category that deserved first place and not the goose image. The photographer did catch a very interesting moment, but I feel as though there are better stories and overall better photos in some of the other images.

Architecture Preview

Hundertwasserhaus (Forest Spiral, The Hundertwasser Building), Germany

1. Heinz M. Springmann was the architect.
2. It was built in the 1990's and completed in 2000.
3. It is located in Darmstadt, Germany.
4. It is a building you can visit, but it is for owners of apartments, so it is a private building.
5. I could not find any information on how much it coast to build.
6. This building was created for residency because it is an apartment complex.
7. I chose this building because it is extremely unique in its architecture and design. While reading about it, I discovered that in this building there are no to windows alike. Every single one of the windows are unique and there are absolutely no duplicates. The entirety of the structure is fascinating to look at because it is a U-shaped building that has different numbers of stories at different sections. I picked this building because it was very interesting to learn about and it is a very cool structure to look at.

Krzywy Domek (The Crooked House), Poland

1. The building was designed by Szotyńscy & Zaleski.

2. It was built in 2004.

3. It is located in Sopot, Poland.

4. The building is not private and you can visit it.

5. I could not find any information on how much it coast to build.

6. The building was created in a shopping center for public use and is now occupied by a pub.

7. I chose this building because of how unique it is. I enjoy looking at funky buildings because the architecture is extremely interesting and fun to look at. This building in particular is interesting because it does not look real but instead it looks like an optical illusion or something through a funhouse mirror. I picked this building because of the sheer weirdness and illusion it has created by looking at it. 

Habitat 67, Canada

1. The architect of the building was Moshe Safdie.

2. It was built as a pavilion for Expo 67 in 1967.

3. It is located in Montreal, Canada.

4. The building is a building for owners of apartments in the complex, so it would be considered private.

5. I could not find information on how much the building cost to build, but I found that it costs $22,195,920 or about $140,00 per living unit.

6. The building was created for the Expo 67 (World's Fair).

7. I chose this building because of the design of the outside. I like the geometrical shape of the structure and to me it looks like a puzzle of sorts. This aspect of the architecture promotes and sparks interest in viewer's eyes like it did mine. Overall, I picked this building because of the simplicity of the color scheme but to creativity of the design of the architect.

Atomium, Belgium

1. The architects of the structure were Andre and Jean Polak and it was designed by Andre Waterkeyn.

2. It was built in 1958 for the Brussels World's Fair.

3. It is located in Brussels, Belgium.

4. It is a public building and can be visited.

5. I could not find information on how much the building cost to build.

6. The building was created for the Expo 58 (Brussels World's Fair).

7. I chose this building because it is also extremely unique in its design and purpose. It is a museum that is open to the public and the architecture design makes it a very interesting museum. I picked this building also because of the geometric shapes it is made out of and it is cool to look at.

National Centre for the Performing Arts, China

1. It was designed by architect Paul Andreu.

2. The construction for the building started in December 2001 and the first concert was in December 2007.

3. It is located in Beijing, China.

4.  It is a public building.

5. The planned cost was 2.688 billion yuan, but after the construction was finished the total cost was over CNY3.2 billion.

6. The building was created for an arts center.

7. I chose this building because of the unique shape and design. It looks like a giant glass and metal egg and this created a very symmetric building. I loved how it reflected on the water and the reflection looks like the second half of the egg. I picked this building because of its location and how interesting the architecture is.

Action Shoot

Yelenna, a sophomore at Bowie High School, jogs towards the camera for the photo shoot on Monday. Her class learned about the different types of action shots in photography.

Ian, another student at Bowie, jogs parallel to the camera as his picture is taken. While doing this assignment, Ian and his fellow classmates learned about the different shutter speeds necessary for different speed intensities.

Dancing around the courtyard, Yelenna laughs as she gets her picture captured while she goofs off. Having had a passion for dancing since she was three years old, Yelenna was happy to have helped her classmates with her skills.

Connor Parks, a senior at Bowie, walks by the tree in the courtyard on the way back from the meeting held for seniors. After having listened to Mr. Benson's talk about drinking and driving and the consequences that follow, Conner was deeply moved.

Warm-Up: Sensory Overload

1. "I believe that more and more, we are defining our environments not as the spaces themselves, in terms of the buildings or architecture, but rather by the objects and devices that we buy and surround ourselves with. ... I would like that message to carry through universally," Seymour said.
I think that this statement is talking about how materialistic our world is becoming. We define our "status" and homes by the the things we purchase and surround ourselves with. I think the statement is absolutely true, so therefore I agree with it. As an inspiring photographer, this quote makes me feel a little sad because I want to shoot nature and cities and people in the hometowns. I want to shoot those things, but our societies are too focused on objects and devices that it takes away from the genuine feelings that there used to be in photos.

2. When I saw the pictures of this place, it made me want to go there and take pictures of it because it would be fascinating.

3. I think it would be very interesting to be the child of someone who worked at this place. Their parents probably have crazy work hours so they would either just spend time with them at their booth or wait at home for them. I feel like it would also be exciting because the child would get to see all the people coming to visit from around the world and see all the different cultures. It could be a very educational and practical experience.

4. My favorite photo from the article was the one with the booth of teddy bears and stuffed animals. There is a nice variety of color in the image, but not as much of an overload as some of the photos. I like this photo because the woman who is working the booth looks very happy and pleased with her booth and job. She has a big grin on her face and that makes the booth look very inviting and not as quiet or awkward as some of the other booths seem.

Warm-up

1. Why is this part of a winning sports photography portfolio?

Because it is a tradition to celebrate a victorious game by pouring a cooler of some drink on the    winning coach.

2. What is the shutter speed?

It would have to be high because the drink is frozen midair and not blurred.

3. Is this a key moment?

No, because it is predictable and the ball is not in the shot.

4. Could this have been planned?

Yes

5.  What advanced techniques are present in the photo?

The photo tells a story and the photographer knew how to adjust the shutter speed and aperture correctly.

Twisted Fairytale Prompt Shoot

Please DO submit