Assignment 1: Select a task from 'The Photographer's Playbook' and execute it

I. Research around the editors

A. Jason Fulford

Jason Fulford is a photographer and co-founder of J&L books. His photographic projects have reoccurring themes of Eyes & optical illusions such as 'Gypsy eyes', this started when he did a job for the New York Times where he had to used optical illusions to tell a story.

B. Gregory Halpern

Gregory Halpern is a photographer and teacher at Rochester Institute of Technology. His most recent project ‘ZZYZX’ uses California’s golden sunshine married with the smog from the dense air pollution to create mysterious portraits of the people who live there, while following a documentary style of shooting.

II. Selected task

A. Amy Elkins: Assignment 2 (Assigned by William Hendricks) [page 92]

Go to an area that has a decent amount of foot traffic. After finding what you want to be your fixed backdrop within that area, set up your tripod and camera. You will not move until you have completed this assignment. Once set up, ask a minimum of twelve strangers to "sit' for the camera. Keep in mind that you must edit and print a minimum of ten solid portraits to present in class.

B. Response

This task I went outside the train station in Herne Hill for the shoot. I felt that this place would be appropriate as it wouldn't be as densely populated as they Brixton where it would be hard to pick up people in the crowds to take their portrait and I knew that there would be a good amount of people exiting the train station each time a train arrived.

For the shoot, I chose to shoot on film as opposed to digital. I felt that by not having the digital screen immediately show the end result to me and the sitter it would remove some anxiety from the subject in case they thought I could then immediately go and share the image of them onto the internet as “Where will this photo go?” Was a common question I anticipated.

I'm very happy that I have done this assignment as it pushed me out of my comfort zone and got me to take risks. This shoot has broken my previous misconception that strangers would be reluctant to be photographed.

Upon review of the photographs, I noticed small things that each sitter chose to do without my instruction. The way they chose to sit, if they choose to smile or not, what would they hold in their hand. And through picking up these little features from just the image you see parts of the sitter's personality coming through even though my interaction with them lasted no more than 10 seconds.

III. Research around the photographer who assigned the task (Amy Elkins)

A. Amy Elkins

Amy Elkins is a photographer based in Los Angles after receiving a Bachelor of fine arts from the School of visual arts, New York. In several of her recent projects identity has been leading concept; in her project 'DANSEUR' She photographed young men who are dancers to explore how they had broken away from male identity. I feel that she assigned this task to break the photographer out of their comfort zone of shooting friends and people they know. By completing this task name is to remove the anxiety of taking photos of strangers. I believe this as in all of her projects dear bass drum communities which she is not from therefore she would not have a direct link to the subjects.

IV. Bibliography

(III. A). Retrieved from http://www.amyelkins.com/new

(I. A). Retrieved from www.jasonfulford.com

(I. A). Retrieved from https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/kwnqnx/an-interview-with-jason-fulford

(I. B). Retrieved from www.gregoryhalpern.com

(I. B). Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2016/oct/15/gregory-halpern-zzyzx-photography-book-california-los-angeles

Fulford, J., & Halpern, G. (2014.). The photographer's playbook. New York: Aperture.