I'm feeling a little weird . . .(nothing new, I know) Now that APEL is out of the way and I'm starting with level 2 photography, and I have all my learning material and prescribed reading material for PWDP, I've installed photoshop (for the most part - Do Not go there - It was a mission and a half to get it done properly) I really should be getting on with PWDP. I've looked at the work, sent my tutor another email asking about a few things I wanted to check. So it's not as if I'm not doing anything constructive about the course. And yes, I am still really excited about it and I want it. I really do.

But . . . something's holding me back. And I've realise in the past that I need to trust that feeling. Intuition is really important to me. And in this case, even though I might be an excellent procrastinator at times, I have to admit that life has been exceptionally hectic lately. So yes, time is an issue as well. But that's not it.

I think, with actually finishing an entire course, and preparing it for assessment, getting graded and feedback, and having that entire process done and dusted, comes a certain amount of closure. It's Done. You're finished. You can put it aside and focus on the new course at hand. I don't have that with TAOP. I feel differently about P&P. Even though I started P&P 5 months after TAOP. I completed all the exercises and assignments for it. Didn't send all assignments to my tutor, as APEL happened. But I had gone about working on the assignments and their outcomes, and I produced images that I am satisfied with. With TAOP, I just don't feel that yet. It's not anything specific about the course that concerns me. I have enough knowledge and skills and I've done enough work around all the TAOP exercises and assignments to feel that I am competent in it. I wouldn't have applied for APEL if I didn't feel that way.

But still, something's holding me back from just putting that course away, even if it's on emotional level. I know our learning material is there to guide as through our entire learning experience. It's not as if I'm not going to be using level one course material ever again. Surely I will be going back to certain sections at times, when I want to read up on it etc.

After much deliberation, I've decided that I need to do something to feel that I'm Done with TAOP. I think there's a part of me that is concerned with missing out on things that I perhaps haven't done. I don't know. . . It's just a crappy feeling at the moment. And I don't want to officially start with PWDP with that kind of mindset.

So, this weekend, I shall be doing three things to work towards clarity, and make a start on PWDP. Firstly, I want to read through some of the TAOP course work again, to see if there are any sections that I'd like to work on as side projects. Secondly, I'd also like to do some more work with different sources of light, as I didn't officially complete assignment four. I'm not planning on actually completing that assignment, or on doing all the work on that this weekend. But I want to start exploring ideas of what I can do, to work on it. And thirdly, I want to start reading through the reading lists for PWDP.

And if I get to Sunday and this hasn't worked for me on emotional level, there's always the possibility of making a huge bonfire and destroying something like . . . . I dunno . . . something . . . and dancing around it in the Wiccan way and going completely crazy.

Let's hope it doesn't come to that!

I was sorting through my TAOP course notes and tutor reports today, to make space for PWDP, now that I've received APEL for TAOP and the other courses. I decided to make a few notes based on the feedback that I received from my TAOP tutor, as I haven't exactly had time to incorporate that into my work. These are personal notes, so I don't expect them to make sense to anyone but me.

• Work on more possibly diffused background where you want to focus solely on one particular item - increase aperture, and use tripod.
• Again: Fused backgrounds to bring out object more - try to avoid confusing or cluttered backgrounds
  
• 100mm macro lens: In macro mode experiment with apertures and a tripod to gain total focus.

So, when I get the same (or similar) feedback for three different assignments, I wonder why I didn't do something about it at the time? Actually I did kind of . . . , but not with every single picture - hence the feedback. But in hindsight, I see the pattern now. Guess I shall be playing with tripod and macro lens and apertures soon!

I've been reading up and researching the "composition" of photography. In my course material, it mentions that other artists start with a blank canvas, and then, with each brush stroke, they add detail, to compose their picture. With photography, as soon as you look through the viewfinder, there is already an image present. It's about deciding what is worth taking a picture of, and how to frame it.

From my course material: " if the process of making photographs hinges on choosing a potential image from the viewfinder, then the most important skill to learn is how the various parts of an image inside the frame fit together, in other words, "composition.

Because I didn't include people in my initial attempt for project 8, I decided to redo this project. The event was an Easter Egg hunt on the beach for children in my family. We were to use the camera as a viewer and keep it to our eye and check out possible pictures in that way. Normally we would wait to have the best viewpoint to take the picture, but we were to take pictures as we went along and keep that as a record of how we moved around and found good shots.

During this event, I took almost 50 images, and I am showing what I consider the best. During  the shooting  of each image, there was a reason why I moved onto the next one.

During this assignment, I found that it is not necessarily a "final" image that I find the most attractive in terms of it being the last shot and thus a "final moment". If I look at all the images I took, there is at least one from each sequence of events (involving a specific child or a specific action) that I like most, which is what I am posting here.

With the subject matter for this assignment being “Your neighbourhood” I chose the theme of “Sanctuary” within that context. Looking up the word in a dictionary, I found the following:

sanc•tu•ar•y

• A sacred place, such as a church, temple, or mosque.
• The holiest part of a sacred place, as the part of a Christian church around the altar.
• A sacred place, such as a church, in which fugitives formerly were immune to arrest.
• Immunity to arrest afforded by a sanctuary.
• A place of refuge or asylum.
• A reserved area in which birds and other animals, especially wild animals, are protected from hunting
  

I thought about all the meanings of the word, and tried to incorporate as many of those into my theme, not always literally, but in symbolism, within the context of how the different possible meanings relate to me, and my neighbourhood personally. I thought of places which balance me, which grounds me, where I go – Seeking Sanctuary.

This led me to think about different areas and places near to where I stay, that I often turn to, when I need sanctuary. We have Stanborough lake/ park which is an area I often visit with my camera. It is not only a beautiful part of nature; it also has wildlife such as squirrels, foxes, swans, geese, and many other birds. I even once spotted a King fisher. Often I visit the local parks with my daughter. I like to people- watch, and she likes to play, so it works out for both of us.  Another of my favourite places to visit are churches. Places of worship fascinate me for many reasons. Architecturally, spiritually, aesthetically, and just for the fact that one can find silence and tranquility within those walls.

For 8 weeks, my plan was to visit one of the above-mentioned places per week, with the idea of creating at least one image each time, to fit my theme. I contemplated the idea of “personal sanctuary” – or, what sanctuary means to me as an individual. I realised that in many ways, this assignment was almost the opposite of what I had just done with Assignment 2: Colour. In the Colour assignment, I choose bright, bold colours. Within this assignment, to suite my theme, I went with muted colours, dappled, and diffused light, and often shadow. I feel the colour choices I made, together with light choices, and design choices for the images, all contribute well to the theme of Sanctuary. There is tranquility, not only visually, but emotionally as well – gentleness, no extreme angles or colour choices.

I chose images that would be different in subject matter, and show a wide range of the skills I have acquired. I also chose images that compliment each other, even though they are individualistic, and can easily stand on their own.

To me, the most interesting part of “Sanctuary” is that it is absolutely unique to each individual. Many people find that a church is a place where they can reflect, think, escape or release the emotional burdens they carry. To other people, they may feel more uncomfortable or alienated there than anywhere else they'd ever been. With this collection of images, I feel there is definitely a sense of that uniqueness, because they are images that relate to me personally within the context of Sanctuary.