Embracing The Lens

This blog describes my journey from completion of Fetac 5 Photography Course in 2014, through to exhibiting, with other class members, our work in various locations under the umbrella of our newly formed group " Féasta"

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Petal " On The Rocks "

This is my final submission,which is a cropped version of my previous photo included in the final 4.I also darkened the overall image somewhat to allow the ice to "float a little" The cropping eliminated the distracting bright area of the bed of seaweed, and some of the bland section of ice.Very happy with this outcome and ,as it is a somewhat " arty" piece, I intend to have it printed on a relatively  large canvas of 24" x 16". Our final  class is next Fri May 8th. What comes next??? Let`s see - but myself and my classmates are chomping at the bit to get a Fetac level 6 photography course run in Dingle to allow us to build on the considerable progress we have all made to this point."Fingers Crossed"!!

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THE FINAL FOUR - Which one to choose as my "ONE PHOTO" to submit as my course final project ?????? At the outset of this at pre visualisation stage,I had broadly decided that I would like to produce an image with either an ice formation,or water droplets or flowers, or any combination of same.With this in mind I placed a small flat container of water in my freezer,with 2 colourful leaves submerged in same.I wanted to see what would happen when the resultant ice block would begin to thaw,and observe the effect on the leaves and indeed to see what type of patterns would appear in the ice,especilaly if I "roughed it up" a little bit! Results were disappointing, nice enough - but certainly no "WOW" factor.I shifted my concentration to spraying water on leaves as seen above, and liked the results.All the time I had the camera in manual mode with a wide angled lens and a close up filter.

As an afterthought, and after the ice block had melted a bit further,I decided to experiment a bit more,using the ice, a snip of our "forest Flame" shrub (which I had only intended using as a backdrop to my original ice photo idea) and placed both of them on a bed of seaweed, inside in my polytunnel.It was a very bright sunny day but the thick plastic cover of the polytunnel gave me excellent lighting conditions,without the glare of direct sunlight.

I got quite excited when I saw the results and the possibilities in terms of colour, texture and knew almost immediately that I would use one of these afterthought photos as " THE ONE"

Will post this separately in the next few days with  some details of the (minimal) editing techniques I utilised.

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Allessandro Zocchi

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Don Komarechko

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Class Presentation - my chosen lens based artists -both photographers

I`m back at last!! .Since my last post I have given a class presentation on my chosen lens based artists,both photographers, which was video`d by a fellow classmate and which I will hand in on a usb stick at the end of the course. Following on from this our next and final project was to plan, execute and submit ONE photograph within my chosen theme i.e. Macro/Close Up which links visually with one or both of my chosen artists. On my next post I will upload 3 images which I have narrowed down from numerous shots taken, and hope they will give some pleasure to someone out there! I will also summarise my previsualisation thoughts for the shot + my  experience of  trying out different shots, before deciding on my final three. Chow for now!!

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Next class project- A Collection of Work:

We are required to research 2 digital and lens based media artists and give a 10 minute class presentation outlining their influences, style.and how they apply digital technology to their work practices.This presentation will be filmed in class Arising from this we will then have a further project: to submit 1 photograph that comes under the genre of these artists and shows their influence on same.I am now going to search the internet etc to try and come up with 2 artists(photographers,in my case)I have chosen the theme of "Macro/Close up" and in particular "water &/or Ice based images. I am posting 2 of my own attempts at macro photography from last year- a raindrop hanging from a flower & raindrops sitting on a broad leaf.

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SKELLIG CHRISTMAS CRAFT FAIR - DEC 2014

Fellow classmate Helen Matthews arranged for a stand at the above fair costing  40euro for the day $ of the class opted to participate and shared the manning of the table throughout the day There was a good buzz and throughput of people and sales achievedI was very happy to sell 5 of my images INCLUDING ONE TO A PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER, who herself had a stand at the fair (X cross on Mt Brandon, above) + a few local scenes ( Milltown Bridge & Beenbawn) see above photos-One thing that became very evident at the Farmer`s market and especially at the Skellig was that local identifiable scenes are more commercially viable,not so much the quality of the image

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LISTOWEL FOOD FAIR

Ann Sheehan travelled to Listowel andmet the Food Fair chairman Pearse Walsh, who was delighted to include our exhibition in their programme.Ann even succeeded in having it included in their printed programme as an event. A vacant shop premises was offered but could not be viewed until the morning of the 1st day of the festival, so we just had to run with that and hope for the best. A rota was arranged to cover the setting up on the Thurs and to cover the weekend. Myself, Ann & Bosco spent 3-4 hrs cleaning & organising the premises and then arranging & hanging the Posters. I covered the Friday morning which was very quiet, with Ann covering the afternoon.Reasonable response & public unterest over the weekend.Again, very worthwhile experience- We are learning all the time!!.

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MORE EXCITING NEWS: Máire advised us that we, as a group, had been invited to display a selection of Wild Atlantic Way/locally sourced food themed shots, around Dingle town during the annual Dingle Food & Wine Festival in October `14. Challenging but also very exciting!

19/9/2014Further to the invitation received by Máire Ní Léime from Dingle Food & Wine Festival to exhibit food photographs in shop windows around the town, todays class focussed on the preparation for same.To Do List:1.Agree location for own poster from list provided by Máire.2.Choose & bring prospective photos to class next week for group evaluation.3.Photos will be A2 poster size (594cm x 814cm)Having toyed around with several ideas around fruit, fish, eggs etc I visited both Mannings Eggs and Sheehys fish taking many photos with only 1 or 2 possibilities from each. I also took photos of a “smoked salmon and scrambled eggs “ plate with steam rising from it prior to it being served to a guest in our B&B. – strong possibility.Next I put together a plate of mixed fruit & berries and as an afterthought, decided to take a shot through the opening on the back of the dining room chair – another strong possibility.26/9/14 & 29/9/14We all showed our prospective photos in class and gave our opinions on each others photos and their suitability for the Food & Wine Festival. Taking the feedback on board, I decided to go with the fruit plate and Smoked salmon with scrambled eggs images.Had to convert Raw images to Tiff & Jpeg – resized & re tilted before creating a new file and uploading the finished photos to Dropbox for transmission to Killarney Printing Works for printing. Image titles: “Framed Fruit” & “Smokin’ Salmon”1/10/2014Siobhán invited us back to Bruic`s to see the finished printed product over a glass of wine/ cup of coffee.All delighted with the results and the very sociable get together.2/10/2014Myself, Margaret and Helen teamed up to hang our posters in their chosen locations.We hung mine first in Foxy John`s side window on Green St, which worked out quite well, as there were already hooks on the wall over the window, which we were able to use.I was unable to help Margaret due to time constraints, but did assist Helen to hang one of hers in Justin the barbers window.( See photo collage in journal)3/10/14 – 5/10/14 –Festival Time!!Managed to see  most of the posters hanging around the town on the Saturday and thought they all looked very well.Debrief Meeting arranged for Monday 6/10/14, but I was away on hols so could not attend.One of the decisions taken at  that meeting was to approach Listowel Food Fair offering to exhibit our work there.Ann Sheehan agreed to contact them and revert.See debrief notes in journal 

Above some photos of me hanging my images with the aid of fellow classmates Helen Matthews and Margret Shea

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In April,class member Máire Ní Léime arranged the community stall at the local weeklyFarmer`s Market to offer our photos for sale. Those of us that were interestedhad a brief meeting and agreed pricing & sizing guidelines etc and drew upa rota to man the stall on the day.

Then the fun started as we had no idea how to go about printing, mounting etc at a reasonable cost!!

Local artist Cate Sweeney put me in touch with Strand Framing, Clonakilty, where I sourced “slip in”  mounts with plastic sleeves at a very reasonable price. I had printed several A4 size prints at home until my photo printer came to the end of its life, so I printed some more in Harvey Norman`s in Tralee.I was very satisfied with the print quality of both batches and ended up with 24 good quality prints to offer for sale @ €15 each v a cost of €7 each approx

Market Day: Máire arranged to set up the stall in early morning and I assisted in the dismantling and storing of same.There was a reasonable level of interest in the stall and there were 6 sales.(Delighted that 2 were mine).

It was envisaged that we would have this stall available to us approx. every 4 weeks or so through the summer months, which I found very exciting, to be able to display our work and maybe even sell some as well!

We attended the market on 4 more occasions with varying degrees of sales success.The above collage is a selection of my photos that sold.

Though overall sales across the group were a little disappointing, it was nevertheless a very worthwhile experience, from the planning and operation of the stall to the very fact of exposing our work to public scrutiny. We need not have worried!! The feedback across the board was very positive and encouraging.

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Local exhibition visits in Dingle during Féile na Bealtaine

We subsequently visited various non photographic exhibitions locally as part of Feile na Bealtaine:  Una ní Shé, Lisbeth Mulcahy, Kate Buckley, etc. See journal for details. These visits gave us a good insight into the different “hanging” styles etc & best use of limited space also.Opened my mind somewhat to the possibility of exhibiting my images unframed e.g. on canvas etc.

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Richard Mosse part 2 - Film installation

This was overwhelming in its graphic nature and all encompassing screens showing the film clips in sequence but at different stages on each screen and even having the same clips opposite each other from the reverse angle.Very taken with all aspects of this and the  strong impression left on the viewer.Richard Mosse is a true artist who succeeds in making a very strong statement with his work

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Seo grianghrafanna a bhaineann le taispeántas Richard Moss. Bhí an taispeantás le Richard ana éifeachtach

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These are the photos referred to in my previous post and illustrate the ponys I made there

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[embracingthelens]

Welcome,

This,my first ever blog, isan account of my exciting entry into, and continueing journey through, the field of Digital Photography.It all started soon after I retired in Nov 2012 when I was delighted to be offered a  place in a Fetac 5 level Digital photography course in Dingle Co Kerry Ireland,based in the old CBS Monastery, one morning per week for a full school term.I was thrilled to achieve the highest grade available, along with ALL my fellow classmates, -DISTINCTION -.

This led to a follow on course, which commenced in Feb 2014, incorporating Visual Arts Practise & Digital Media Technology combined, a major part of which is to create and maintain this blog.

Our first few classes involved brainstorming sessions around preparing for an exhibition - "Pre production, Production & Post production"  before then embarking on a few visits to various exhibitions to get a feel for how different artists display hang their work, which was very informative and interesting.

Our first visit was to the EVA exhibition in Limerick, as part of the "City of Culture 2014. 

Our first stop was Limerick City Gallery of Art which had a wide and varied selection of audio, visual and photographic exhibitions and a few "eye catching" displays, notably the convex mirror in the entrance hall(see photos above)

Exhibition 1: Luis Jacob - Album X11 (Peruvian born -Canadian resident)

Images presented in plastic laminate panels displayed sequentially,much like a family photo album, with up to 3 images per laminate, one underneath the other.While interesting to see this style it would not be "My cup of tea" Thought it looked a bit amateurish/thrown together, though I know this was most likely deliberate.I`m sure it must have real artistic value as otherwise it would not be here, though personally I cannot see it.Too traditional in my outlook perhaps?

Exhibition 2: Uriel Orlow - Unmade Film -London based

Multi Media installation incorporating Audio,video,photos,drawing,print

I really liked this with its variety of media " an expansive collection of audio-visual works that point to the structure of a film but never fully become one"I was particularly taken with the mental hospital register and the entries for the insight they provided.

Exhibition 3: Richard Mosse- The Enclave -Culmination of a 3 year exploration of the conflicted landscape of Democratic Republic of Congo in film & photographs.To quote the Curator: Employing a psychedlic palette, he poses disturbing questions, one of which is,what does it mean to make human suffering beautiful?

Part 1- 6a Rutland St - Photos

Striking display because of the sheer size of the images and the use of infra red resulting in all the greenery becoming a bright pink. Next post is photos of this reblogged from classmate Máire ní Léime