Total Hours: 9
Perpich, Rebecca Bullen, 5 hours
Today at Perpich, Rebecca and I started with her darkroom photography class. They had just finished shooting a full roll of film, and we went over how to rewind the film in the camera, take it out, and remove the film from the roll container. Then we used a dummy roll of film to reel it into a plastic spool in the light, so they would be able to do it in the dark.
I got to give them humorous anecdotes about the first time I loaded the film into spools in a dark room, and how much more difficult it is than one would imagine. After Rebecca gave them a short demo on the loading, students partnered up and went into the loading room.
One of the students had already shot their film and loaded it, so Rebecca asked me to show them how to develop their film one-on-one. We went into the developing area and I explained the order of using the chemicals and what each one did. We set the timer and prepped our materials, and I showed them how to agitate the film. After the developer, stop bath, fix, and wash, they successfully developed their first roll of film.
I was very impressed, and it looked like all of the images were perfectly exposed! I wish my first roll of film would have went that well! I really enjoyed my time developing with them. We talked about photography, MCAD, and I shared my personal experience as a photographer.
After the darkroom class, we started the afternoon narrative class. Rebecca had assigned that the students read the screenplay to the Sundance film, Pariah, from 2011. They all broke into groups and analyzed a scene, and imagined what it would look like filmed. Since screenplays are widely interpretive and subject to change, we watched the entire film after to see how these scenes ended up playing out.
After watching the film, they met back with their groups to start planning their own screenplay.
Paul Sinkler, MCTC, 4 Hours
Today was an exciting day in class, because most of class was a hands on exercise and demonstration. Paul started class by giving a lecture on the different kinds of digital cameras, and the kinds of sensors they have, and a comparison of them all.
Digital cameras started off being digital backs that would be used in place of film backs for medium format cameras like Hasselblads. These still exist today, but part of Paul’s lecture, was that consumer digital cameras have advanced so much, that the cost of a digital back may not be worth it.
We compared four cameras side by side: the Hasselblad with a digital back, a Phase One medium format digital camera, a Nikon D810, and a Canon 5D Mark IV. The difference between these cameras being $15,000 price tags (the medium format digitals) versus around $3000 (the Nikon and Canons).
After the lecture, Paul and I set up a still life and a spot for a portrait with some strobes. Since I almost never use strobes in my photography practice, one of Paul’s students was kind enough to help me set it up! And although I had never used a medium format digital camera like the Phase One, I was able to figure it out pretty quickly!
We had the students photograph the setups with their own cameras, and Paul and I photographed with the four cameras mentioned. It was important for this test to be accurate, so each camera was shot with the exact same setting under the exact same conditions.
For the portrait, I was the model, so everybody got to photograph me from the same angle. The students and I all got to share a good laugh at my skills as a model, and it was truly a good time. Paul really creates a great teaching atmosphere that is both extremely informative and also a lot of fun.
After we finished, I help Paul tear down the equipment and we uploaded the images so that the students could use them next week to edit and compare the image quality.