Art classes in Ennis, Co Clare at Ennis Art School

Digital Photography

Cria - Digital Photography Block

Photography for me is a very important tool in all aspects of design.  I use the camera continuously and I therefore believe that it is important for all students to understand photography sooner rather than later.  I team the students up into production units one would be the photographer another the set designer and the third the model, this team would than alternate, allowing each student to experiment in all aspects of the production.  I have included two photographs here, the students are nine years of age and they had complete control of what images they shot, for this project the students had to use themselves as the models but they had to experiment with different facial expressions.  What I like about this photograph personally, is how it fits in the frame and that it is slightly out of focus  the light and she is not looking into the camera.  This is shot by 9 year old girls.

Chloe & Jam Jar

As part of this photographic project the students had to find different props that would aid in making a good photograph.  For this particular shot the used the dog, what I like about this shot is the composition of the two faces, Chloe is looking directly into the camera while the dog is looking up into the air.

Teaching Plans for Digital Photography with children:

Experiment, show how to vary subject and background matter, shooting from different perspectives, up high, down low, getting in close, stepping back for a wider angle shot, moving around your subject to shoot from different sides, experimenting with different settings (teaching them about different exposure modes).

How to get the backgrounds right and props.

Cria photography

Holding the camera straight and elimination of camera shake.

Getting in close to the subject annd using the zoom lens but not forgetting to teach them how to use their legs to move closer can achieve the same results.

Getting the balance right between photographing people, things and places.

Rule of Thirds.

Finding a point of interest, interesting photographs have interesting things in them, they need a visual point of interest.  This photograph on the left, which was taken by a nine year old, using another nine year old as the subject matter and choosing their own props and backgrounds.  What can I say is it beginners luck?

“Billy Jean” by Rachel and CriaAnimation

Billy Jean, animation by Rachel and Cria

Each term is dedicated to a specific art form, this particular term was animation and digital photography.  I find this a particular useful way to teach students how to create storyboards, specifically for this project we used soundtracks which the students had an affiliation with, i.e. Michael Jackson, etc.  So basicially all they had to do was to draw the story and then to arrange into an animation story.  Each of the students created their own animation,  all of these animations will be loaded up in the next few weeks.

Subjects include:

Graphic Design using Photoshop and Illustrator

Digital Video Production using Dreamweaver, Edit D.V.

Web Design using Dreamweaver, Fireworks, WordPress.