Photo lab Saturday

I decided today was as good a day as any to catch up on my B/W photo stuff.  Thankfully my replacement film arrived yesterday in the mail.  I successfully turned my bathroom into a dark room so that I could load the film without ruining it this time.  Hooray!  After that I went out and shot at Cox Arboretum in Miamisburg.  Wonderful venue, beautiful scenery.  I was not the only one who thought so.  There had to have been about 20 people getting pictures taken, let alone taking pictures.  There were senior photos going on, family portraits, engagement pictures and anything else you could think of.  For about 10 minutes I tried to make sure that I was keeping my set up out of their shots, but then I realized that was impossible.  With that kind of venue comes the inherit risk of other people being in your shots, so I ignored the people and got my shots.

Came back to the lab to develop which was actually quite nice.  No one else was here, I had the lab all to myself.  It was nice and quiet and dark and soothing.  Developing 4x5 film in complete darkness is fairly meditative and I have to admit it was  refreshing.  I'm not sure how but it appears that all my film is a bit overexposed.  I find this odd because I always underexpose my film because its ISO 125 and my light meter is reading things at ISO100.  I know, a lot of photo shop talk, but for those of you who understand film speed you'll be right there with me.  I'll have to talk to my professor to see what I'm doing wrong.  I even tried to counteract the over exposure by under developing as much film as I could.  Didn't really make a difference.  We'll see.

And unfortunately just as I was finishing my last round of negatives people started showing up at the lab.  Thankfully I was finished with the dark dark room and only need the printing dark room, but my reverie has been broken.  It was peaceful and quiet and serene...and now my serenity is gone.  I'm going to try to make my contact sheets as fast as possible and then get the hell out.  I'm not angry yet, but I am already starting to get annoyed.  I hate being that hermit, but when the other people in the lab don't leave me alone and act as if their problems are my fault...yeah, I'm gonna get irritated.  I'm discovering that in the photo lab, too.  People just can't let you do anything in peace.  They always have to comment on something.  Even if its just telling you what you're doing.  That happened to me last week.  I was developing FB paper which is much more sensitive to developer than RC.  I'm watching the time so I know when to pull it out of the chemicals and not over develop.  As I'm doing this a complete stranger leans over my station and asks me "fiber or RC?"  I didn't want to be rude so I said "fiber".  She then replies with "make sure you don't leave it in that developer too long.  Fiber paper is prone to overdeveloping".  I responded with "yeah, I know, its got another minute left".  And then she kept talking about the dangers of overdeveloping and how I needed to avoid it.  What about me staring at a clock and quietly developing paper makes you think that I have no clue what I'm doing?!  I think that was rude.  She didn't stop there.  She followed me around the dark room for an hour telling me thins I was already doing and fixing.  It got to the point were I just had to leave and come back later.  Its ridiculous.  And lame.  People are ridiculous and lame.

I think I'll finish shooting my next assignment tomorrow so that I can develop next week.  Its a zone assignment so I don't really want to develop without consulting my professor first.  We are manipulating the amount of light we let into the camera in regards to the light meter and also the length of developing to get the best quality negative.  Lots of math and adjustments, I'd really hate to do it wrong.  Let's pray this awesome weather holds out just one more day!

Art History Midterm

If you haven't figured it out, I tend to complain.  It burdens me, and venting helps me cope in a more healthy way.  At least that's how I feel, but then again I'm not the one being vented to, so I really don't know.

I have an art history midterm this afternoon.  Its actually in about 3 hours.  This final lasts 2 hours and contains roughly 10 slides of major artwork to identify, compare/contrast, whatever.  I just finished making myself a study guide.  The guide itself was 13 pages.  While this does contain the artwork involved, thats still roughly 40 works to learn.  That means the title of the piece, the artist, the medium used, the date it was produced and the movement it belongs to.  Please tell me why she narrowed our study selection down to 40 when all she's going to quiz us on is 10?  I have other classes.  I hope to have a life (clearly don't have one now, I have been studying).  I have friends and a boyfriend and 2 different jobs as well as all my other homework and heaven forbid a little free time.  This is a midterm.  Its not even the final!  I'd kind of understand for the final.  But here's the kicker: for the actual final in her classes she tells you exactly which pieces she's going to test you on.  Learn all of them and you'll be quizzed on all of them.  How is it that the final is easier and more straight forward than the midterm?  It just doesn't make sense to me.

That being said, I need to go back to studying because I have 5 different art movements to memorize and keep straight.  BTW, memorizing dates does not sit well with my brain structure.  I personally feel that if the movement lasts a certain time frame and doesn't deviate from that time frame, and I can identify the movement but not the date...shouldn't that still be peachy keen?  I get the whole "this work influenced this work within the movement because it came first" thing.  Doesn't mean I'm great at remembering it for a test.

Lame.

Mid terms

I'm gonna keep this fairly short, but I felt as though I should update.  Its officially week 5...half way done actually.  I have taken 1.5 midterms.  One of them has a take home portion so I can't really call that one done yet.  I have another 2 tomorrow.  And for the first time since BMZ all those ages ago at Miami I have a real live practical midterm.  I'm pretty excited about it.  For digital photo my prof is having us go take pictures during the exam, come back and edit them as the grade.  I think its a great idea and I'm pumped.  The other is art history.  I think my first one went pretty well, and that was a 400 level class while this one is only a 200, but its still an exam so we'll see.  I have a paper due Friday as well, technically 2 with a presentation attatched to the first one.  Now you will understand why I haven't really posted.  All that on top of shooting assignments and starting 2 new jobs has put a little bit of strain on my time.  Cuts had to be made and sorry, this blog is low man on the totem pole.  Things should ease up next week, hopefully.

On the plus side of things I got a decent sized scholarship for next year which will defnitely help my loan situation.  Yay!  I got accepted into the Pari/London trip, though I'm still waiting to hear about the scholarship.  They hope to announce Friday, keep the prayers coming.  I think I actually did really well on my portraiture assignment for digital, yay again.  That will boost things a bit after the first assignment of B.  I'm pretty sure I'm gonna resubmit it for a better grade.  Just not until things calm down.  May.  Things will be calm in May, I'm sure.

I'm getting slightly behind in my B/W class which is disheartening as it is my favorite.  I ruined roughly $30 worth of film and need to buy more.  I also need to start preparing for my final assignment which means paper, film, etc.  The new job should help a bit.  If you know someone who needs a tutor at Wright State, highly encourage them to go lol.  I need more appointments (primarily math, if you'd believe that from an art major). 

So I have a busy weekend of shooting and developing to get caught up after I grab some more film, hopefully cheap.  Thank God I had left over RC paper from photo 1 and didn't have to buy more.  That will help a lot.  I am going to need more fiber though.  Big printing assignment due the 11th.  She is providing a good chunk of paper though, so thats nice.

And I failed at short, but I think I hit all the major bullet points. 

Case of the Tuesdays

Holy crap, its week 4.  When the quarter is only 10 weeks long things tend to sneak up on you.  Like how next week is mid-terms.  I haven't even begun to study (big big problem) on top of my projects to do.  Granted, I have a very meticulous schedule, so I'm not actually behind.  I just keep waking up in the middle of the night thinking I have forgotten to do something.  I stop hanging out with friends because I'm convinced that there was something huge and epic I had to do so I don't have time for fun.  I'm stressed to the max, I haven't had an appetite in nearly a week (food isn't fun when its forced, just fyi), and I feel as though my newly adorable haircut is going to turn prematurely grey.  And not that cool artistic streaks of white, but that heinous nasty homeless guy drab grey color.  White I could handle.  Not necessarily with the world's best grace, but I could definitely handle it.

Oh well.  I just have to keep reminding myself that I'm not behind, I am organized, I haven't missed any classes or readings so I do actually know my material.  I have no tests for over a week still.  I have the whole weekend to study.  And its Holy week!  God is with me.  Deep breath.

On a happier note I am incredibly ahead on my portraiture assignment for digital photo.  I took nearly 200 pictures at my friend's rehearsal.  So thank you to Gateway Percussion for letting me invade your finals day rehearsal.  You all looked amazing and I couldn't have asked for better shots.  I have the lovely task of editing them, but it doesn't even feel like work.  They were such great performers that I keep getting wrapped up in every little facial expression made.  Absolutely fantastic.  I must have spent an hour and a half the other day just looking at them.  I'm hoping to get them copies to put on their facebook page or website.  Look them up, I know they'd love the company.  My only regret is that I didn't get any shots in uniform.  Oh well, they didn't need them.  Seriously, AMAZING performers.  Great job guys!

But I did get fairly involved with taking pictures of other people and forgot that I need pictures of myself.  I need to get on that pretty soon.  I only need 4, and I don't plan on taking flattering pictures.  Let's face it, we're only truly flattering a very small fraction of the time.  God made me the way I am when I wake up in the morning, or when I tanked a quiz, or when I pulled an all nighter writing an essay.  Those are the shots I want.  Since they're of me I'll probably be able to post those on here.  And I know I haven't posted a lot of pics, but the files are large and it takes awhile to organize that kind of post.  I tend to write these posts in my spare time between (sometimes during class breaks) classes.  That means random school computers and no time.  So maybe this summer I'll be more diligent.  Or start a flickr page or something.  We'll see.

Also, keep the prayers going, I just had my interview for the Paris/London trip this winter.  I left my portfolio for a scholarship possibility.  fingers crossed!

And back to studying for my many mid-terms next week. 

End of Week 3

Negative Nancy got tired and went back to sleep, sorry for the pessimism.  This week wasn't that bad.  Humbling, yes, but not bad.  I didn't do as well as I'd hoped on my first digital photo critique.  I haven't gotten a grade back yet, so I also don't know how poorly I did.  He also seems like a professor who isn't very fond of positive feedback, so maybe I didn't tank it too badly.  I fulfilled the requirements except for one (I definitely misunderstood what he was looking for).  We'll have to see.

I developed my film for my first 4x5 shooting assignment.  I think they turned out pretty good.  Two of them were slightly overexposed, but I had troubles with my light meter.  It doesn't have a setting for 125 speed film, which I'm shooting at.  So there's an element of guestimating going on that didn't work in my favor every time.  Oh well.  We are now printing a technical comparison between RC and FB paper.  I've never printed on fiber based paper before so I'm kind of excited.  My RC print turned out pretty good.  If it wasn't for simple comparison I'd have to do a lot more adjustments with burning and dodging, but seeing how that isn't the purpose of the assignment I'm not going to waste expensive paper yet.  I'll save that for later in the quarter.

My history classes are going well.  Other than me being really busy this past week, things have gone decent.  I can't complain.  I am still waiting to hear back about my financial aid package to see if I can afford to take summer classes.  There are 2 studio classes I could get out of the way that would tremendously help my efforts to graduate sooner and not die of an aneurysm at the same time.  I'm also submitting my application and deposit for the 2 week study abroad program for this December today (would have already had it turned in except the office was unexpectedly closed until my class starts, poo) so that's one other thing to get going.  I have half of my fees saved already.  I need the other half by October, and any spending money for souvenirs and trips (or festive beverages) by the time I leave in December.  That means my torrent of prayers began yesterday when I officially made the final decision to do this (the deposit is non refundable).  I'll keep you posted on developments to that end.

This weekend I'll be working on my portraiture assignment for digital class, probably spending a lot of time at the WGI finals lot.  Its the best place I know to take pictures of people in their natural environment.  Percussionists at WGI finals.  Its like indoor band Mecca, we all flock to it once a year without fail.  Now I live down the street from it, so there's not even guilt in going.  I'm pretty excited about that.  I also need to come back to the photo lab over the weekend to develop my contact sheets because I cleaned out my car and forgot my negatives when I drove to class today, like a dope.  Like I said, this week has been humbling in very small but effective ways.

So here's to a better more productive weekend!

Weather

Ok, kids.  First lesson in doing big kid assignments starts with making sure you have a reliable source.  We all learned this in probably 3rd grade, roughly, give or take a few grades.  Writing a paper?  Don't use the National Enquirer for your source.  Its also ill advised to research something like the Lock Ness monster or Bigfoot because there's not a lot of verifiable evidence for these topics.  As a science major I was drilled over and over again about sources.  Not only citing them so that someone else can say that you're a viable source, but meticulously checking and double checking and cross referencing information to make sure its credible.  If one person says it, its a story.  If 5 people say it, its worth looking into.  If 100 people say it, you can probably take it to the bank.  Even new scientific discoveries aren't believed for decades simply because there was no one else to say "I conquer!".

So why the big monologue?  Because I broke the cardinal rule of checking my sources.  I had planned on going out Saturday and Sunday this weekend to shoot for both my photo classes.  I actually have a weekend off, first one in almost 7 months.  I checked the weather and it said it was supposed to be partly cloudy and warm.  Yay! 

Wrong.  My source was not credible.  I did not verify my findings with 3 other weather forecast websites.  I didn't check the news.  I used one source.  The same source that after I was out trying to get some shots, waiting for the clouds to pass that suddenly opened up and poured on me and my equipment, wishing I wasn't back back in the woods on a nature trail when the thunder and lightning happened...yes, that source then changed from partly cloudy to thunderstorms.  And when I got home and checked again, it shows ugly nasty lighting rain for the next 3 days. 

Moral of the story?  Check your source.  Its never a bad idea and can save you a lot of heartache in the long run.  Pray for some bright weather, though?  I still need shots with variable light, not just all overcast and rainy.

Expenditures

I am realizing a new cost in the wonderful world of photography.  Besides all the film, the paper, the negative carriers, the matting, the everything that makes my budget a living hell I now understand that even pixels aren't that cheap.  I have to shoot 100 shots of roughly 15 different color situations.  This means that I will be unable to accomplish my homework assignment in my apartment or on campus.  Not a big deal, right?  I love going out and photographing nature and cityscapes and such.  What I never fully took into account is the amount of gas that I have to use to drive to all of these wonderful places to shoot my homework assignments.  Especially for my B/W class.  I may only have to take 6 pictures, but they still have to be good pictures.  I'm not going to waste film on pictures of my laundry basket or my parking lot.  That means going somewhere.  And when you live in the city or suburbia, that usually means driving to that location, probably 20 minutes or so.  Gas prices are going to kill my education simply because I can't afford to drive someplace to shoot!  Its just not something you plan for until it slaps you in the face.  I don't know, maybe I'm just naive.  Guess its time to start looking for another job.  I'll sleep when I'm dead, right?