1.Write a brief summary of your project.

 

2.Identify areas that you will document photographically during the agroecology landscape pilot project.

 

3.Take a series of photographs that illustrate one aspect of your project that tells the story .

 

Introduction by Stephanie Aubin introducing course participants and facilitators.

 

Photography comes from the Greek words phōtos meaning light and graphé meaning paint or draw. Hence photography means - “painting with light.”

 

Your camera is a tool, much like a pencil or paint brush, which you use to create a picture. As with any skill you need to practice and know your tools. In this section we start by getting to know our phone camera and think about how we will take our photograph.

 

As a starting point, remember that the more you practice the better you get. So, take your camera with you everywhere, play and experiment with it. The more you use it the more it will become an extension of you, and the way you see the world around you. Even if you don't have the camera with you look at the world as possible images and think how you would record them.

 

Camera care.

 

-      Make sure your smart phone is charged.

-      Clean the camera lens.

-      Advisable to have a cover for the camera to give the lens some protection.

 
Taking a photograph

 

-      Hold your camera steady

-      Avoid shaking as you take the photograph.

-      Keep the camera level to the horizon.

-      Avoid using the camera zoom. (This will lead to loss of image quality) Move yourself closer or further from the subject.

-      Focus, use the touch screen to focus on the subject you want  to photograph.

 

Looking at photographs from Chief Mapata’s homestead illustrating how photographs can tell different stories.

 

We briefly discussed before and after photographs, this will be covered later in the course.

 

We took a short break and participants were given an assignment to show their immediate surroundings.

 

After the break participants submitted their images via WhatsApp and each participants discussed their photographs and received feedback from the facilitators.

 

We discussed having a series of images that tell a storey and zooming by further or closer from the subject.

 

In conclusion it was emphasised that in order to get good photographs the photographer has to take lots of photographs by exploring different angles, perspectives, lighting conditions and taking photographs from high angles and low angles focusing on making the subject being photographed in the best way.