Class Exercise B -- Surrealism

"Surrealism style uses visual imagery from the subconscious mind to create art without the intention of logical comprehensibility.” – I believe this is a good explanation of surrealism.

Here's some good images I think qualify surrealism.









We did a class exercise during lecture.

Here’s our group’s work: Definition of Surrealism: A photo that brings out the thoughts of a subconscious mind in an irrational manner.




We created something we want to present as surrealism. We put a lion’s mouth on a green apple.

We make the apple biting a human’s arm. Here’s a explanation why we got this idea and concept:

Genetic modification of food or plants and use of pesticides for the cultivation of food has altered them so much so that it might come back to haunt us. We eat apples because it is presumed to be healthy but now with genetic modification and use of pesticides, it may harm our health.

Assignment 3--Focal Length & Sensor Latitude

1. Perspective

This is my perspective shot. I wasn’t sure what kind of view counts perspective. I thought there should be a lot of space in an impressive angle of view. Turns out I did fine with the perspective. The teacher likes my angle which is a looking-up view. Not like normal eye-level angle.

2. Close-up

I saw few ants climb around a white cute flower. I took some photos. I crop it up to the ant but turns out the quality drops too much. I thought the ant is so tine, so it should counts close-up. Anyway, it doesn’t … so I need to change the subject…

3. Zoom Shot

This is the most amazing tech I ever learnt so far! I was walking by this very pretty white church. The zoom shot effects out of the cross should be amazing!

I also love this one, but I might want use this as high key, but not sure it is qualified…

I was moving the camera around on purpose while take the zoom shot beside the street. I love this one very much. But one of my friends said it’s just messy lines… so I wasn’t sure about this…

4. High Key

High key suppose to have a neat white background with few highlights in foreground. It’s a cloudy day while I took the photo. So the background (the sky) is quite neat white. And the church is white too! So I thought it’s the perfect subject for my high key photo.

While I was taking photos around the church, there’s a couple taking their wedding photos outside there. The bride wearing a very pretty white wedding dress, so I thought with the white church background, if I push the expose a bit, it’s a good high key that not a lot of students would have the chance to take.

5. Low Key

I thought this is a great low key. With the lights shape in a curve, it’s a great photo! I don’t know why others saying it’s messy… but I think I get it, there are some trees between all the lights, so there’s lines cutting some of the light ball in half…

So here’s some backups ….

Assignment 2-- Aperture & Shutter

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are the very first four photos I have been taken with knowing what I was doing. After learning about aperture, shutter speed and ISO etc… I was shocked to find out how great photos cameras can take without editing in PS!


The Motion Blur was taken by accident. I was gonna shooting the MRT train. But the lady was walking around. Because the train would be gone soon, so I lost my patient, just shooting a lot of it. Then few of them got the lady in it. Surprisingly, it looks better than the ones with her. So I picked this one. But after tutorial, the teacher said I need someone there, but the position is not right…

Here’s one I took with someone at the right side which I hope would be a good one! I like the person I got in the photo wasn’t purposely posing there. It’s real life!

Freeze Action, I wasn’t really like to shooting a friend jumping, coz I was afraid there would be too many students shooting the same type of photos. (turns out I was right) However, I did catch a good moment of my friend jumping, and it is taking in a tree house which looks like a cage. So I was trying to say he wants to escape! Anyway, the teacher said I need a neat background. So another need to retake....

Shallow-Depth-of-Field, these one is a retake one already, instead the one I shown during tutorial. The one I shown in tutorial is a flower. It’s not really an interesting subject to shoot at. So when I was out shooting for another assignment I took this one.

Deep-Depth-of-Field, I was also using the same flower one during the tutorial, coz I didn’t know we could use different one for both shallow one and deep one. Plus, I thought by using the same one, the difference should be more clear! Anyway, I always like this kind of chairs and desks, especially beside beach!

Assignment 1-- Objects as Subjects

I start this photography module with knowing nothing about DSLR, and any other professional knowledge. Do this first assignment is the first time I touched a SLR and took photos without doing anything professionally.

To quote from the lecturer, “Photography can serve simply as a visual book – a straight forward record of events, people, and places. It can also treat the subject itself as a mean to an end – a source of colors, shapes, and forms (visual qualities) from which an image can be created.” So the objective for this very first assignment is to apply visual elements on ordinary objects.

I have been really enjoying editing images in Photoshop, so to learn how to archive certain effects using camera is very exciting for me.
We required taking totally five photos with following visual qualities:

1. Line

This is a tree house near the place I used to live in. I was dreaming of a tree house since I watched some American drama and saw kids have a tree house when I was very young. Anyway, I thought this could be a good form of lines. I took a lot of photos of the tree house in different angles. I thought the ones with some blue sky background would be prettier. However, according to the assignment request, the lines should be the dominant element. So, eventually I choose this one.

2. Shape

I heard the teacher said shadow could be a great element of shapes. So I was walking around and taking photos of all kinds of shadow. All of the sudden, around 6pm, I looked out my window; I saw the perfect shadow of balconies of one building on another. However, the feedback I got wasn’t as great as I thought; people said I should shoot the neat shadow. But it’s only gonna appear on sunny days, around 6 to 7pm… good luck to me…..

3. Pattern

I don’t know why I choose this one for Pattern. My friend thinks it’s interesting. However, it’s not pattern --- the feedback I got…. Actually I get some other photos for pattern. I just couldn’t decide which one to choose…

4. Form

Form-this is the hardest one in this assignment. Form should be less color, 3D, single light source… I really don’t know what to take for form. So I took the hands of a friend. I didn’t realize we don’t allow any manipulation on the photos, not even make it black and white, so I was not allowed to use this one… other than that, this one is too flat to be a form….

5. Texture

Texture, sounds like an easy one, but after the tutorial, I found out a lot of people found very interesting subjects… I would think about something much more interesting to shoot at!

Class EX A _Overall Winner 2008 !

The overall winner in 2008 of Digital Photographer of The Year ！

Name: Fun Bathing

By: Tan Choon Wee (Singapore)

The winning strategies are the good dark waterfall background, the perfect contrasts between the background and the subjects, and the wonderful captures of the movement of the children and the water.

If I was one of the judges, I would also select this one as an overall winner. The reason is simply I like photos gives people feelings of nostalgia. This photo brings the happiest childhood memories back to me. Remained people how simple things can make you happy. This kind of image we barely get to see these days. Not to mention the simple way to give kids fun, most places all over the world don’t have such clean rivers or lakes any more.

I recently watched a Japanese film called Always Sunset on Third Street, published in 2005. It was so successful, so the director shot the sequel and published in 2008. I would like to recommend these two movies because of the nostalgia of these films. It takes place in a small community in postwar Tokyo, and follows the interweaving story threads of a number of the community’s residents over the course of a single year as Tokyo Tower is being built.
Movies contain millions of great photos to tell a story by catching every movement. The only difference is one good photo could tell the whole story and leaving imaginary space for audiences. The 2008 winner photo is one of the kinds of storytelling photos.