Photo Assignment 9: Stop Action Photography
I have had a lot of experience with shutter speed in my past but I have not had many opportunities to utilize it recently in my work. I was a part of my high school's yearbook organization so I was shooting a lot of sports photography and had to be cautious of my shutter speed. For this assignment trying to decide what I was going to shoot proved to be a bit challenging for me. I had an SMU Look shoot but there isn't much motion in posing for pictures. I had many trials and errors, like issues with balancing the ISO which you mentioned in the assignment post. I have included some more images of pictures I took in highschool of sports so you can see that I understand and can grasp the assignment. It was hard to plan for this because while I had many trails of pictures of people they ended up with grainy textures on the picture or just in the wrong lighting. None of them turned out how I had envisioned it in my head. I did keep working on it though and that is what I have included as my submission for this assignment. I think what is hard is that when you are taking these shots you don't want to mess up the moment and you want to freeze that moment as a picture. That puts a lot of pressure on being at the exact right place at that exact time in the perfect spot to ensure you will capture it correctly. I remember when taking pictures for a yearbook and being at a tournament you want to make sure it isn't too slow and captures the moment itself in elongated limbs or shaky features. I actually used to really enjoy taking pictures like these at games or practice and I didn't realize how much until I was writing this post. I remember feeling so proud of myself after I was looking at my SD card and saw the first image of the two football players that I had captured that I shared below. I think everything from the framing, the colors, and the clarity it is one of my best pictures. Same with the image of the drill team dancer next to it of her fringe in motion. I think this one really expresses excellent stop motion because it is a moment absolutely frozen in time.
Some of my pictures from high school working for The Highlander (Highland Park High School's yearbook publication) (Arden Eiland 2018-2021):
I want to talk to Ella (in our class and an SMU Look photographer with me) about what she does for SMU Football. I think she takes really great pictures and I feel really lucky to learn from her. Another person who I think takes really great stop action photography is Danielle Ellis, she is the one who took our pictures for our football team in high school and is extremely talented. https://danielleellis.com
I don't remember exactly what my settings were at when I captured the images in high school but I know I definitely had to mess around with my settings to get them how I wanted them to be.
I took a few pictures of my dog, Oliver, which brought challenges like: issues with being too bring, not in the frame due to chaos, and trouble with getting and maintaining attention. I think some of the ones I included however were successful in capturing the image and were very cute. I also included images of a girl swinging on a swing at a park outside the Tri Delta sorority house to portray stop motion photography.
Oliver, an old english sheep dog, plays in his backyard in Dallas, Texas on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
An Old English Sheepdog runs around his backyard in Dallas, Texas on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
Oliver Eiland chases a ball in his backyard in Dallas, Texas on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
Mckenna Madden swings on a swingset at Burleson Park in Dallas, Texas inbetween classes on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
Mckenna Madden swings inbetween classes at Southern Methodist Univeristy at Burleson Park in Dallas, Texas on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
Mckenna Madden swings inbetween classes at Southern Methodist Univeristy at Burleson Park in Dallas, Texas on March 27, 2023. (Arden Eiland/ SMU)
Side Note:
I did want to share however in a study break yesterday I made my way down to the Bishop Bazaar that I saw posted in Bishop Arts District on Photologique’s instagram and I got to go down there and see many very cool vendors and Photologique’s booth of old cameras and works done with those camera which was very interesting for my new interest in researching of film.
