Photography

Benefits of self-assignments for photographers

By in Photography

Benefits of self-assignments for photographers

Self-assignments are a great way for professional and enthusiast photographers to practice, improve their skills, and challenge themselves creatively. Here are some benefits of creating self-assignments and some examples to get you started:

Practice and improvement

Vanelli and friend self-assignments

Self-assignments allow photographers to practice their craft regularly, which can help them develop their skills and become more confident in their abilities. For example, a photographer might set a goal of taking one self-portrait per week to practice posing, lighting, and composition.

Creative challenges for self-assignments

portrait of a girl smiling

Self-assignments allow photographers to push themselves creatively by setting new goals and trying new techniques. For example, a photographer might challenge themselves to take photographs only in black and white for a week or to capture a specific theme or subject matter uniquely and creatively.

Personal growth

portraits self-assignments

Self-assignments can be a way for photographers to learn and grow as artists, as they allow photographers to experiment with new styles and techniques and try things they may not have otherwise considered. For example, a photographer might aim to take photographs using only natural light for a week or shoot a series of images in a specific location or with a particular subject.

Portfolio building

boys sports photos self-assignments

Self-assignments can be a great way for photographers to build their portfolios and showcase their skills to potential clients. For example, a photographer might set a goal of creating a series of images that showcase their expertise in a specific area, such as portrait photography or landscape photography.

Some examples of self-assignments that photographers might consider include:

  • Taking a series of photographs using only natural light
  • Shooting a series of portraits in black and white
  • Capturing a specific theme or subject matter in a creative way
  • Experimenting with different compositions and angles
  • Taking photographs in a specific location or environment
  • Shooting a series of images using a specific lens or camera setting
  • Capturing a specific emotion or mood through photography

Overall, self-assignments are a great way for photographers to practice their craft, challenge themselves creatively, and grow as artists. They can be a fun and rewarding way to improve your skills and build your portfolio, no matter your level of experience.

Supreme Court sides with photographer in copyright case involving Andy Warhol, Prince

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Supreme Court sides with photographer in copyright case involving Andy Warhol, Prince

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday sided with a photographer who claimed the late Andy Warhol had violated her copyright on a photograph of the singer Prince.

The Supreme Court sided 7-2 with photographer Lynn Goldsmith.

“Lynn Goldsmith’s original works, like those of other photographers, are entitled to copyright protection, even against famous artists,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in an opinion.

The case involved images Warhol created of Prince as part of a 1984 commission for Vanity Fair. Warhol used a Goldsmith photograph as his starting point.

Warhol died in 1987.

‘Dune: Part One’ Photography Book Delivers Intimate Glimpse At Denis Villeneuve’s Arrakis (First Look)

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‘Dune: Part One’ Photography Book Delivers Intimate Glimpse At Denis Villeneuve’s Arrakis (First Look)

With Dune hype riding high off the trailer for Part Two of Denis Villeneuve’s film adaptation, publisher Insight Editions has offered up an exclusive peek inside a new book of stunning imagery taken on the set of Part One by veteran film photographer, Chiabella James (Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Wonder Woman 1984).

“I’ve spent my whole life on film sets, but the difference on Dune was the atmosphere amongst the cast and crew,” James tells me over email. “The tone of the whole experience was of respect, collaboration, and creative expression, which gave space and opportunity for crew like myself to work with the freedom to push our boundaries and show our best.”

Hitting stands this August, Dune Part One: The Photography comprises an assemblage of production and candid stills meticulously culled from the thousands snapped during the film’s Sandworm-sized shoot around the globe.

Principal photography took the cast and crew from the precarious cliffs of Norway (serving as Caladan, the Earth-like home world of House Atreides) to the expansive deserts of Jordan (standing in for the spice-filled wastelands of Arrakis). While stunningly depicted onscreen, these real-world locations posed the greatest challenge for James, who found herself in a constant battle with the elements.

“The most difficult images to get are usually the ones in extreme conditions like the sandstorms or the rain,” the photographer recalls. “It’s hard enough to find a great angle when you’re squeezing your way into a film set, trying to stay out of the way of the cameras and crew working to shoot the scene, but add in the practicalities of sand or rain whipping your face, seeping into your equipment and obscuring your image, and the challenge to get a great image is intensified exponentially!”

As for choosing which stills would make the cut for publication, James selected “a few hundred images from the thousands,” and then winnowed it down from there. The goal, she explains, was to show that an on-set photographer’s job goes well beyond the usual collection of assets included with a press release.

“I went through multiple rounds of selections to narrow down to the best. I wanted to incorporate the whole experience of the production … while also shining a light on the fact that, on a film like Dune, unit photography is an art — not just a marketing tool.”

Hailed for its dense and world-building and influence on the likes of Star Wars and Game of Thrones, the seminal source material written by Frank Herbert takes place in a far-flung future where royal houses live in tenuous harmony throughout the cosmos. This interstellar civilization thrives on Spice Melange, a precious and mind-altering substance only found on the desert planet of Arrakis. When his father, Duke Leto Atreides, is betrayed by the ruthless Harkonnens, young Paul seeks refuge among the Fremen (the native folk of Arrakis) and fulfills his destiny.

Dune Part One: The Photography goes on sale from Insight Editions Aug. 15. The book features a foreword by executive producer Tanya Lapoint, a preface by cast member Rebecca Ferguson (Lady Jessica), and an afterword by author Brian Herbert (son of Frank Herbert and curator of the Dune legacy).

Dune: Part One is currently streaming on HBO Max (or just Max, if you prefer). Part Two arrives on the big screen Friday, Nov. 3. While nothing’s been confirmed yet, Villeneuve has voiced interest in a trilogy by adapting Dune Messiah.

Supreme Court Rules Against Andy Warhol in Copyright Case

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Supreme Court Rules Against Andy Warhol in Copyright Case
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The justices considered whether the artist was free to use elements of a rock photographer’s portrait of the musician Prince.

The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that Andy Warhol was not entitled to draw on a prominent photographer’s portrait of Prince for an image of the musician that his estate licensed to a magazine, limiting the scope of the fair-use defense to copyright infringement in the realm of visual art.

The vote was 7 to 2. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, writing for the majority, said the photographer’s “original works, like those of other photographers, are entitled to copyright protection, even against famous artists.”

She focused on the fact that Warhol and Lynn Goldsmith, the photographer whose work he altered, were both engaged in the commercial enterprise of licensing images of Prince to magazines.

“To hold otherwise would potentially authorize a range of commercial copying of photographs, to be used for purposes that are substantially the same as those of the originals,” Justice Sotomayor wrote. “As long as the user somehow portrays the subject of the photograph differently, he could make modest alterations to the original, sell it to an outlet to accompany a story about the subject, and claim transformative use.”

In dissent, Justice Elena Kagan, joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., wrote that the decision “will stifle creativity of every sort.”

“It will impede new art and music and literature,” she wrote. “It will thwart the expression of new ideas and the attainment of new knowledge. It will make our world poorer.”

The dueling opinions, from two liberal justices who are often allies, had an unusually sharp tone.

Justice Kagan’s opinion, Justice Sotomayor wrote, was made up of “a series of misstatements and exaggerations, from the dissent’s very first sentence to its very last.”

Justice Kagan responded that Justice Sotomayor wholly failed to appreciate Warhol’s art.

“The majority does not see it,” Justice Kagan wrote. “And I mean that literally. There is precious little evidence in today’s opinion that the majority has actually looked at these images, much less that it has engaged with expert views of their aesthetics and meaning.”

The decision was also unusual for including more than a dozen reproductions of artworks by Warhol and others, most of them in color.

The portrait of Prince at issue in the case was taken in 1981 by Lynn Goldsmith, a successful rock photographer on assignment for Newsweek.

In 1984, around the time Prince released “Purple Rain,” Vanity Fair hired Warhol to create a work to accompany an article titled “Purple Fame.” The magazine paid Ms. Goldsmith $400 to license the portrait as an “artist reference,” agreeing to credit her and to use it only in connection with a single issue.

In a series of 16 images, Warhol altered the photograph in various ways, notably by cropping and coloring it to create what his foundation’s lawyers described as “a flat, impersonal, disembodied, mask-like appearance.” Vanity Fair ran one of them.

Warhol died in 1987, and the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts assumed ownership of his work. When Prince died in 2016, Vanity Fair’s parent company, Condé Nast, published a special issue celebrating his life. It paid the foundation $10,250 to use a different image from the series for the cover. Ms. Goldsmith received no money or credit.

Pages from the petition submitted to the Supreme Court by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts show various images made by Mr. Warhol and Lynn Goldsmith.Jim Bourg/Reuters

Litigation followed, much of it focused on whether Warhol had transformed Ms. Goldsmith’s photograph. The Supreme Court has said a work is transformative if it “adds something new, with a further purpose or different character, altering the first with new expression, meaning or message.”

Justice Kagan rejected the idea that those photographs and Warhol’s image were fungible.

“Suppose you were the editor of Vanity Fair or Condé Nast, publishing an article about Prince,” she wrote. “You need, of course, some kind of picture. An employee comes to you with two options: the Goldsmith photo, the Warhol portrait. Would you say that you don’t really care? That the employee is free to flip a coin? In the majority’s view, you apparently would.”

She added: “All I can say is that it’s a good thing the majority isn’t in the magazine business. Of course you would care!”

The majority’s analysis, Justice Kagan wrote, was simplistic and wooden.

“All of Warhol’s artistry and social commentary,” she wrote, “is negated by one thing: Warhol licensed his portrait to a magazine, and Goldsmith sometimes licensed her photos to magazines too. That is the sum and substance of the majority opinion.”

The case, Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts v. Goldsmith, No. 21-869, concerned the limits of the fair-use defense, which allows copying that would otherwise be unlawful if it involves activities like criticism and news reporting.

Lower courts differed about whether Warhol’s alterations of the photograph transformed it into something different. Judge John G. Koeltl of the Federal District Court in Manhattan ruled that Warhol had created something new by imbuing the photograph with fresh meaning.

But a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit said that judges should compare how similar the two works are and leave the interpretation of their meaning to others.

“The district judge should not assume the role of art critic and seek to ascertain the intent behind or meaning of the works at issue,” Judge Gerard E. Lynch wrote for the panel. “That is so both because judges are typically unsuited to make aesthetic judgments and because such perceptions are inherently subjective.”

Justice Sotomayor wrote that a crucial factor in the fair-use analysis — “the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes” — weighed in Ms. Goldsmith’s favor.

“Warhol himself paid to license photographs for some of his artistic renditions,” Justice Sotomayor wrote. “Such licenses, for photographs or derivatives of them, are how photographers like Goldsmith make a living. They provide an economic incentive to create original works, which is the goal of copyright.”

Other Warhol works, like Warhol’s images of Campbell’s soup cans, were a different matter, she wrote.

“The purpose of Campbell’s logo is to advertise soup. Warhol’s canvases do not share that purpose,” Justice Sotomayor wrote. “Rather, the soup cans series uses Campbell’s copyrighted work for an artistic commentary on consumerism.”

The Woodlands High School Photography Earns Rising Star Award

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The Woodlands High School Photography Earns Rising Star Award

THE WOODLANDS, TX — The Woodlands High School Photography students, under the guidance of Julie Pelosi, were named the Association of Texas Photography Instruction 2022-23 Rising Star Program.

TWHS students took first place in architecture and nature, second in portrait, and third in sports.

Students whose work was included are: Aiden Fritsche, Eesha Reddy, Gabrielle Nix, Annabelle Rohrbough, Ema Lamyuen, Holly Mullins, Gio Walden, Albert Kaci, Mauro Barragan, Connor Koenig, Wenny Stein, Arturo Rios, Katie Pepper, Rachael Howse-Wygand, Alex Maclaughlin, Taryn Farnsworth, Jude Gillespie, Micah Archibald, Nico Nunez, Anneliese Pridgen, MJ Monroe, Ben Davis, and Mason Brady.

Schools may enter 10-image portfolios in up to four categories. The Rising Star Award is presented to the school with the highest number of winning portfolios.

“This is our third year entering the Rising Star contest,” Pelosi said. “In 2021, we placed in two individual categories, but not overall. Last year, we took a big jump forward and placed second overall. This year, the stars aligned for us, and we were able to put together some winning portfolios. I’m so proud of this group of students.

“My advanced photo kids especially are a special group, they were the ones who helped us place second last year and their talent and leadership has increased exponentially over the last year. They really have been all-in from the beginning of the year. We’ve won 55 total awards as a program this year, and that’s a testament to all their hard work. I’m so happy they were the ones to help establish us as a dominant program in the state. I can’t wait to see where we go from here!”

The Association of Texas Photography Instructors provides information and resources to teachers and students that work with photography, whether in Art, Journalism, Career and Technology, or Vocational curriculum areas.

Attached are samples of their winning work.

Photography: Turnstile at Otto Bar

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Photography: Turnstile at Otto Bar

Posted: 18th May, 2023 by The Editor

After 2021’s release of “GLOW ON”, Turnstile has been non-stop touring and filling up venues. The band has grown to incredible fame, and has brought the new wave of hardcore into the mainstream. The band played a packed show in their hometown venue, Otto Bar, in Baltimore, Maryland. Jay was there bracing the pit and taking some amazing photos. Check them out!

Photos by Jay Leiby

The Alternative is ad-free and 100% supported by our readers. If you’d like to help us produce more content and promote more great new music, please consider donating to our Patreon page, which also allows you to receive sweet perks like free albums and The Alternative merch.

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Photography for the Ocean

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Photography for the Ocean
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Strong Together | Begin Ontario, 2022

The blizzard blocks my view. At the intersection of a snow road and a snowmobile trail, I notice a black spot in the distance. When I get to the trail, I realise that it is a lynx! I lay down on the ground and wait. Suddenly, a small lynx comes out of the wood and joins him, then another and another and another! To finish the parade, another adult sits with them. I have a total of six lynxes in front of me. They see me, but don’t move, I wait, and that’s when the small clan starts to walk in my direction. The lynxes float on this soft snow

Photograph: Jean Simon Begin/100 for the Ocean

Harrowdown Hill: landscape, photography and the death of David Kelly

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Harrowdown Hill: landscape, photography and the death of David Kelly
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‘I visited the location once a month over a year, making multiple pictures of the same locations a few seconds, minutes, hours, or months apart. By doing this I was hoping to create a sense of time dilating and compressing that would enable the viewer, through the changes in light, weather, and season, to “move” backwards and forwards in time.’

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