This Day In Pictures (Stephen Fry and Seagulls)

Once again, intrepid reader, I ventured down, down, down the stairs of the colossal sandstone monument to knowledge, into the dank and disused war room.

This is the war room! You can't fight in here!

 Or, as it’s known today, room 109 of the Forgan Smith Building.

But now I must cease my meandering through the corridors of yesteryear, for the lecture in week four was not about text, but about pictures, and how pictures, like text, can tell a story. These picture stories are everywhere and, unlike text, don’t wind on using words with too many syllables. (Not that I’m dissing words in any way whatsoever)

And here's a Picture of Stephen Fry. There doesn't need to be an explanation for Stephen Fry.

But now for a history of picture stories:

• Too-long-to-remember-ago

- Australian Indigenous Cave Stories, Cave Paintings at Lascaux, France

• BC to AD (and everywhen in between)

- Holy Books & Stained Glass

o   Book of Kells, illuminations, church windows, etc

• Newspapers were invented shortly after the first politician was spawned

- Early newspapers/news stories – originally illustrated with line drawings and woodcuts

• 1879

- First published photo in a newspaper (halftone only), rather than the heretofore line drawings, wood cuts and engravings.

• 1936

- The first colour photo is published in the Scottish Daily Record and Mail

•  And then everything else was shopped.

•  And then they stopped using human models and made everything on a computer.

The end.

So what makes a Great Photo?

Clue: It’s not (always) having great equipment.

Hold on guys, because this is where it gets technical. Fortunately, my dad is a professional photographer, so I understood all these fancy terms already.

Check out my new lens kids! It only cost 4 and a half grand, so we only need to skip dinner for 3 weeks!
If you think I'm joking about lens prices, you would be mistaken. My dad has a lens worth 6 grand.
And once I went without dinner for 5 years.

·      Framing – this is basically where you put your subject in the photo

·      Focus – this is about how much of your photo is blurry

·      Angle & Point of View (POV) – this is where you take the picture from (are you shooting from above or below, or to the side?)

·      Exposure/Light – basically, which bits of your picture are dark, and which bits are light, and how light? How dark?

·      Timing/Shutter Speed - Timing is just about getting the best photo possible – which often means waiting till the right time. Shutter speed to me means the difference between a blurry and in-focus short.

·      Capturing the Moment – This comes back to timing – clicking the button at the exact second the person is jumping, or smiling, or crying.

·      Inclusion of Sound Dimension (Movies) – Would a movie/grab be better if it was silent, or if you could hear the screams?

CAW! CAW! That poor kid doesn't stand a chance.
Is anybody else getting flashbacks to The Birds?

“A picture has no meaning at all if it can’t tell a story”

And that picture story was about how terrifying seagulls are.