For this first set of photos I used my iPhone 6+ to take them. I took all of them on August 31, 2017 during my first real journey through South Congress. I didn’t really know exactly what to look for when taking photos and took photos of things that caught my eye. As you can see it varies from signs, to plants and even graffiti. The top row of images are the original images I took, while the row below them are edited versions of their respective images. After analyzing which photos were my best, I realized a correlation in my photos.
For instance, The crosswalk graffiti made me imagine someone who was just fed up with waiting and decided to publish his thoughts with a few sprays of paint. The face on the mailbox was perhaps put there to give the mailbox a personality of sorts. The arrow pointing towards the ground make it seem as if something is hidden within the dirt and is just waiting to be found. And the odd face with a pompadour just seemed very silly to me, as it was the only piece of graffiti on the wall. I suppose I took these shots because they created a story in my head and I wanted to preserve them.
As for the picture of plants, I took them because I believe wildlife and plants are quite beautiful. At the time that red flower was the only flower that still vibrant in color and the little odd katydid-esque plants just looked quite nice. The cactus in the tire just looked silly but interesting to me and the cactus mural caught my attention as I had just taken the picture of the tire cactus.
Finally some of the more miscellaneous seem to all incorporate metal. The bike wheels as seen in my photograph were actually part of a larger fence made entirely out of bike wheels. Both the hotel sign and Twin Tires sign both caught my eye, as signs for businesses should which is why I took their pictures. I believe at the time I took the picture of the barbed wire from the angle I did in an attempt to make it look like art. I think the message i was going for was something like “The sky is so grand and free, something like barbed wire could never restrain it.”. Does it work as art? I have no idea, but maybe.
While I’m not exactly a master photographer, I’d like to at least think the images I took came out decent enough. I know I could use much more practice and I’m ready for it. I’m sure as time goes on I’ll improve. We’ll see if i made any progress when I go back for a second time to take photos. Below you’ll find the 5 images I’ll have critiqued during my Visual Studies class on the 11th. They are my favorites of the bunch, I’ve also included the edited versions as well. The first 5 are the edited versions and the last 5 are the originals.
