Photo1Q3.18: Let's Get Weird (A Beautiful Mistake)

I think this assignment is a set-up for a future assignment that challenges us to truly portray a message in a photo. This type of assignment is daunting at first, but that's exactly what happens when you're out there trying to capture a good photo under certain conditions.

The topic I selected was "A Beautiful Mistake", which asks the photographer to make up a rule (open to interpretation), take a photo following that rule, make up another rule... etc. I selected this topic because it seemed challenging and interesting. I honestly thought I'd break my rules a couple photos in, but I actually got to 6 before breaking my most simplest rule. But yeah; I selected this topic because confining someone to certain conditions is a fantastic way to bring out someone's creativity.

Rule: Decent exposure (doesn't have to be perfect)

Rule: Frame right

Rule: A human element

Rule: Actual human

As I was trying to fulfill the topic, I was obviously lost the first couple of minutes trying to think of a rule to use, but I knew that I was under a time limit so I thought broadly. Exposure is an easy rule to follow despite it being the victim of so many photographs, so I just went with that. As the rules got broader and broader, the 20 minutes felt like a breeze. It's definitely limiting, but if you're efficient then it's more than enough time.

Rule: Pose the person

Rule: Group of people

Rule 1 is broken, exposure was poor originally

This photo above was when I broke the first rule, which was good exposure. It's funny how the most simplest of things could be the thing that topples the assignment. It looked worse pre-Lightroom (all of these photos were edited mainly for color instead of exposure, though the last one was pretty dark so I had to boost the exposure slightly). It's definitely unintentional, though I don't think this image is horrible. Sure, it might not be in absolute focus, it might not have the greatest exposure, and there's a lot of things that I would change, but I think it captures the title of this topic ("A Beautiful Mistake") because it exposes exactly the type of photography I want to capture. This was slightly posed, but I did it in a way that would allow the subject some degree of freedom to appear candid and "raw".

Overall, I feel that this assignment was a really great way to get oneself churning in terms of creativity. I usually do not pose people, and I could've done a better job in terms of posing them (I kind of just said "just do whatever" for the photos with people in it), but it shows what you can improve on and what kind of photos you're good or bad at taking. Very enjoyable project.