Photo Friday: Halloween

Hiawatha, KS is a small town that's not too far from my school. They are best known for their annual Halloween Frolic. 

"Founded in 1914, Hiawatha Halloween Frolic is considered to be the Oldest, Continuous Halloween Frolic in the USA."

They hosted a "Horror" Halloween Photography Contest and my students were excited for that Photo Friday challenge. They used simple props- a dollar tree skeleton, a paper mâché Van Gogh head I made several years ago, and some face paint. We were lucky to have a corn field across the road from our elementary school and got permission from the farmers to shoot in the field. The students used the free app SnapSeed for some editing to give the photos the feel they wanted.

None of us placed in the contest. The winning photos were very well done, and a lot creepier than ours! We still had fun and will watch to see if they do another contest next year.

Photo Friday: #ThingsOrganizedNeatly

Have you ever looked at #ThingsOrganizedNeatly on instagram? It is what my students would call #satisfying.

It also became a Photo Friday challenge. Students could bring in objects or use what they found in the art room. Most just used tools or supplies found in the classroom.

Lots of brushes!

Vintage thread spools that I played with.

Letter magnets

Straws and popsicle sticks

Photo Friday: Rule of Thirds

I have had students ask me about taking a photography class but my high school only offers 3 art classes. Because there is a real interest in photography, I decided to be more intentional about incorporating digital photography by starting "Photo Friday" in my Computer Graphics class. Each week Friday is reserved for photography and we've been working through understanding how to use the camera, how to make effective compositions, themes, etc. Some of the ideas have been based on photography assignments I had in the past and some have come from things the students want to learn or try out.

One of the earliest assignments we had was to focus on the Rule of Thirds. I gave a quick explanation about how the "dead center" can be kind of a boring place to put a focal point and shifting off to one of the "tic tac toe" lines or "power points" where they intersect can be more interesting. I also tell students that the rule is more of a suggestion because they can be broken intentionally to achieve an effect.

 

After discussing the concept, we set out around the school and campus to take pictures. I asked students to explore and to turn in 2 photos at the end of class- one portrait and one "other".

 

Now that I'm posting these it's obvious to me we need to work on actually turning the photos in!