PH6BOW-5 Nicola South Student:514516

COURSE LEARNING OUTCOMES

LO1 produce convincing visual products that communicate your intentions, using accomplished techniques in complex and unfamiliar environments, with minimal supervision from your tutor.

1. My final visual product includes images, which have been developed and are presented as visual metaphors for my feelings about community. These are accompanied by poetry that I have written as signposting to communicate my intentions. See – Submission Major portfolio:  https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/submissions/bow-ass-5-submission/a5-bow-submission/
2. My subject and environment are constantly changing with the seasons and the weather. To reach my final product I have moved through several stages of experimentation both visually and technically. See – Assignment 4 Reflection against Learning Outcomes: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/bow-assignment-4/bow-a4-reflections-against-learning-outcomes/
3. To communicate my intentions, I have tried many ways of signposting the intention behind my images, culminating in the poetry presented in the final work. In assignment 2 I assigned the close-up woodland images dictionary definitions to highlight the attributes that they show that could be ascribed to humans. See – Assignment 2 Submission: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/submissions/bow-a2-submission/a2-bow-submission/  

LO2 demonstrate comprehensive knowledge of your area of specialisation and be able to situate your own work within a larger context of practice in your field.

My work is led by photographic discourse on photographs metaphorically as ‘mirrors’ expressing a photographer’s thoughts and emotions, as well as ‘windows’ which project reality before us; this informed by my work in Contextual Studies on ‘affect’ and ‘effect’ in the practice of Minor white.

1. My practice research is influenced by many photographers who work with the landscape metaphorically. My Assignment 5 research post summarises some of these. See: Assignment 3 reading post: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/research/bow-research/bow-research-part-3/  
2. To gain a deep understanding of my visual subject I researched trees and other woodland species, as well as photographers who work with these subjects. See- Assignment 2 research post: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/research/bow-research/other-photographers-same-material/  
3. Before I experimented with using poetry to signpost my work I researched Poetography. This post summarises the research, with my reflection at the end of it. See – Assignment 4 research post: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/bow-assignment-4/research-poetry-photography/

LO3 transform abstract concepts and ideas into rich narratives and integrate them in your images.

It was a concern to me throughout how I might transform the abstract concepts behind my work into a tangible narrative for my viewers. My photographic work depends on the same premise that I researched in my contextual studies, that ‘affect’ a representation expressing an emotional response, as well as one documenting reality ‘effect’ can be present in photographs. The woodlands are a visual metaphor for my feelings about community.

1. Representing the concept: A turning point for me in transforming my abstract concept into a narrative was during assignment 3, when I had drilled down into the crux of my message, that diversity can be harmonious, and I presented this  with the woodlands as a visual metaphor for the concept, using image titles to provoke thought. See – Assignment 3 Submission: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-submissions/bow-ass-3-submission/a3-bow-submission/
2. Forming the narrative and integrating with my images: To consider what I would share and how I would narrate this in my final work, I reflected on the internal reflective and external visual journey that I had undergone. These are detailed at the beginning of my learning log for assignment five draft. See- Assignment 5 Major portfolio learning log: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/bow-assignment-5/bow-a5-portfolio-learning-log-bow-assignment-5/
3. Creating the narrative and integrating with my images is detailed in my learning log for my submitted Major Portfolio. In summary I chose and formed a series from a small set of the strongest images. I added a narrative to this in two ways, firstly by integrating with my own poetry as signposting and secondly by including as footnotes images captioned with definitions to add a final focus to the work. See – Major Project Portfolio for Submission Learning log: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/submissions/bow-ass-5-submission/bow-5-post-feedback-learning-log/

LO4 critically review your own work and evaluate it against desired outcomes.

I have been used in previous lives to being a reflective practitioner, reflecting throughout my processes and enjoy learning in this way.

1. I record my reflections against the Learning Outcomes for each assignment. In my reflections against Learning Outcomes for assignment 2, those noted against LO1 and LO4 are good examples of critical reflection. See: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/assignment-2/bow-a2-reflections-againgst-learning-outcomes/
2. I use learning logs to reflect on my progress as I develop my work. My learning log for Assignment 3 demonstrates how I reflect on the various stages in the process, from changing concepts, influences from research, and my responses to shooting and particularly my final check on my image selection during editing. See: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/bow-assignment-3/bow-a3-learning-log/
3. I am open to input from others, which is part of my critical review process. After discussing my draft Assignment 3 with my tutor I experimented as suggested with cropping my images to a 5:4 ratio, this led to me to photograph from Assignment 4 onwards in this ratio – I usually compose in camera and rarely crop postproduction. After this I also used padlets when editing images for series as a virtual tabletop. See: https://oca.padlet.org/nicola514516/bow-draft-assignment-3-image-crop-sizes-td51x6mcq2sijad0

LO5 demonstrate management, leadership and communication skills and have deployed them during the negotiation and production of the final body of work with your tutor and third parties.

1. Throughout the process I have shared my work with peers, this course necessarily mainly virtually in group ‘hangouts’. Interacting with peers has been invaluable; verbalising my work and ideas, inviting critique, and then making decisions what to assimilate to my work has contributed to my final body of work. See example: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-assignments/bow-assignment-5/bow-a5-peer-portfolio-review-oca-hangout/
2. I have benefited enormously from formative feedback and have particularly enjoyed video call feedback where I have been able to discuss and negotiate in real time. All my submissions changed following my first drafts. Following Tutor feedback sessions, I record and set actions and reflect on the outcomes. My reflections on tutor feedback after Assignment 3 demonstrates the way I experiment with feedback given, and subsequently adopt/integrate elements into that particular work, carry some ideas forward, and discount others after further thought. See example: https://nkssite6.photo.blog/category/body-of-work/bow-submissions/bow-a3-reflections-on-formative-feedback/