BOW Assessment

ASSESSMENT BOW & CS AUTUMN 2023

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       Nicola South   Student number: 514516

PH6BOW and PH6CTS

AUTUMN 2023 ASSESSMENT

NOTE TO ASSESSORS

Dear Assessors,

BODY OF WORK ASSESSMENT

My Body of Work is presented for assessment via my Padlet Body of Work: What Lies Beneath: Assessment. The link to the site can be found in my Selection of Creative Work folder on the Assessment G Drive.

In case of any technical problems, I have also uploaded to my Assessment G Drive:

  • Learning Outcomes
  • Evaluation
  • Video of portfolio presentation and single images (Slideshow of portfolio presentation, in case of technical problems with video).
  • Tutor reports

For guidance on accessing Body of Work blog posts directly see below Contextual Studies assessment notes.

CONTEXTUAL STUDIES ASSESSMENT

I have uploaded the following to my Assessment G Drive:

  • Literature Review and Dissertation Plan (Assignment 2)
  • Dissertation and Abstract (Assignment 5)
  • Revised final Dissertation plan
  • Reflective commentary
  • Learning Outcomes
  • Tutor Feedback

Blog posts are generally in the standard descending order by date but are easiest accessed by consecutively by the sub menus. My posts for Contextual Studies can be accessed from the Contextual Studies tab, which has sub menus for Coursework, Assignments (including learning logs, and Assessment against learning Outcomes) and Submissions (including Reflections on Formative Feedback).

CS Assignments:

CS Submissions:

My Contextual Studies Research can mainly be accessed from my Reflective Journal_Research_CS Research:

.

NOTES ON BODY OF WORK BLOG POSTS: Blog posts are generally in the standard descending order by date but are easiest accessed by consecutively by the sub menus. My posts for Body of Work can be accessed from the Body of Work  tab, which has sub menus for Coursework, Assignments (including learning logs, and Assessment against learning Outcomes) and Submissions (including Reflections on Formative Feedback).

BOW Assignments:

BOW Submissions:

My Body of Work reading, research, and reflections can mainly be accessed from my Reflective Journal:

BODY OF WORK: ASSESSMENT

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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/

BODY OF WORK MAJOR PORTFOLIO OF WORK: ASSESSMENT

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PH6BOW 5 Nicola South Student number: 516514

REFLECTIVE EVALUATION

Where did I begin?

The areas of interest that developed during my Level 2 Landscape and Documentary work brought me to the beginning of this Photographic project. I acquired a curiosity about layers of truth. I also had a desire to continue exploring landscape, but in an immersive slow manner with attention to the ordinary, drawing on my subconscious. Having recently moved to a new location I chose to focus on two things in my current experience, firstly the ancient woodlands that drew me in, and secondly the disharmony and animosity to ‘incomers’ in the local community.

My intention was to represent my feelings about community through equivalents in the unnoticed and ordinary within the woodland landscape. I began by exploring visual representations of elements of ancient woodland communities as metaphors for characteristics that could be beneficial in human communities.

Other Influences on my Body of Work

My research for Contextual Studies on ‘affect’ and ‘effect’, or ‘mirrors’ and ‘windows’ in landscape photography, particularly in the work of Minor White, opened further possibilities for my Body of Work photography. My work in both the courses was symbiotic, developing and enriching each other.  A broad range of photographers influenced my work from Alfred Steiglitz, John Blakemore, to contemporary photographers such as Rob Hudson, Guy Dickenson and Gregor Radonic. I have also been affected by critical feedback from my peers given in student hangouts where I have shared my work, just as with my Tutor.

Experimentation

I experimented with a variety of visual strategies such as changes in scale and perspective, macro and micro, abstraction, blurring, and symbolism. As I worked into the project I became more concerned with being a ‘mirror’, than opening a window for others to a world of realism. To do this I developed a keener sense of seeing, slow looking, and immersion in my surroundings, and experimented with psychogeography and mindful photography. Eventually my looking became increasingly defocused, or ‘bottom up’, led by the landscape and my subconscious, rather than led by conscious intent. This to the point towards the end of the project where I was less keen to photograph and happier to pre- visualise; certainly, my image capturing decreased significantly.

Difficulties I encountered

Initially I struggled to get to the nub of my idea and to focus my intent. It took until assignment 3 to drill down into this enough to move forward more confidently. Another difficulty, which I am still working on, is how to signpost my subconscious ideas and messages for viewers. Adapting to the dynamic natural environment that I was photographing was challenging, but I enjoyed finding ways to overcome the constant changes, turning them to my advantage and overcoming technical difficulties.

My critical positioning and personal voice

My work is a combination of landscape and conceptual photography. By representing my feelings through equivalents and metaphors in visual objects, I can transform abstract ideas in my head, my subconscious, into something concrete, via a physical representation of another subject. I can put something of myself in the landscape without intervening in it, and believe that my voice, my subconscious, is in my images. I edit purposefully, with stronger confidence, and combining instinct with intention. I have discovered and show how a photographer may use the landscape to form new relationships and meaning. This is my emerging voice.

What I will take forward

I am enjoying and will continue to use visual metaphors and put my subconscious in the images. This will be in tandem with going deeper visually and spiritually into ancient woodlands.

I am still developing methods for signposting my intentions or messages. I have tried various techniques to signpost images to increase access to their meaning, definitions as captions, poetry, poetography, and binary pointers. Looking forward I need to find ways to share the messages in my photography with an audience, whilst not excluding the opportunity for viewers to decide for themselves what meaning they take from the images.

My intention is to build on this body of work and refine my publishing ideas to create a photobook, or Zine to realise a publication for Sustaining Your Practice.

BODY OF WORK MAJOR PORTFOLIO OF WORK: EVALUATION

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Where did I begin?

The areas of interest that developed during my Level 2 Landscape and Documentary work brought me to the beginning of this work. I acquired a curiosity about layers of truth. I also had a desire to continue exploring landscape but in an immersive slow manner with attention to the ordinary, drawing on my subconscious. Having recently moved to a new location I chose to focus on two things in my then current experience, firstly the ancient woodlands that drew me in, and secondly the disharmony and animosity to ‘incomers’ in the local community.

My intention was to represent my feelings about community through equivalents in the unnoticed and ordinary within the woodland landscape. I began by exploring visual representations of elements of ancient woodland communities as metaphors for characteristics that could be beneficial in human communities.

Other Influences on my Body of Work

My research for Contextual Studies on ‘affect’ and ‘effect’, or ‘mirrors’ and ‘windows’ in landscape photography, particularly in the work of Minor White, opened further possibilities for my Body of Work photography. My work in both the courses was symbiotic – they developed and enriched each other.  A broad range of photographers influenced my work from Alfred Steiglitz, John Blakemore, to contemporary photographers such as Rob Hudson. Guy Dickenson and Gregor Radonic. I have also been affected by critical feedback from my peers given in student hangouts I have shared my work, just as with my Tutor.

Experimentation

I experimented with a variety of visual strategies such as changes in scale and perspective, macro and micro, abstraction, blurring, and symbolism. As I worked into the project I became more concerned with being a ‘mirror’, than opening a window for others to a world of realism. To do this I developed a keener sense of seeing, slow looking, and immersion in my surroundings, and experimented with psychogeography and mindful photography. Eventually my looking became increasingly defocused, or ‘bottom up’, led by the landscape and my subconscious, rather than led by conscious intent. This to the point towards the end of the project where I was less keen to photograph and happier to pre- visualise; certainly, my image capturing decreased significantly.

Difficulties I encountered

Initially I struggled to get to the knub of my idea and to focus my intent. It took until assignment 3 to drill down into this enough to move forward more confidently. Another difficulty, which I am still working on, is how to signpost my subconscious ideas and messages for viewers. Also adapting to the dynamic natural environment that I was photographing was challenging, but I enjoyed finding ways to overcome the constant changes, turning them to my advantage and overcoming technical difficulties.

My critical positioning and personal voice

My work is a combination of landscape and conceptual photography. By representing my feelings through equivalents and metaphors in visual objects, I can transform abstract ideas in my head, my subconscious, into something concrete, via a physical representation of another subject. I can put something of myself in the landscape without intervening in it, and believe that my voice, my subconscious, is in my images. I edit purposefully, with stronger confidence, and combining instinct with intention. I have discovered and show how a photographer may use the landscape to form new relationships and meaning. This is my emerging voice.

What I will take forward

I am enjoying and will continue to use visual metaphors and put my subconscious in the images. This will be in tandem with going deeper visually and spiritually into ancient woodlands.

I am still developing methods for signposting my intentions or messages. I have tried various techniques to signpost images to increase access to their meaning, definitions as captions, poetry, poetography, and binary pointers. Looking forward I need to find ways to share the messages in my photography with an audience, whilst not excluding the opportunity for viewers to decide for themselves what meaning they take from the images.

My intention is to build on this body or work and refine my publishing ideas to create a photobook, or Zine to realise a publication for Sustaining Your Practice.

BODY OF WORK LEARNING OUTCOMES

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BODY OF WORK: 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:
  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/