T189 Digital photography course at the OU
I’ve just submitted my end of course assessment for T189 and it’s a wonderful feeling. I’ve done my best in the time available and I’m proud of myself. I’d forgotten how much of a buzz I get out of finishing a course - I haven’t felt like this in years. I’ve just been on the OU website looking to see what I can do next. Well, they did tell me it was addictive.
It’s a shame I didn’t have more time to devote to studying the course generally. It would have been nice to do all the exercises and share my results with the other students and here on my blog. I won’t have learned as much on the course as I could have because I haven’t really had time to practice and experiment with the ideas and techniques, but I have still learned a lot, especially in doing the final assignment. I’ve really enjoyed it actually, even if I did get a bit stressed earlier in the week.
Most of all I’ve discovered that images are considerably more complex than they first appear.
July 14th, 2007 at 07:10 pm
If you’re looking at this wondering what they teach on the course then here’s a list of topics:
Week 1 - what makes an interesting image?
Week 2 - how does light become data in your camera?
Week 3 - image exposure - how to control it when you take a photo and how to alter it in Photoshop Elements.
Week 4 - How does focus work and how do you control the depth of field of a photo?
Week 5 - How you see colour, how the camera sees colours, how the VDU on your computer displays colour and how your printer prints colours, and then how do you control and adjust all that?
Week 6 - printing photos - what’s important?
Week 7 - a brief history of innovation in photography - where did the conventions come from?
Week 8 - Getting critical - practicing critiquing your own and other people’s photos, learning how to see and describe the visual and tehnical qualities of an image.
Weeks 9 and 10 - End of course assessment - preparing some great photos and describing why you think they are great.
Weeks 3, 4 and 5 were the most work, and in many ways the most important for improving your photography, since this is where you learn what most of the buttons do on your camera ie what is shutter speed, aperture, ISO, focal length etc. Expect to work hard but learn the underpinning principles of photography so that you can take your camera off automatic mode and play with the manual settings in a meaningful way.