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PHOTOJOURNALISM
I myself am not much of a photojournalist, but I do help with a lot of the logistical side in setting up photoshoots and getting things together. This is an area of my portfolio that I would love to continue to cultivate even further.
ORGANIZING PHOTOSHOOTS
At the beginning of each magazine cycle when my Cabinet and I are doing story assignments, we also meet with our Photography Editor, Aza, to set up the photos that she will need to take for the issue. We talk about the shots each story will need, when we need them, and what we are thinking for each layout so that we can plan ahead for visuals.
This planning ahead allows us to have clearer communication with Aza and the visuals team, and prevents us having to catch up on photos on the back end. Click on the photo to view our story assignments and the list of who was taking which photos!
CAPTIONS
Something that I have worked on since my freshman year in ODYSSEY is how to write a properly formatted, ODYSSEY-style caption. ODYSSEY-style captions are formatted as follows:
- First sentence: present tense, describes the photo
- Second sentence: past tense, sets up the quote
-Third sentence: quote, photo attribution
I have been working on caption writing for almost four years now - from scenes, to magazine captions. I've learned that writing a strong caption makes or breaks a story, because it gives the context the reader needs to truly understand what's going on. I'm still not perfect at it, but writing captions has become a strong suit of mine throughout my career.
The photo above is from a presentation on scenes and writing captions I gave with my colleague, Isabelle Duncan, during the ODYSSEY Media Group 2023 Summer Workshop. Click on the photo to view our presentation!
Q&A WITH J. GRANT BRITTAIN
In October, the Iliad EIC Olivia Hendershot and I conducted a live Q&A session with famous skateboarding photographer J. Grant Brittain and local photographer Jason Thrasher. They visited our school and Brittain gave a presentation on some of is favorite photos and the stories behind them. Olivia and I asked them questions about the evolution of their photography, what got them into skateboarding and the world of skateboard photography, and what inspired them to create, and the event went really well. We had to do a lot of prepration ahead of time, doing background researching on both of our subjects and their illustrious careers and coming up with engaging questions for both our guests and the audience.
Having Mr. Brittain come and speak with us was a very unique experience, and it really helped invigorate a love of photography that I didn't know I had. I found myself wanting to learn even more about not only his career, but about photography in general. I am amazed by what you can do with a camera, and I was very grateful that our guests were able to show us that. Click on the photo to read our questions!
Afterwards, when the coverage of the event had been posted on the ODYSSEY's social media, we received this incredibly kind comment from Jason Thrasher, who commended our work and appreciated the questions we asked.
FAILED ATTEMPT
This scene is an example of a photo that I took that I don't find to be the best. The lighting isn't great, I wasn't following the Rule of Thirds, and her hands and legs are cut off in the photo. While I was trying to get these scenes quickly and in the moment at a football game, I believe that I still could've taken the time to make sure the photos were compelling and told a story for the readers. After completing these my sophomore year, I received some helpful feedback from my adviser on where to improve, and I believe that I have worked to obey more of the photography rules going forward.
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