Quandrary!

Oh Fuji, what have you done???

Thrown a spanner in my works, that’s for sure *sigh*

I was almost settled on the S5600 over the S5700 when I found that there was a brand new S5XXX camera just released – the Fujifilm Finepix S5800 which is SOOOO tempting! It’s supposed to be available from October 2007 but the first ones are now appearing on Ebay and a seller has it for sale on Amazon as well.

It’s around the £150 mark at the moment but I’m waiting to see what price it will be from Amazon itself a/. because it will be post free and b/. I do value Amazon’s customer service. I bought an Archos Gmini MP3 player last year and it went wrong within a week – I was able to print out a personalised returns label from the Amazon site, send the faulty player back and subsequently received a brand new one in less than ten days.

So, not surprisingly, I’ve put my new camera plans on hold for a little while so I can save up the extra cash to get the S5800

Moving onwards and upwards

Today, we got up at the unearthly hour of 5.15am on the final leg of our journey home, having delivered daughter safely to college up in Leicestershire over the weekend, and arrived back safely just before lunch. Hubby fired up the computer to do some printing and then I downloaded all the (mostly) junk emails before checking in on my OU First Class desktop. I have to admit that it came as a bit of a shock when I double clicked on T189 Feedback which sported a red flag only to be told that I’m not allowed to perform that function

So I dashed over to my StudentHome page to see if any results were there … it appeared not. I’m not exactly sure when the T189 results will be released but it’s possible that the OU is being extra-scrupulous with the marking since it is the first presentation of the course and they want to set an effective benchmark for future presentations. However, on checking a little later, I found the following announcement on my T189 course details page:

Your course result should be available by Thursday 13 September 2007

So it’s not long to wait now for students of the first presentation of T189!

I confess I’ve not taken that many photographs this summer, apart from ones of our daughter, so I really need to get going again now that autumn is here. There’s that faint bonfire-smoky tang to the air that heralds the ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’ and the spiders are out in force, spinning their webs across anything available. It also heralds the fast approaching excitement of my next course – A215: Creative Writing, a sixty point Level Two course, and a fascinating challenge.

So good luck to all T189-ers for fantastic results

The End is Near

T189 Digital Photography Unofficial Forum

As the title of this blogpost says, it’s nearly all over now for the first presentation of T189

The announcement has appeared on my StudentHome page saying that the course website will be closing on August 31st and I imagine that we will lose access to OpenStudio at around the same time. So I went into OS and systematically saved each ‘week’ page to ensure I would have a record of the images I submitted for each week. Then I deleted each week’s images one after the other so my section of OS is now empty.

After that I went to the T189 website and clicked the link which allows each student to save a webpage containing all the images they’ve submitted to OpenStudio together with the comments made by other students on each one. That was a nice feature introduced in response to student requests so the course team/web developer were obviously listening to us.

The folder I created containing the nine OpenStudio pages with their image thumbnails together with the ‘digest’ version which contains the images at full size (480 pixels was the largest dimension allowed) was a fraction over 4Mb in total so not a huge download. It also means I can keep a good record of my OS contributions and comments for future reference

At the beginning of next month, the OU’s housekeeping department will (metaphorically speaking) be moving into OpenStudio and the website, cleaning and dusting and tidying it up ready for the October intake of new students, all eager and excited at the prospect of studying digital photography for ten weeks Good luck to all of them!

Many ex-T189 students remarked that they are feeling a bit ‘lost’ now that the course has finished. It takes a degree of discipline and dedication to study an Open University course and T189, despite only being a 10 week course, is no exception. Some already have their next course lined up, some were doing other courses alongside T189 and are continuing to study, others (like me) are still undecided and have yet to commit themselves.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my blog and, if you decide to take T189, I promise you’ll find it interesting, challenging and inspiring

When it’s all over …

… it’s not unusual to feel slightly down and loose-endish. I’ve come to expect this at the end of a course so I wasn’t surprised when today’s rather gloomy and damp weather seemed to mirror my mood. Sometimes there’s this odd aimlessness which follows the final exam or submission of an ECA and it might take a day or so to adjust to ‘normal living’ again

Many students will already have decided to continue with their Open University studies and might even have registered for their next course. Some, like me, might be taking the summer off because of family and work responsibilities with a view to possibly signing up again in the autumn. Others might just have done one single course and don’t intend to do any more. That’s one of the great things about being an OU student

One of the best things about studying with the Open University is the amazing sense of camaraderie and mutual inter-student help that marks many of the course conferences. Admittedly, some courses have very quiet conferences but some, like T189, are characterised by lively exchanges and extensive information sharing. Many strong friendships can be forged that transcend the course itself. So it’s hardly surprising that some students are now posting messages of thanks which include rather plaintive questions about how long the course conferences will be accessible on First Class. The usual time is six to eight weeks after the course finishes but I’ve noticed that the T189 conferences have become noticeably quieter towards the end of this week.

So I decided to create a message board which past T189 students can use after our course conferences are closed. It’s not restricted to those who have already studied T189 – everyone is welcome whether they’ve signed up for the second presentation in October or are thinking of taking the course at some time in the more distant future.

I’ve tried to cover all topics and I’ve added a Suggestion Box forum so that anything I’ve overlooked can be pointed out, discussed and (hopefully) implemented. There’s also an Informal Course Feedback forum where students who have taken part in the first time presentation (which wasn’t entirely trouble free …) can offer their suggestions for improvements and additions to the course team for future presentations. Please be courteous and constructive in your comments – this is not a place for disputes.

T189 Digital Photography Unofficial Forum

There are lots of free message board systems out there but I opted for Yuku which, although still in beta, does offer a lot of options. I’ve deliberately made the board open to everyone so you don’t have to register for a Yuku account to read and participate. Hopefully it will be easy to use …

Note that this is an UNOFFICIAL board which is not affiliated to the Open University in any way. Any views expressed within the forums are those of the original poster. Please treat others with respect and courtesy.

See you there

Success, frustrations and ideas

I’m writing this offline using Notepad because it’s been a MOST frustrating day. Since midmorning today, my ISP (Tiscali) has been repeatedly timing out, dropping my internet connection, suddenly dying but apparently not being disconnected, and returning ‘Remote server did not respond’ messages. I confess I muttered more thana few mild imprecations at the distant server (images of Dastardly and Muttley float into my mind here … ) The thought of these problems continuing through the weekend was not a pleasant prospect. I even resorted to my reserve 56k dialup connection to visit Tiscali’s homepage (oh, it’s so painfully slow after broadband …  ) and check on server status. This morning it admitted rather grudgingly to only 80% efficiency on its internet connection but by this evening it was claiming 100% …. yeah, right!

So, with only 72 hours until the T189 ECA deadline, I decided I had no choice but to get my skates on. Cue a frantic afternoon juggling images in slideshows, editing and polishing the written answers, converting my Works word processor document into the requisite .doc format which can be read by the Assessors, spellchecking and proofreading, formatting and zipping ……. finally, at exactly 21.23 this evening, I managed to submit the T189 End of Course Assessment. It took me two reboots and many attempts to connect but eventually Tiscali obliged by squeezing out ten minutes online for me … before dying again I printed out a hardcopy of the written part of the ECA then also backed the whole lot up to a CD AND Goliath, our external hard disk, just because I’m paranoid.

One unfortunate student reported on the T189 conferences this week that her laptop had been stolen and she hadn’t backed up for three weeks So she’d lost the bulk of the work she’d done on her ECA together with all those irreplaceable images taken over these three important weeks of the course. It is a painful but salutory lesson – not only to suffer the indignity and trauma of someone breaking into your house but also the loss of property that holds data far more valuable than the thieves could have imagined. Fortunately it looks like she will get an extension for submitting her ECA due to exceptional circumstances. She’s also had her laptop replaced and is now gearing up to tackle the final stretch.

Now I can’t get a squeak out of Tiscali so I’m giving up until later…..

Just one final quick footnote: I’ve just registered the domain name www.t189digitalphotography.co.uk and I was thinking of creating a simple ‘portal’ website where information, links, useful resources, websites, blogs etc can be collected together for the purpose of helping future T189 students. I also thought a message board might be a good idea so T189 -07E students can keep in touch and give help and advice to folks thinking of taking the course. What do you think? Any ideas … suggestions … brickbats …. I need some feedback here

Back!

It’s now just gone 9pm and I’ve been up since 5.30am so apologies if this post seems to be a bit disjointed. I don’t think or write very well when my brain needs sleep …

I confess that I am faintly dismayed by the number of students on the OU T189 conferences and also on Flickr who are celebrating having sent their ECA After seven years of OU study, I thought I was pretty much immune to the feelings of panic, indecision and anxiety that seem to invade the consciousness of a student nearing the submission date for an ECA when surrounded by students who have already completed it.

So I’m sternly telling myself that I took my draft ECA away with me on my laptop and gained valuable insight and feedback from various family members as we travelled upcountry and back down again. The deadline isn’t until midday on Monday 16th so I still have plenty of time. Creating the slideshow in Acrobat format wasn’t difficult and I’ve done a fair amount of zipping and despatching of zipped files through the OU’s electronic TMA (tutor marked assignment) system so neither of those pose any problems. Writing has always come pretty easily to me and 200 words x 3 isn’t exactly taxing. But still there’s this still small voice inside telling me that I’m behind everyone else …

Part of the problem is the conflicting feedback that I’ve been getting on OpenStudio and on Flickr. One image may be a ‘hit’ on Flickr but a ‘miss’ on OpenStudio AND vice versa. This brings all sorts of doubts and anxieties bubbling to the surface and it’s induced a sort of paralysis over the final choice of ten for the panel. I thought I had it pretty much sussed out but now I’m not quite so sure. I was planning to drop the Ripe Golden Pear in Sunshine which, although nice, hadn’t received much feedback and replace it with the rather more dramatic Evening Storm Cloud.

But now the pear has gathered some very favourable comments on OpenStudio and I’ve been thrown into indecision

The other “not sure” has been the dramatic blood red amaryllis close-up (image on a previous post) which was raved over on Flickr, gathering several ‘awards’, but managed only one single comment on OpenStudio. Talk about conflicting views! I was wondering whether to replace it with another moody grey evening sea image (probably one of the week 4 images either Porthloo at Dusk or Steely Sky) … but would that be too much sea in my panel? Would the poor assessor have to reach for the Kwells to stave off seasickness?

As you can tell, I’m both tired and confused. I think I need to sleep on it and return refreshed to the fray later this week….

Flummoxed …

I just popped in to check on my blog one last time before I shut down the computer and finish off the packing ready to go away this evening and I was … well … I think ‘gutted’ might not be too strong a word … when I read a comment made in response to my previous post. I’ll paste the comment and my reply just to make sure they don’t get overlooked.

Your pictures are very very good. Loved the waves crashing on the stones, especially. But what I really want to say is, that I’m very glad I happened upon your blog, because I did consider doing T189, but now I’m really pleased I didn’t, because I’d be so embarrassed by the inadequacy of my photos, if your standard is anything to go by!

Comment by nomdeplume — July 7, 2007 @ 10:00 am

Oh No! nomdeplume, I’m writing this blog in the hope that people will be inspired to take the course, so it’s really upsetting and disappointing to read that you’re PLEASED you didn’t do T189 because you feel your photos are inadequate

Surely the whole point of taking a course like this is to improve your photography and creative skills? If you start from a high point, where do you go from there? Better to start from not-so-good photographs and end up with brilliant photographs.

I don’t think I would have managed to produce the ten ECA images if I hadn’t done the course. Part of T189 is learning how to correct and enhance your images using Elements 5 – it’s astonishing what you can do to rescue a so-so image. If you saw my ten images before I edited them, you wouldn’t be quite so embarassed – trust me!

It’s a striking fact that lots of students are now posting delighted comments on our conferences about how much they have improved and how much the standard of photography has rocketed between weeks 1 and 9. That’s what we all hoped for when we signed up for the course!

Please think again and consider signing up for T189 – I PROMISE you won’t regret it …

Almost crunch time!

Trust me, it’s a challenging process trying to whittle down your T189 portfolio to just ten images to submit for the ECA!

I selected about fifty images that I thought had potential, trawled OpenStudio and Flickr to glean further inspiration then narrowed the choice down to about twenty. We aren’t compelled to submit ten images using completely different techniques but I felt it was probably best to select ten that illustrated various important aspects of digital photography.

My problem was a portrait image. As I’ve mentioned before, my family runs a mile if I point a camera at them so I had to resort to an archive image. Christmas proved a particularly good source of images because people are generally relaxed and happy, less likely to bolt at the sight of a camera. I narrowed it down to about four images … then two … then put them up on OpenStudio for other students to comment on … then narrowed it down to two … tried some of the editing techniques suggested to improve them … failed dismally on one but succeeded on another.

So, if you visit my Flickr photostream you can view the ten images that I think will probably be my final panel for the ECA submission. I say think because I’m well aware that an unfavourable response to any image may well see me reviewing my choices again.

Aqua Marina’s Photostream

But, since I’m away from home tomorrow evening until Wednesday lunchtime (and I intend to take my laptop so I can show my prospective ECA slideshow panel to family members to gather their opinions), I am planning to chill out a little, enjoy a few days away (collecting autistic daughter from college) and then return ready for the final push. So the ten images aren’t absolutely definite but they are pretty certain.

Let me know what you think of them, please?

Refreshing the memory

I decided this morning that I would revisit my OpenStudio weeks and re-read the comments that students made on my images just to refresh my memory. I also went through all the images on my Flickr photostream as well and did the same. It’s interesting that there isn’t necessarily a correlation between the two – an image that was liked on Flickr and got several comments might be languishing un-commented on OpenStudio. I’ve now got a good selection of ECA ‘possible’ images and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to choose between them.

I’d like to get a fairly broad selection of images rather than mainly macros or mainly landscapes. One of the trickiest subjects has been portraits which have been common amongst other student images but which I find very difficult, not only because I feel self-conscious about photographing other people but also because most of the folk I know would run a mile rather than let me take their photo! If I do manage to ‘snap’ someone it’s usually a spur-of-the-moment candid shot – grabbing the opportunity when it arises – so the images tend to be less than perfect technically but usually capture a great expression or a special moment.

The other problem I’ve had has been weighing up one image against another and trying to determine which one should be included in the ECA panel. It’s very difficult to make a decision when you’re comparing two very different images. Adding the potential for editing in the Elements digital darkroom just complicates the issue for me especially since I’ve not mastered all the techniques in the tutorials, especially the more complex week 8 techniques. Anyway I’ve always had problems making decisions and the final ten images for the panel is going to take a lot of time and deliberation.

We’re also going to be away for four days over the weekend so that raises the prospect of taking more photos which will then throw all my ECA panel plans into disarray!

Week 8 Assignment

Yes, I know, I’m a bit behind but the weather has been very changeable this weekend and The Artist hasn’t been able to get out and paint. Consequently he’s been working on the computer – catching up on the delicate task of balancing, resizing and adding text to images of paintings ready for printing on our professional giclee printer to sell in the Gallery.

So I haven’t had much time on the computer neither have I been very inspired to go out and take photographs. What is it about inspiration? It seems that either I’m full to overflowing with it or flat as a pancake (mixed metaphors, I know …) Anyway, I’ve been suffering from a badly blocked right ear and my hearing and balance are both affected so I’m due to visit the Health Centre for a ‘de-coke’ tomorrow morning. I intend to take my camera on the walk there and back – if the weather is halfway decent (as it might be according to the Met Office) I might get some good shots en route …

This evening I’m re-reading the week 8 assignment and spending some time online.

Your central task in this week’s assignment is for you to put into practise better commenting and critiquing of others’ images. Constructive criticism is a powerful tool – both for the giver and the receiver of it.

Spend at least 1 hour this week giving constructive criticism on the photos in your group. Share at least three images that you have created by using some of the advanced image editing taught in the course and use the rest to share any other images you wish. To help you focus and improve your commenting, use the language and terminology in the criteria on visual awareness and technical quality used in the ECA. This in turn will help you prepare for your own ECA as well as next week’s assignment.

 

As I’ve mentioned before, constructive criticism is a tough call. I’ve been reading around various photography forums and camera websites and almost everyone seems to agree that it is beneficial but it can be surprisingly tricky to get right. So this evening I’ve settled for browsing the images that have already been submitted by my Week 8 group and admiring their efforts. I try and comment on some of the images that haven’t received comments yet – usually they’re the ones that you look at and think “What do I say about this and how do I phrase it constructively?” as you scratch your head.

 

In the meantime, I thought it might be interesting to post some raw statistics about OpenStudio. Bear in mind that these statistics have been produced about two weeks before the end of the course so they are by no means definitive. But they give an insight into MY experience of OpenStudio.

 

My Photos

• Week 1 -  10 images submitted – 5 received comments
• Week 2 – 10 images submitted – 4 received comments
• Week 3 – 10 images submitted – 7 received comments
• Week 4 – 10 images submitted – 9 received comments
• Week 5 – 10 images submitted – 6 received comments
• Week 6 – 10 images submitted – 5 received comments
• Week 7 – 10 images submitted – 0 received comments

(I haven’t submitted any images for Weeks 8 and 9 yet!)

My Groups

• Week 1 Group – 21 students – 186 images submitted
• Week 2 Group – 20 students – 164 images
• Week 3 Group – 20 students – 163 images
• Week 4 group – 20 students – 109 images
• Week 5 Group – 20 students – 116 images
• Week 6 Group – 20 students – 81 images
• Week 7 Group – 20 students – 60 images
• Week 8 Group – 20 students – 86 (to date – 2nd July 2007)
• Week 9 Group – 20 students – 104 (to date – 2nd July 2007)

Now I’m off to track down and copy my ECA possibles to a CD-RW so I can work on son’s computer tomorrow because it looks like The Artist will be working on the Office Computer….