Month: October 2018

Video can be found at https://www.instagram.com/p/BpEZY_RlG5q/?taken-by=nothing__but__doors)

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

This video was easy to film due to the handheld nature of the smartphone. With this type of camera it gives a first person point of view to this situation I was trying to capture. The recording required me to start inside a building, walk through a door and walk outside into a carpark to capture the shot. I opted for a portrait style video to make it seems like it wasn’t a structured and planned video as it is meant to portray a day-to-day issue some people have. Therefore in order to fulfil this, I think a portrait style video is more appropriate. I wanted to keep this video raw and unlike all my other posts, I did not add any filters or make any adjustments whatsoever. Which seems very foreign to me personally. I think you get into the habit of adding filters to everything across different social media platforms as they all give you the option to. So in a way it was refreshing not having to worry about making it “look good”. I recorded the shot in one continuous clip as I felt that would enhance the rawness I was going for. I also left the audio on for the same reasons to give it a more unplanned and unedited feel. With this post I decided to leave the default ‘cover’ again reinforcing my intentions.

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

I made it an important note to keep this footage raw, so I gave myself one shot to get it and if I didn’t get the exact shot I wanted, well that was that. To ensure I captured the shot I wanted, I did a practise walkthrough without recording to imitate what I would actually be doing when I hit record. Doing this helped me achieve the shot I envisioned. Most people would say, “Why didn’t you take multiple videos?” and thats a valid question but I wanted to set a challenge for myself to see if I could accomplish it. And I did, although I would’ve like more of the door and handle to be in the shot, I think you still get the message with the caption attached. “Is it push or pull?”

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other

social media services?

Much like the other posts, they were again shared to a twitter and tumblr account. Again due to the ease of clicking a button to share the same post across different platforms is almost too appealing as it is very convenient. I chose to not include hashtags for this last post to see if since my first post we would get some traffic due to the other posts that did. However since the account is very small I highly doubt we will see much interaction.

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

Still using the same smartphone as the previous posts, this photo required some movement one my part to achieve the correct angle. I had to get down lower to the ground in order to get this level shot. I tried multiple angels before I achieved this one above, that I thought encapsulated the idea I was going for. Since it was taken in daylight I did not have to use flash. One thing I did have to be careful of was the reflection of the car. I did not want the reflection to capture me taking the photo, as that would be distraction from the car door which is the subject of this photo. In Instagram I went for the square format as the other things in the frame if it was portrait would not add anything more to the visual, so I felt no need for it to be portrait. I edited the photo heavily with filters and adjustments. Below you can see the before and after. I altered the brightness, contrast, highlights and shadows, and added a diagonal tilt shift to draw the focus to the door itself. The tilt shift runs along a straight line from the wheel of the car to the door handle. Around that, the photo has a slight blur to draw attention to the focus of my photo. 

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

I took quite a few photos before I chose the final one. It was difficult because I had to chose an angle that communicated the idea I had in mind. Similar to in the week 10 photo post. I took multiple images from different angles. This time from higher up, from a more skewed angle to the subject and facing the subject front on. In the front-on angles, you could see my reflection in the car because of the finish coat on the car, which is something I honestly didn’t consider when envisioning the photo. Due to this I had to go for a more skewed angle to avoid this. The caption I added was “is it locked? or unlocked?”. Instilling a bit of mystery whether the car door is locked or unlocked. You would naturally assume a closed car door is locked if there is no driver around but this is not necessarily true and you wont know unless you try and open it. However in this case it was locked. 🙂

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other social media services?

I decided against any hashtags for this image to see if it could get any traction on its own. But since the account still doesn’t have an followers it is unlikely. I guess I just want to test whether it shows up in any searches without the help of hashtags. As per my other posts, this was too shared amongst my other social media, Twitter and Tumblr as there is no reason not to.

(Video can be watched at https://www.instagram.com/p/BpEZCOmFw8R/?taken-by=nothing__but__doors)

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

Being consists with all other posts and still using my smartphone to capture video. I used my camera application to record this video as I found it easier compared to using the video option in the Instagram app itself. I find it easier to capture what I want and then crop the video and then upload it to Instagram to ensure I end up with a post that I was aiming for. I positioned myself to get the most of the door in the start of the shot, so I had to stand quite a distance from it and then moved towards it as I walked through the door. I opted to keep this video the original format it was recorded in being a portrait style. As this is the default of the camera application on my smartphone. For video I did not edit it too much. I just turned up the brightness slightly and added a filter to make it visually more appealing. I muted the audio in this clip as it wasn’t necessary to the video and it was taken as one continuous shot. I chose to leave the ‘cover’ as the first frame as it makes sense in a sequential order.

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

I took a number of shots to see which one looked the best. I also had the added factor that it was recorded in a public place and that other people around could get into the shot or in my way whilst i was taking this shot. Since it was shot in a public place I had no issue adding the location for people’s interest before uploading the photo. I also added a caption but did not realise until after i posted it that it contained a typo. However this was an easy fix as I could just press the edit button on the post and correct my error. The caption I chose is a silly comment “magic self opening doors”.

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other social media services?

Continuing the trend of sharing to Twitter and Tumblr, I did just that with this post too. I also decided to add some hashtags to this post to attract more attention. The hashtags I chose were ones that have a huge number of followers and some do not necessarily relate to my post at all. I was curious to see if my post came up in these tags, if it would get likes even though it did not quite relate to the topic. The hashtags I chose were, #magic #instagood #me #follow #happy #tagforlikes #fun. Some of these are amongst the most popular hashtags and it will be interesting to see if I gain traffic this way.

 

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

Exactly the same as last weeks posts. I used the 12 megapixel rear camera on my smartphone which is a Samsung Galaxy S9. This week I am focusing on taking the photo with my camera application that comes with the phone and then uploading into Instagram. I took a number of photos from different angles. Some from a low angle looking up at the subject, some front on and these all captured the full shed in the original photos. When uploading the chosen photo into Instagram I could chose if i wanted a more portrait or default square format photo. I opted for the square format as I thought it complemented the subject when I cropped the original. I intended the photo to be relatively symmetrical as it is natural more visually appealing to the human eye. However the chains in the photo pull towards the right side of the photo it doesn’t disrupt my intentions too much. I then added a number of filters and made adjustments to the brightness, contrast, structure, saturation and added a slight vignette. All these enhance the photo from being dull to a more saturated and structured photo.

Comparing this process to other types of photography I have done. It is a good and easy way to capture and publish photos day to day. Depending on your intent on the photo, such as taking photos for a event with a DSLR camera, higher quality photos require a professional program such as Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop when working with clients. But again I think it all depends on the purpose of the photo. In saying that, I don’t think you can’t get professional looking photos through the a smart phone however it may be harder and more time-consuming.

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

In order to get this final photo, I took a number of photos and chose this one that I thought fit best. I had around ten images and from the ten I narrowed down the two best angles I captured and within those I then decided what I was truly trying to communicate to my audience. I had a low angle shot looking up from a bottom corner from the shed, which made it look huge and dominating in the frame. And then I had just a simple front-on shot that was focused on the lock and chain on the door of the shed. I felt that the other photo was communicating a more daunting image than I first intended. So with that in mind, I chose the front-on image which I then cropped to its final form as seen above. Similar to my photos last week, I did not think it was necessary to add a location as it wasn’t a key factor in what I was trying to communicate.

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other social media services?

I chose to distribute my image in the exact same way as I did last week. A simple and easy method of just selecting the other social media platforms to post to when doing the final steps in Instagram. That allowed for a consist post throughout my social media platforms. I chose to include hashtags in this image to see how much traction I could get compared to last weeks posts which did not include any hashtags at all. The hashtags were: #door (appropriate) #shed, #lock #chain #lockandchain #green (obvious) #whatsinside #mystery (everyone loves a mystery). Hopefully we will see a difference in traction compared to last weeks posts.

 

(Link to the video: https://www.instagram.com/p/Bo8NfYiFu3p/?taken-by=nothing__but__doors)

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

Using my smartphone, a Samsung Galaxy S9 with a 12 megapixel rear camera, I captured this video through the Instagram application. I stood very still to capture this video with minimal shaky footage. As this video was captured through the Instagram application, I could not crop the video to be shorter as it does not give you the option to do so. Instead you can just add a filter or chose which frame of the video will be the display image before someone hits play. Since I could not crop the video it did not turn out exactly as I wanted it to as I felt restricted but not having this function in the application.

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

Due to the subject in my video not co-operating all of the time (my dog). I had limited chances to get the clip I wanted. Since I restricted myself for this week to only use the app itself I only had one chance to get the footage. I spent about 15 minutes recapturing this video as between timing it correctly and getting my subject to listen to me was a challenge. Similar to the photo I published this week for the contents of the video I did not feel like a location tag was necessary at all. I added a slightly satirical caption, “Can’t have trouble opening a door when you aren’t the one opening it” followed by my student number as I wanted it to look like a direct quote from me. This is a mock to those typical inspirational captions you see that overly cheesy and sappy. However my caption is relevant to the topic at hand.

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other social media services?

Similarly to the photo posted also this week, I shared this video to Twitter and Tumblr. Again i found the ease of sharing through Instagram to be very quick and simply and requires minimal thought. It is a great way to get your content to a wider audiences. However with my accounts being brand new there is not really an audience for my content at the moment. But hypothetically with a well established accounts you can have quite a big reach.

1. How did you author (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

For week 9 I decided to only use the Instagram application itself to capture and edit the photo/video works to see how it impacts the final outcome.

The type of smartphone I used to take the photo is a Samsung Galaxy S9 that has a 12 Megapixel rear camera. To capture the photo I wanted the whole door to be in frame, therefore working with a square format I had to move my body backwards away from the door in order to fit it all in frame. Whilst usually with a portrait format in a normal photo taken by the camera app on the phone, I wouldn’t have had to do this. After getting the shot that I wanted, I then was prompted by Instagram to add filters and adjustments to the photo. I adjusted the photo by rotating it slightly so that the door was perfectly straight. I adjustment the contrast, structure, warmth and added a vignette and tilt shift. A tilt shift adds a slight blur around the chosen subject in a photo. In the photo above I added a vertical tilt shift to draw my audience’s attention to the door itself and not anything else in the frame.

The differences I noticed in this authoring process is that you can be limited in some aspects but due to the simple nature of the process it may be efficient. Depending on your purpose, you may find that it takes you longer to get the shot you need because of some of the constraints of the camera within the Instagram app itself. For example you cannot take a portrait style photo within the Instagram camera but you can take a portrait photo on the devices camera app and then upload that photo to Instagram. However for this assignment we were restricted to use of the Instagram applications on its own.

2. How did you publish (the photo or video) you recorded for upload to Instagram?

When publishing the above photo, it only took me about 5-10 minutes to capture the photo. I knew what I wanted the image to look like exactly so I had a clear vision. I chose to not add a location tag to my photo as the contents of my photo is very personal. This is the front door to my house so for obvious privacy reasons I do not feel comfortable even tagging a suburb and publishing it online. I added a caption “Lucky door No. 1” for the mere fact that the door has a metal number one on it. The caption I came up with reminds me of those old gameshows that used to have contestants guess the correct door to win a prize, but if chosen wrong they got a pity prize for being on the show. I kind of like the idea of no truly knowing what is behind any door (unless it is made of glass). We don’t know what we are stepping into each and every day and thats scary but somewhat exciting.

3. How did you distribute (the photo or video) you published on Instagram to other social media services?

I distributed the Instagram post to a twitter and tumblr account which both were extremely quick and simple. I shared my photo after I had already posted it on Instagram, however Instagram allows you to share to other platforms straight away right before posting the initial photo to Instagram. I went on the post I wanted to share and pressed the share button which automatically gives you a number of other platforms to share with. Twitter being the third option down, I selected it and it opened up the Twitter app and all I had to do was add another caption or tags if I wanted or simply press share, which in this case I did. Instagram have made distributing so easy between different social media platforms so if you do interact with more than one platform you don’t need to spend hours editing the same photo to just post it on another platform.