I was super interested to see what other people brought for their Pecha Kucha presentations. I picked someone on the easier side of being able to replicate their work easier for our mimesis assessment, Wes Ellis. However, I found myself super inspired by other people’s presentations, particularly ones that were low-light and neon-based, as I really enjoy playing around with illumination techniques and night-life photography. Jinli’s presentation particularly caught my eye, and I decided to deviate from my original plan and choose someone with a heavier focus on that style for my assessment. 

In the Tuesday exercise, taking one-hundred photos around the block, I tried to make a special emphasis on colour and settings, and deliberately manipulate settings with greater consideration for what I wished to achieve. This probably came out better in my weaknesses for photography: movement and shots that are blink-and-you’ll-miss-them types, because I was more acutely aware of how I was shooting. However, this probably let me down in the more stylised photos, because I was trying to shoot what I believe is ‘correct’ and what that environment calls for (as in, faster shutter speed in sports settings, for example), compared to what felt natural to me (leaving it on a slower shutter speed and controlling blur through playing with exposure). But I got some decent photos out of it, particularly when messing with the white balance and shutter speed; I found a 2900 white balance to be a whole new perspective for cityscapes I hadn’t considered, as it gave a gloomier, darker look, that challenged with Melbourne’s obsession for wearing black and our penchant for tall buildings, began to look at times quite uniform. The task was a good challenge, and even though I’ve been photographing for a long time, I definitely feel more in-tune with my camera and perhaps the capabilities (and limits) of it. It also makes me want to buy a mirrorless DSLR more than ever.