The Methodology Project

The next path on our journey involves something called the Methodology Project!

This project enables you to bring the aspect of focus but into detail, environment and the object itself.

For one of my Methodology Projects, I decided to go with the Municipal building in St. Charles, IL.

I chose the building because of its environment. It is located right off the Fox Valley river.

Finding Your Project

1. Find an object you want to photograph

2. Look at the object from point of views you never thought of before

3. Look at the detail of the object and capture it

4. Take a look on what drew you into the object and take a picture of the object itself

5. What does the environment look like and how does the object fit in?

The Object

When taking a picture of the object, making sure you get all the points of the object. This way your viewers can see what the object is and later see the different aspects of said object.

The subject doesn't have to be a building. It can be anything you want it to be!

If you want the subject to be a person or even, say, a dog, you can still show what the object looks like as a whole. You would then have to find how to show detail on them and what does their environment mostly consist of.

You can have your subject even be an apple and bring it to life through the camera.

Detail Shots

So, what exactly do I mean by a detail shot? This shot shows the object up, close and personal on details that might not be quite as prominent in the regular object shot.

With this detail shot, it shows the building from a different angle and point of view.

The details of the building are being shown to where the viewer can see what the windows really look like and the cracks on the cement on the building.

You may have noticed that the sky all of a sudden looks darker than the object picture. If this happens to you, don't threat.

Your camera does this in order for the bright background to not take over your subject. It was an extremely bright, sunny day with not clouds when I took this.

So, when you are trying to come up with what you want to do for your details shots, try to find a way where you can really see and understand more about the object.

Environment Shot

Now, the environment shot and can above and beyond to what it means. For example, the picture above shows a little aspect of what the environment of this building is like.

However, showing the fox to represent the buildings environment is still appropriate.

The fox represents St. Charles' "Pride of the Fox" and the fox river, which is right where the object is located.

You can show it's environment with an object as simple as this, or you can show it's environment as a whole, etc.