1. AO4- Review the project

2. How did you plan your time? Before I started the extended project I created a Gantt chart so I could plan my time effectively and efficiently. I thought that by creating a Gantt chart it would make it easier for me in the long run. I didn’t really keep to the Gantt chart as I spent longer on research than I had originally planned, after I had finished the research I kept to the planned time scale for production and pre production. I think that having the Gantt chart did help me, I knew what I would be doing and what dates I would be doing them around.

3. Throughout the project I have ran into a few problems, some of the smaller ones being with networking sites and the major ones with exhibiting the work. Problems that I have encountered with networking site have usually been when I couldn’t sign up to them or had a few technical problems with servers. Twitter and Audioboo were the two main site I had problems with, twitter wouldn’t let me register with them claiming that my email account was invalid and audioboo wouldn’t allow me to upload audio to it. That caused a few problems when having to record things were part of my brief. What difficulties did you experience and how did you overcome them

4. The major problem that I had was trying to find a place to exhibit my work. When I finally found a gallery, The Zion Arts Centre, I thought that things would work out. When originally trying to meet up with the curator of the gallery there was a lack of knowledge on the destination on my behalf and some major communication issues that forced me to have to head back. Once I had finally met with the curator everything was sorted out for when the exhibition would go up. Come the week of the exhibition there were some printing issues that meant the photographs wouldn’t be ready for the date. After this I decided that it would be best for me to put the photographs up in college. Continued

5. For my research I mainly used websites. I used websites as I couldn’t find a variety of books on the Photographers I wanted to research. I think that given the chance to find more books on Photographers I am interested in, the research man have been stronger. However I did manage to get a few books for research, there wasn’t many that I could find but they gave me more precise information. Even though I had a lack of research techniques I personally believe that my research was good, I got the information that I needed to complete my project and that helped me a lot. How thorough is your research

6. My final outcomes are not what I originally intended them to be, my original idea was to have photographs from a few genres of photography. Conceptual photography was supposed to be a big part of my original idea and so was pinhole photography and portraiture. I never got round to doing conceptual photography, I think that I got a bit carried away with Long Exposure. When it came to pinhole photography I bought two pinhole cameras but never got the hang of it. I also do not have access to a dark room so there wouldn’t have been a way for me to develop the frames. Are your final outcomes what you originally intended or are the different

7. After taking the majority of my photographs I decided that there would be no need to take portraitures as a theme had started to develop and they wouldn’t have fitted in. Even though my final outcomes weren’t what I had originally intended for them to be I personally believe that what I have now is stronger than what I was originally intending to do. As the assignment when on I started to learn more about photography and what I liked about photography. Continued

8. At the beginning of the extended project I hadn’t had any experience in managing my own project, coming from previous projects where there is a set task/brief I found it quite daunting and couldn’t see myself completing it to the best of my ability. As I went on I found that it wasn’t that bad and I had skills in time management that helped me structure what I would need to do. My knowledge in photography has been given a massive boost as I had to find everything out myself; this also gave me more confidence in myself and my ability as a photographer. What skills (project management, research, production and reflection) have you developed through doing the extended project

9. As I had to exhibit the work at the end of the project I had to arrange this myself, having never previously done this before I hadn’t a clue where to start. After doing a bit of research I felt able to arrange the exhibition. I have developed personal skills in photography and setting up an exhibition, the extended project has made me stronger in these points. continued

10. To gain feedback on my final outcomes I used various different methods; an online survey, deviant art and paper format questionnaires. Deviant art is a website where artist of all kinds upload their work to, there is an option to leave comments underneath the art in question, I posted work that I didn’t use in the exhibition and these images were the ones with comments on them. There is an option to get critical advice on deviant art but you have to become a premium member which I am not. How have audiences responded to your final outcomes

11. Due to not getting much feedback on deviant art I then turned to creating a paper format questionnaire. I handed only a few of these out as people were not interested in participating in it. I wasn’t to bothered about this fact as the exhibition was in college and there wouldn’t be many people, other than teachers, that I would be able to get professional feedback from. Continued

12. Taking this into account I decided that I would create an online survey and post it on to professional photography sites. By doing this I would be able to obtain professional feedback from people who are in the business and know what they are talking about thus giving appropriate feedback. The sites I sent the questionnaire out to were www.dpreview.com and www.talkphotography.com. This method was the easiest and I had a good response from other users of these sites. The questionnaire consisted of 6 questions, they were; Continued

13. Of the 71 responses that I received all of them answered this question. 42 of these 71 replies said that they preferred the ‘Equilibrium’ series, 28 of them said ‘The Night’ and 1 said Neither. Which series do you prefer, 'Equilibrium' or 'The Night'?

14. What would you rate this series on a scale of 1-10 I wanted to know what people thought of the series that the preferred so I included this question. The response was mainly good, there were a few people who didn’t rate the series highly.

15. I tried to capture the atmosphere of the night, would you agree that I have achieved this? I asked this question as it was an aim of mine to capture the atmosphere of the night, as you can see from the chart below 57.7% of the people agreed that I manages to do this, however there was a total of 18.3% of people that did not agree with this statement.

16. I asked this question as I wanted to get the general opinion of whether people thought that this series was effective. The majority of people agreed with this statement. Do you think that the use of symmetry in the ‘Equilibrium’ series is effective?

17. Do you think that the use of black and white in the ‘Ancoats canal’ photograph is effective? I put this question in the questionnaire as I wasn’t too sure about this photograph, that majority of people believed that it was effective.

18. I wanted to have an open question for people to be able to answer freely and give their exact opinion on my photography. After reading through all of the comments left, there is some good and bad feedback left. As I intended, people have left tips and corrections that I could make to the images and things that are wrong with them. This sort of feedback is what I was looking for as it is specific and tells me exactly what is wrong with it. There were a couple of people who did not like my photography at all, these people leaving comments such as ‘Don’t give up the day job’ and ‘Step one is learning the basics’ there are others that are good ‘I really enjoyed viewing your images. My only critism is the sloping horizon on the canal shot.’ It is these sort of comments that I was looking for. From the feedback I have received it seems that I have been only partially successful in completing the aims and objects of my project. After viewing my exhibition pieces do you have any comments to add?

19. If I were to be given another chance to do the project I would do more research into how to exhibit photography pieces, by doing so I believe that I would then have had prepared myself better for this task, I was unaware of what needed to be done and what goes into organising an event as such as that. I would plan my photographs better, getting stories behind them. In the feedback it is said a few times that it seemed as if the ‘photographer is just randomly shooting’ if I were to plan properly what I wanted to capture then I would perhaps have been able to make a stronger connection between the photographs and the audience. What would you do differently if you were to do the extended project again

20. Overall I am happy with how I have mange this project. Considering I have never had complete control over projects of this scale, I managed my time efficiently and effectively, I hadn’t fallen behind with the production or pre-production which made it a lot easier to keep on top of. I had run into a few problems throughout the project but I overcame them and came up with alternative solutions and got on with the project. I am happy with the final outcomes I have produced and I have received a good quantity of feedback from people in the field. Conclusion