Ways of Seeing Response:

        It is amazing how perspective can produce a realistic image. Watching this video I never realized how much zooming in at a photo or zooming out could change the whole meaning or interpretation of that photo. I remember talking about how a piece of art is interpreted differently by which context it is viewed in when I was in Art History last semester. By not seeing the original piece of art or by not seeing it in its original context takes away from the interpretation and the experience. Its meaning has become transmittable. I wish I was able to travel more too see the original art pieces. I could not even imagine how amazing that would be. The picture itself produces so much emotion and meaning by its composition and details. I thought it was interesting that background music can change the mood of a painting so drastically. I had never thought of that before. That is why it is so important for the artist to arrange the composition and all the finer details so that they get the viewer to recognize what they want them to recognize or make the viewer feel how they want the viewer to feel. Towards the end of the video I was impressed by how the children interpreted Carivagio's painting. They picked up on so much detail, some things that I, myself, would not have picked up on. I will now be skeptical of how images are arranged because we only see what the artist wants us to see.

Susan Sontag's "On Photography":

        The introduction to this piece really got me thinking about how much photography has been and is being used around the world. It seems that we used it to document everything now. But of course it is probably the easiest and most straight forward way to document a place, person, or event. Especially in today's society where everything is electronic and no one really uses books or paintings anymore. I am just an amateur photographer. I have job shadowed a photographer once and did not really get anything out of it. I know nothing about photography. Reading these articles doesn't help me learn how to photograph, but they give me a better insight on how photography has changed over the years and to tell me why we photograph things in our lives. In the article I liked when Sontag mentioned that photography gives us the sense that we can hold the whole world in our heads. Photography gives people power over being able to capture so many things that other people are not able to see. Photography is in some cases a way of note-taking for many reasons, like Sontag said. I found it interesting that Sontag said, "A photograph is not an accident", and also that "There is an element of luck in most great pictures". I have not gotten the element of luck yet, but hopefully with this project and a few photo classes I will be lucky enough to get some great shots.

Roland Barthes "Camera Lucida":

        What I really found interesting in Barthes's article was his own opinion on what a photograph was to him. He was not speaking for anyone else, but himself. I guess his voice spoke to me through this article than the others. I also thought the fact when Barthes's stated, "The date belongs to the photograph: not because it denotes a style, but because it makes me lift my head, allows me to compute my life, death, inexorable extinction of the generations." Just reading how he interprets a photo really started to get me thinking of how and why I interpret photos. He gave me things to think about for the next time I look at a photo; from past or present. "The photograph's presence is to ratify what it represents." He is saying that a photo is simply just a photo, it "fills the sight by force." I take it from reading this that Barthes is not necessarily a big fan of photographs, and to hear the complete opposite from the other articles, it makes my mind wander. In some ways I can agree with Barthes, but in other cases I cannot. I only see the history within photos, but Barthes sees violence.