Reflective Essay For Photography Class

During my sophomore year in high school, I chose to enter the Principles of Art, Audio, and Video Technology elective class, which taught the basics of photography, cinematography, and other arts associated with the two. Most people looked at the class as an unchallenging way to get out of taking an art credit; however, I wanted to use this class to pursue my passion of photography. As the school year was coming to a close, my teacher offered applications into the Commercial Photography class to individuals, like myself, that exhibited a substantial interest in the subject. Although I knew I could take pictures worthy of appeal, the competition was tough, which meant that I had to step my game up in order for my teacher to accept me into the
class. My teacher gave us a month to demonstrate our photography skills in our applications, while also giving us a list of themes that we would have to portray in our photos.
Sports, portraits, architecture, still life, I didn’t know where to begin! I decided to do contact my friend, Elysabeth, who was already in the commercial photography class so she could give me some tips for taking great pictures. She told me to start by a genre of photography that I had the most trouble in and work my way down to the easier categories. I took her advice and wow, did that help! Since I had the most difficulty in sports photography, I started with taking action-shots of the athletes at games, and they actually turned out all right, thanks to paying attention to my teacher in the Principles class. Then, I worked down to portraits and asked the most photogenic friends of mine to model for me. I used different angles of light and poses in order to use my photo characterize my friends as different emotions. Those photos turned out pretty well too; my confidence in my art increased when Elysabeth critiqued my pictures and told me that I had a good chance of making it into the Commercial Photography class. I was excited, but my challenges weren’t
over. I only had a week left to turn in my application, and I still had to take pictures of various architecture and still-life pieces, my anxiety washed over me like a tide in the ocean. “What was I going to do,” I thought to myself. I only had only one week, only seven days, only ten thousand and eighty minutes to finish; time was maliciously ticking against me. I started to buckle down and put everything I had into photography. I researched, I wrote down ideas, and I took photos, I didn’t focus on anything else. In retrospect, I realize that only focusing on my photography application was irresponsible, considering that my core classes were more important to my future goals, but it worked out. I won against time in this chess game of deadlines. In the whole week, I managed to shoot decent pictures of both architecture and still-life photography and my grades in my core classes didn’t suffer at all; time was working in my favor. Later on, I went back to Elysabeth to have her look over my photos and she told me that I had a knack for it. Things were turning out well. All I needed to do was to turn in my photos and my application in, and I was able to enter the fierce competition of the application stream. My teacher informed the applicants that those who made it into the Commercial Photography class would be announced by the end of the school year. My mind came across multiple bad thoughts, in which my self-conscious criticized my actions. What if I didn’t make it? What if my pictures weren’t good enough? The nervousness was eating me up, I didn't think I could make it to June and stay sane. Time flew by and June came earlier than I expected, luckily. The special date came and I ran to my teacher’s classroom where the list of students who made the cut for the Commercial Photography class was hanging. Like a robot, I scanned through the list and then finally, I saw my name. My name! I had made it! I couldn’t contain my excitement and I just started to laugh hysterically by the classroom door; I’m sure the students walking by me wondered what was wrong with me but I didn’t care. Next school year, I would be sitting in the class, expressing my art in form of pictures, I was the happiest girl in the world. Now, I am currently in the Advanced Commercial Photography class, and looking back made me realize how lucky I was to be apart of this opportunity. The struggle was worth it, because it pushed me into challenging myself, let me pursue my interests, and I made many wonderful friends who enjoyed the same thing that I did - sharing art. This class has taught me a lot like how to properly take a photo, how to communicate with others, and how to push my friends into the right direction when they need help. Although I spent a lot of time going around the city taking photos and turning them into my very own masterpieces, I gained much more: experiences, friends, memories, and the art we all shared.