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Part 1
Prepare for Active Learning![]()
Chapter 1
Know Your Audience
The Photo Student
Everyone is a Photographer
Everyone is a photographer, from a 21st-century student’s point of view, in that they have the means and ability to capture digital images. Much of a student’s experience of the world and their relationship to it are facilitated through photography. In addition to viewing the world through images, students interact globally by creating user-generated content that communicates their ideas, feelings, and perceptions of the world (Wyrwoll, 2014). One way this is accomplished is by posting images on Instagram. The Pew Research reported that, “For the first time, roughly half of internet-using young adults ages 18–29 (53%) use Instagram. And half of all Instagram users (49%) use the site daily” (Duggan, Ellison, Lampe, Lenhart, & Madden, 2014). As a result, the term photographer has taken on a much wider spectrum of possible meanings. The spectrum ranges from phonographer to Photographer (with a capital “P”) where phonographer is someone who casually snaps photos with the camera on their phone and Photographer as being a more elite, authoritative title.
One of the differences between these distinctions lies in the purpose behind the image-making. A study on smartphone photographers conducted by researchers from Hewlett-Packard Labs and Microsoft Research reveals that, “The most common social reason for capturing an image was to enrich a mutual experience by sharing an image with those who were present at the time of capture” (Kindberg, Spasojevic, Fleck, & Sellen, 2005). The study went on to point out that image-makers commonly extend their mutual experience by sharing photos with others through social networks. The above research also verifies the presumption that phonographers have little interest in printing their digital captures. For them, the quality of an image produced with their phone is good enough for achieving the intended end result.
Many Photographers believe there is a distinct difference between a phone camera user and a Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) user. It is like the difference between using one’s hand to throw a bullet and using a gun to shoot a bullet (Hanselman, 3/21/15). The Photographer is understood to be a person who generally utilizes prosumer or professional quality cameras, which could include a DSLR, medium- or large-format camera (either digital or film based) in order to capture high-quality, editable images. Photographers seem to be motivated to make deliberate, compelling, and communicative photographs in digital and/or print formats, for the eyes of a discriminating audience or clientele. They have a great concern for expressing their awareness to light in a way that communicates personal vision. The spectrum that separates these two extremes can be understood in terms of the purpose, methods, and approaches for making images.
The term iPhonographer, coined by Glyn Evans in 2008, has traditionally fallen at the amateur, consumer end of the scale. The name was coined to distinguish those smart phone users who have available “thousands of photo apps that allow us to process and share our art using only an iPhone” (Yawnick, 2012). Marty Yawnick also believes that the term refers to large numbers of people who contribute to giving the title iPhonographer instant recognition. As a result, he points out that, “Recognition helps give us credibility.” David Roccato believes that iPhonography implies a combination of “art and photography” (Boogar, 2012). In a 2013 Apple iPhone 5 television commercial, the narrator adds further credibility to the title iPhonographer by pointing out that, “Every day, more and more photos are taken with the iPhone than any other camera.” Research conducted by Michael Zhang even proves Apple’s claim to be true (2013). In the end, there is little to separate iPhonographers from the popular masses of phonographers, or cell phone image-makers.
Most beginning photography students will tend to fall on the phonographer end of the spectrum, with very little understanding of what it would mean to become a Photographer, or what the study of photography as a discipline actually entails. The typical phonographer will not be familiar with aperture, shutter speed, the history of photography, or what it means to critique an image. They will have limited experience with the rigors of technical mastery, editing, presentation, or visual literacy. Though they will be very adept in using photography as a socially communicative, performative tool, they will not realize the creative journey involved in a constant, ongoing practice of deliberately making images to discover and establish one’s distinctive voice.
New learners will not be able to “identify what is essential to an idea, vision, association or functional characteristic so that it can be communicated, embodied or designed in a medium” (Jaffe, Barniskis, & Cox, 2013). Photo-educator Michael Stone recommends that, when teaching Millennials, “Deliver material as if you’re teaching your undergraduate self what you didn’t know when you didn’t know it. Everyone has to start somewhere, and it should be assumed that students are coming into a subject from scratch—not elementary school scratch, but intellectual scratch” (2/22/15).
Digital Natives, Millennials, Tech-Savvy Learners, and Everyone Else
The students who register for academic photography courses are extremely diverse. In US high schools, community colleges, four-year degree colleges, and universities, students represent a population that ranges in age anywhere from fourteen to ninety. Cultural, ethnic, and racial diversity among students can also be common at institutions. A given photo class may have a mixture of local, out-of-state, and/or international students. Given the impossibility of generalizing a set of typical characteristics for this student body, it could only be said that they are alike in that they have some degree of interest in photography. And even that statement may not be completely accurate. In light of this situation, it would be most helpful to focus on qualities of the most common, average photography student who is either at the end of their high school experience or is in college, ranging in age from sixteen to twenty-one.
Marc Prensky broadly describes these students as “digital natives.” Prensky points out that, “They have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age” (2013). One study, by Harris Interactive, revealed that a greater majority of students polled “believe that mobile devices will change the way students learn in the future (92 percent) and make learning more fun (90 percent)” (Aspey, 2013). An important part of their digital repertoire is the ubiquitous camera on every smartphone.
One study reports that, of those born from 1980 to 1999, they keep their phones close, with “80% sleeping with their cell phone next to the bed” (US Chamber of Commerce Foundation, 2009). And though this also means they are sleeping next to their cameras, they do so because the smartphone is a multi-functional device students view as “part of their identity” (Silberman, 2015). The phone is their clock (most Millennials do not wear watches), alarm clock, and video camera. Also, the phone is a GPS system that gives students driving directions, it is their calendar, credit card, and access to texting, email, music, games, video conferencing, social network sites, and search engines. With it they can show others their personal portfolio on their websites. The camera, in this context, is only one aspect of the smartphone that connects so strongly with Millennials’ aforementioned identity.
Phones: The New Cameras
For students of photography, their take on cameras and image-making has changed radically over the last twenty-five years. In 1993 US photographers used single lens reflex (SLR) cameras along with a variety of other analogue cameras to make 18.4 billion images (Martin, 1994). In comparison, reporter Ben Zigterman estimates that the “Number of photos taken in 2014 will approach 1 trillion.” Zigterman goes on to theorize that much of the reason for this estimate is due to “the proliferation of smartphones with front-facing cameras. . . . And with apps like Snapchat and Instagram that encourage people to take photos of themselves” (2013). Stan Horaczek reported on the Popphoto.com website that, in 2013, 200,000 photos were being uploaded to Facebook every minute (2013). The cameras used to make these images are a combination of point-and-shoot, digital single lens reflex (DSLR), and, prominently, the phone cameras skillfully manipulated by digital natives.
For the digital native, buying a camera may not seem necessary because a phone camera offers many advantages over a single-purpose device. Based on research, the primary purpose of smartphone cameras is for social interaction. Students use phone cameras mainly to preserve memories, to sustain relationships, for self-presentation, and for self-expression (Van House & Davis, 2005). But, in reality, the smartphone camera is itself not a single-purpose instrument. For example, students commonly use phone cameras for taking notes during classes by photographing whatever has been written on a white-board. Also, 45 percent of young adult phone users pay their bills with their cameras (Mitek, 2015). By taking a photo of their bill, Mitek’s Mobile Photo Bill Pay® “technology automatically extracts relevant data from the paper bill and auto-populates the fields required to make a mobile payment” (Mitek Systems, 2/15/15). Furthermore, Google recently announced Im2Calories, an app that will not only allow users to photograph food but will also respond with a calorie count (Parkinson, 2015).
This shift in perspective illustrates the way the camera has become seamlessly integrated into mainstream student life as a familiar, multipurpose, largely disposable, yet indispensable tool used by digital natives to produce and distribute images with equal commitment to both face-to-face peers and virtual, online peers. Photos establish, maintain, and strengthen social bonds with no distinction made between face-to-face and online friends. For them:
the presence of the camera is natural, ordinary, and expected. In fact, online life is equally important as physical life. To classify physical life as “real” life assumes there is an unreal quality of a digital presence. For digital natives, this diminishment of the virtual feels largely untrue.
(Vigliotti, 2014)
Cameras are not only used to create visual content to be shared with friends, family, and strangers, but also to help manage a user’s personal life. Because of this evolution of perception, technology, and purpose, photography can no longer be seen as:
a uniform practice with a fixed cultural meaning: Photography is a complex and diverse practice across time and space, and it would be naïve to assume that all photographers confer the same meaning on photography or even that they are following the same practice . . . photography must be understood simultaneously as a social practice, a networked technology, a material object and an image.
(Sandbye & Larsen, 2014)
Benefits of Prior Experience
The good news for photo-educators is that a student’s limited experience with phonography may be the hook that causes them to want to learn more about the broader practice of photography. This may be the starting point from which photo-instructors can begin a more in-depth teaching/learning process. Smartphone cameras can serve as an appropriate introduction to photography because students can relate to their own prior knowledge of image-making. By activating prior knowledge, authentic and meaningful learning becomes more possible:
The goal is for the student to understand their own immediate world as potential source material by direct observation and research. Ultimately, I feel that the student’s own experience is their richest asset and I often encourage them to explore what they already know, their lives, and the world around them.
(Bruce Myren, 2/23/15)
Brain-based research confirms that:
Creating an opportunity to challenge our students to call on their collective experiences (prior knowledge) is essential. Through this process we move students from memorizing information to meaningful learning and begin the journey of connecting learning events rather than remembering bits and pieces. Prior knowledge is an essential element in this quest for making meaning.
(Christen & Murphy, 1991)
Once beginning students (phonographers) have attended a few classes, they can become overwhelmed by how much there is to know about the field and what is required of them creatively and intellectually. They may not realize that a photography course will be an experience with much more cognitive depth than what they are used to when freely snapping phone photos. This is even though this can be the perfect opportunity to realize that photography has the potential to be thrilling and rewarding as a tool to speak about those things that matter to them most.
At the same time, many students will experience a shift in the way they see the world. To illustrate this point, photo-educator Cindy O’Dell explains: ‘I also want all my students—no matter what their major, interests or expressed future goals—to become more visually cognizant and critical of the world around them” (2/22/15). This is where a passion for photography can take root. Passionate students are engaged students and can infect other learners with passion. Blake Fleischacker, in his inspirational TEDx talk, reminds students, “Passion is contagious.”
Phonographers do have some advantage in their study and practice of photography. Their prior experience will likely give them some degree of awareness about composing, visualizing, and capturing images. Students may even have some practice with basic editing. A recent Pew Research survey found that 26 percent of young adults have shared a “selfie” on social media (Pew Research, 2014) and an additional nationwide survey of 1000 women reported that 41 percent of women age 18–24 changed (edited) their own appearance by self-Photoshopping their self-portraits, or selfies (Dreisbach, 2012).
Some college students can be at an advantage by having taken a photography course in middle or high school. Many K-12 school systems offer digital photography courses and some still offer film/darkroom as part of their curriculum. A smaller, yet growing number of schools teach photography courses online. Teacher Suzanne Koett describes her middle school photo students as being “honest, insanely creative, expressive.” With her high school students she first helps them build their confidence. While she watches them evolve, she gets to “witness students challenge themselves artistically, become vulnerable and share a lot of themselves within their class setting” (Amynylund, 2012).
Outside of formal secondary education photo courses, s...
