A 4-Square Skills Check is a periodical check-in of your progress in photography, where you post new pictures of a portrait, a landscape, a still life, and another of the photographer's choice. The purpose of these Skills Checks is to evaluate your growth in those 4 categories, and compare your growth over the course of this year. In this skills check, I have finally figured out how to use lighting. To improve this skills check, I can plan my photos even better, by getting more objects for the still-life and by making sure my subjects are photograph-ready. Compared to the first skills check, in September, I have improved in my lighting and my use of the rules of composition, such as the rule of thirds and use of color. I can still improve on my subject use in my still life photos, as they are still bland.
I have accomplished a lot this year. At the beginning of this year, I was taking photos without real knowledge of how to manipulate ISO, aperture, shutter speed, and the like. I kept my camera on "auto" mode on pretty much all settings and used flash far too often. However, now, I never use "auto" and I know how to use those settings. I have used these skills to better my photographs in the specific fields I like most. However, I wish that I had learned more about low light photography and the best ways to take concert photos. I do still have a better idea of how to take them, though. I feel like I have grown very much, and I am very proud of my accomplishments.
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Overall, this skills check is much better than my last skills checks, as my photos use more creativity and use the rules of composition better. My portrait has good lighting, which is pretty rare for me. My landscape uses rule of thirds and leading lines. My "other" photo is creative, as it is a macro photograph of bubble wrap. My still life photo, however, still has yet to improve significantly as the lighting is fairly poor, as well as the composition. Compared to last skills check, my portrait has improved in lighting, my landscape has improved in use of the rules of composition, my still life has yet to improve in subject matter, and my "other" photo has improved in creativity and contrast.
I believe that this is one of my weaker skill checks. My lighting was fairly poor and the composition was not well thought out, but I do think my use of contrast was good. Compared to Skills Check #5, I had a lot less creativity this time and the photos had better lighting than this time, but I am very proud of my "other" category of this round, simply because it is my favourite type of photography and I think it turned out well. Next time, I will try to improve my lighting and my creativity.
Areas that have had growth are my creativity and my use of contrast and value. Areas that need improving are subject matter. In comparison to Skills Check #3, I have improved greatly in my portraiture. However, one thing that still needs improvement is my still life photography, and how I use lighting in them. Comparing to Skills Check #1, I have improved greatly. I now have an understanding of the Rules Of Composition, which I am using to my advantage. I still need to work on my lighting, and to do that, I plan on practicing a lot.
I have grown very much in my use of Depth of Field on my nature photos. I definitely need to improve basically everything with my portraits. I have improved in use of color from my 2nd skills check. The colors were fairly bland, but in this skills check, I have made sure that they are brighter and more realistic. Based on these last two checks, I still need to improve on my creativity with still life photos. I plan to practice taking still life photos more frequently so I can get familiar with it. I am most proud of my sunrise photo, as I had great use of color contrast and texture.
Comparing my first Skills Check to this one, I notice that I have much better use of the Rules Of Composition, value, contrast, and lighting. My photos are simpler, making them more visually appealing. However, I need to grow in my still life photos. I used pretty the same subject as I did last time because I have a hard time coming up with new ideas. I am most proud of my self portrait. I took many that night, and a good portion of them do not look like selfies.
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