{"id":21,"date":"2024-10-21T21:25:59","date_gmt":"2024-10-21T21:25:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freestyleacademy.rocks\/~SophieL\/?page_id=21"},"modified":"2025-06-05T23:39:40","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T23:39:40","slug":"explorations","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/freestyleacademy.rocks\/~SophieL\/explorations\/","title":{"rendered":"Explorations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Explorations project introduced juniors to the question, “How can you find, explore, and\/or expand your passion?” Each student would explore their own passion and improve on a particular skill set that addresses the 21st Century Skills<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For my Explorations project, I focused on addressing the 21st Century Skill of visual literacy<\/strong>. Specifically, I decided to create a macro photography series of 4 photographs, focusing on the elements of nature which are Fire, Water, Air, and Earth. I chose to do macro photography because although I have some experience with photography in general, I\u2019ve never done macro photography before and I thought the Explorations project would be a good opportunity for me to experiment with it further. Furthermore, I chose to focus on the elements of nature because I thought they would be a good fit for a series of photographs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Process<\/h2>\n\n\n
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Mood Boards<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The first part of my process was creating mood boards for each of the 4 elements. These helped me visualize the type of feeling I wanted to go for in each photo and were a good source of inspiration as well. For fire, because I couldn\u2019t photograph a natural fire, I decided to use a lit candle as my subject, and wanted to go for a soft yet mysterious feeling. For water, originally I wanted to photograph a body of water with a serene and calm feeling, however the final product is very different from my initial idea. For air, I wanted to photograph blowing plants or falling leaves to give a refreshed feeling, and for earth I wanted my subject to be a plant sprout to convey the idea of growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photos taken at Filoli<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

After creating the mood boards with inspiration, I used two different locations to shoot: Filoli Gardens and outdoor areas around my home. While I was taking photos, I was mainly experimenting with the macro lens and using any subject I thought could potentially be used for one of the four elements. Then, I used Adobe Bridge to look through my photos and decide on the final photograph for each element. During this process, I was looking for the images that effectively conveyed the feeling and aesthetic I was going for, and not only had a good technical composition, but were interesting and allowed for interpretation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Edits for Air<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Edits for Water<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Edits for Earth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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Finally, I edited the final photos in Adobe Photoshop and adjusted settings such as exposure, brightness, contrast, vibrance, and saturation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Final Production<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

My final production consists of the four final photographs and my Explorations Presentation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fire<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Water<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Air<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Earth<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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