What I Saw And What I Missed
Back in part B, Joline had made a recommendation for me to dig into what makes these creatures relatable from a human perspective, and emphasize a sense of childlike wonder. I hope I’ve accomplished exactly that with the finished draft.
My goal for the narrative of this story was spontaneous, but still organized. The story doesn’t have an arc, but I tried to follow the same beats with each section: how the animals looked, the way they behaved, and how their behaviors were similar to those of humans. I also wanted to rely on detailed descriptions of places and characters to help set the scene, and really leaning into the imagination as to what these animals may have been thinking about their caretakers and onlookers. My intention wasn’t necessarily to anthropomorphize the animals, but instead provide readers with an avenue to empathize with them, and see themselves more as part of an interconnected web of life.
I didn’t really use any strict camera techniques while I was at the aquarium at the time, besides using the zoom function on my phone and casual angling to get a good view of each animal. Even though I can’t change anything about the base images, I was able to make some adjustments in Photoshop for the final website to make them more polished-looking. Some tweaks in contrast, brightness, and saturation helped to deepen the shadows and make sure the creatures’ vibrant colors weren’t totally drowned out by the aquarium lighting. I also tried out some sharpening and noise reduction filters, to make each picture a little more crisp detail-wise. When I added them to the page, I made their slides half-image and half-text, with the image alternating sides to simulate the tank-lined aisles in the aquarium.
Projects That Inspire Me
I loved reading Phoebe’s story, The Indelible Contours of Home. The way she framed all those beautiful photos of her family home, paired with the emotionally-rich mini stories about seemingly mundane nooks and crannies all throughout it, really drive home a sense of seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary. Her story helped me materialize my own better, sharing a goal of taking small details about life itself and showing the big impressions they can make on us. That’s a theme I’d like to explore myself some more in future projects.
Another story I like a lot is Avlin’s post-apocalyptic Day 52. When I went into this class, I thought it would be centered mostly on narrative non-fiction. I had no idea that we could create fictional stories. This was a very entertaining read, and I only wished it was a part of a series so I could keep following the lone traveler’s expedition. The photographs were fittingly bone-chilling: empty freeways, wild plants creeping over steel and concrete, not a soul to be found. I think it’d be fun if I explored a similar theme in the future, places where you’d expect there’d be humans but there are none, and the unsettling feeling it brings. Or I could try exploring the opposite feeling from the liminal spaces, maybe a sense of tranquility in empty natural spaces, a respite from noisy civilization.
Here is the link to my finished Shorthand site in case the embed code does not work.
