Visual Storytelling
What are we doing, with our photos and blogs, other than trying to tell our stories? We all have a human need to be heard. This fall term, I took a class in Visual Storytelling at Cabrillo College with Carmina Eliason.
The first assignment was to rest. That's right, get more sleep. We are more creative when we are better slept, and the first project was to create something from our dreams. I kept a dream journal, and made the self-portrait above based on my dream imagery.
As is my wont, I did not go for the easy A, but rather worked on pushing my own artistic and emotional boundaries. My last blog post was a project for this class, on confronting my fear of dead things. For the second project, rather than doing something ridiculously easy like making a documentary about the Strawberry Creek running through Berkeley, I made a short video about my migraine condition:
The big lesson is that, while we all want to shoot that amazing photo, like Henri Cartier-Bresson, that tells an entire story in a single frame, most visual storytelling does not work that way. Usually, visual storytelling combines multiple photos, or is in video form, with explanatory text or voiceover. The honesty and genuineness of the voice, whether verbal or in text, are important elements.
While I had had extensive past experience editing my husband's video footage, I had had very little experience being behind rather than in front of the video camera. In the class, I challenged myself to do steady camera movement, pans, zooms, etc., and learned some editing techniques such as J- and L-cuts. One fun assignment was just to shoot a bunch of video clips of your life and splice them together. I made a short video about Fortitude's lung condition:
This was a very personal class, which asked us to delve deeply into our own selves and express what we found. It had much to teach about the profound vulnerability of artmaking. This has been a growth experience both emotionally and artistically.
Beth Zuckerman, self-portrait
I am a high-energy creature of passion, a photographer and an aerial dancer. I share with you my journey as an artist.