Studio Portraits Of Our Amazing Kids

Funded Dec 23, 2015

Dear Donors,

I wanted to take this time to thank you for your gracious contribution to the Art program at High School of Arts and Technology. This year, funds were short, and with the deterioration of our SLR camera, as well as the yearly students' request to use a camera off campus - I applied to Donor's Choose. With the cost of a camera being so high and the continual requests and needs of so many teachers, I never anticipated achieving the donation.

Thanks to your support, on the last day before our Christmas break, the final donation came in and the project was fully funded. I went home after work with a smile knowing when our student's returned in the new year, they would finally have that opportunity, not only to take a camera home, but to learn the basics of photography and experiment with a new art form.

This year, the seniors had the opportunity for me to photograph them in the traditional black and white "personality" portraits that have been an annual occurrence here for over 10 years. They are currently hanging in the main hallway of the school and will placed put in the yearbook.

Along with those photos, seniors interested in learning the basics of studio lighting gave up their lunch period so they could get instructions on the camera and the 3-point lighting set-up. We still used the projector for our backlight and a handheld light from the hardware store but the students seemed unfazed and enjoyed the process immensely. Some of them were able to capture portraits of quality to add to their portfolio.

Other students experimented with still life objects and even brought in their own items to light and photograph. They played with placement of objects, focus, and f-stops to achieve a wide variety of effects.

Our goal is to get enough quality photos and post them on the boards in the main hallway to hang over the summer and into the beginning of the following school year.

To finish off our mini-lessons in photography, I took the students on a field trip to the Chelsea area of Manhattan to view galleries that specialize in photography. Our talented junior, whose main interest is in documentary photography, photographed the event. I am still waiting to see what he captured. Other students used the camera to play with different angles photographing the sculptures and street art we saw in between our walks to the galleries.

I can't express the joy I felt and continue to feel as students check out the camera to take home for the weekend to experiment- seeking to find their own sense of style in photography. Many of them are taking it one step further and altering them in Photoshop to enhance their works.

To all our donors who continue to give back to the arts- thank you again- for the amazing support. This has been a wonderful and exciting time for the students and myself.”

With gratitude,

Ms. Gordon