Undergraduate Overview

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This basic class, required for entry into all other photo classes, introduces contemporary technologies for producing photographic images. This course also introduces seeing, thinking and creating with a critical mind and eye to provide greater understanding of the construction and manipulation of photographic form and meaning. Approaching the medium in its current complex and pluralistic state, students explore a variety of photographic concepts and techniques. While various physical cameras are still in use today the fundamentals of using digital cameras, including manual exposure and lighting are stressed. Eclectic forms of output are explored in order to discover methods of presentation most suited to a particular idea.

'Knowledge of photography is just as important as that of the alphabet. The illiterate of the future will be a person ignorant of the use of the camera as well as the pen.' Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1895-1946). This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments will provide technical skills to use cameras, compose images and print digital photographs. Readings, screenings and discussions will provide a framework for critically analyzing the photographs we encounter every day, as well as our own photographs.

This course is designed for students who have a basic knowledge of photography and its materials and an interest in the use of the photo image as part of a broad vocabulary of image-making processes. Students explore cyanotype, van dyke brown, gum bichromate printing, collage, reproduction, and transfer techniques, and are given a basic working knowledge of the graphic arts films and print films. Also covered: Polaroid materials, copy machines, computer graphics, and applied color. Ideas related to text, installation, and performance may also be explored. Each student is encouraged to experiment in both silver and non-silver processes and to conduct research independently.

'The Anthropocene' is the name of the new geological epoch, first proposed by atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen and marine biologist Eugene F. Stroemer in 2000, with the proposal that human species has become the single prominent agent of change affecting the earths geology and ecosystems. Since then, the conversations on the Anthropocene, climate change, sustainability and the planetary ecological crisis have proven that the extremely complex problems the Earth is facing can only be addressed by new forms of collaboration and innovative knowledge production.
Photography plays in this context a pivotal role and goal of this class is to promote empirical and forensic work on landscapes of the Anthropocene, the degraded and damaged ecologies of the planet Earth. Collaborative work and access to different material forms, laboratories, analog and digital photographic media as well as scholarship and first-person testimony on health, race, politics and aesthetics, will help generate diverse perspectives on the entangled realities of the world and the complex human-natural systems.
Questions of environmental justice and environmental ethics will take center stage in this class.

This course will explore the methods, history and potential of medium format film photography. Students will learn to use a wide variety of medium format cameras including the Mamiya 7, Mamiya RZ 67, Mamiya 645, Pentax 67, Holga and various Hasselblad systems. Using a wide variety of black and white and color medium format films, students will become familiar with several film development techniques, and both analog and digital printing methods to create traditional and experimental photographic work.

Color Concepts introduces complex ideas and processes associated with the various applications of color in photography. Emphasis is on conceptual, theoretical, cultural, and perceptual aspects of color related to both vision and photographic image-making. The class explores all aspects of color photography. It traces the roots of analog three-color photographic processes first theorized in 1855, less than 30 years after the advent of black and white photography, and explores the successes and the limitations of color film (for example, the racial bias of color film.) Lastly, the class examines contemporary color dominant popularity amongst artists since the 1970s, through the context of a color constructed digital future.

Through a variety of exercises and assignments students will develop a keen eye to seeing color in the world and on the screen, use peer discussion and collaboration to advance critique skills, and build aptitude for visual literacy. Technical skills learned, include image capture, color correction, qualities of light, color corrected printing on varying scales and media, digital camera and medium format film camera authorizations, strategies of presentation while expanding on digital skills introduced in PHOTO 1001.

Color Concepts introduces complex ideas and processes associated with the various applications of color in photography. Emphasis is on conceptual, theoretical, cultural, and perceptual aspects of color related to both vision and photographic image-making. The class explores all aspects of color photography. It traces the roots of analog three-color photographic processes first theorized in 1855, less than 30 years after the advent of black and white photography, and explores the successes and the limitations of color film (for example, the racial bias of color film.) Lastly, the class examines contemporary color dominant popularity amongst artists since the 1970s, through the context of a color constructed digital future.

Through a variety of exercises and assignments students will develop a keen eye to seeing color in the world and on the screen, use peer discussion and collaboration to advance critique skills, and build aptitude for visual literacy. Technical skills learned, include image capture, color correction, qualities of light, color corrected printing on varying scales and media, digital camera and medium format film camera authorizations, strategies of presentation while expanding on digital skills introduced in PHOTO 1001.

This course introduces black-and-white printing techniques including darkroom and inkjet printing, contrast control through development, the zone system, scale of images, graphic arts film, studio lighting, different darkroom techniques, alternative cameras, and different papers and films.

This course introduces black-and-white printing techniques including darkroom and inkjet printing, contrast control through development, the zone system, scale of images, graphic arts film, studio lighting, different darkroom techniques, alternative cameras, and different papers and films.

This course introduces black-and-white printing techniques including darkroom and inkjet printing, contrast control through development, the zone system, scale of images, graphic arts film, studio lighting, different darkroom techniques, alternative cameras, and different papers and films.

Students are introduced to using light as a means for creative control. By studying the light around us, we are able to better serve our work through specific choices with regard to existing or ambient light and light augmented by other sources of illumination. Students learn the rudiments of metering, mixing light sources, including the use of on-camera or hand-held electronic flash within existing lighting conditions. This is a practical course that enables students to better control and use light and lighting in their work.

Students are introduced to using light as a means for creative control. By studying the light around us, we are able to better serve our work through specific choices with regard to existing or ambient light and light augmented by other sources of illumination. Students learn the rudiments of metering, mixing light sources, including the use of on-camera or hand-held electronic flash within existing lighting conditions. This is a practical course that enables students to better control and use light and lighting in their work.

Large Format Photography introduces students to the ideas and aesthetics associated with a large-format view camera. Students will learn pre-visualization, camera movements, perspective control, large-format optics, and how to handle large format sheet film. Assignments focus on portraiture, landscape, studio, and architecture. Students are encouraged to develop a personal style via flexible assignments. Technical skills acquired include view camera setup and control, experience with sheet film, the zone system, large format scanning, and analog and digital printing. All enrolled students are assigned a 4x5 studio camera and will have access to an 8x10 and 4x5 field cameras, along with a variety of optics and accessories.

A variety of technical readings from multiple sources will help students understand perspective control, camera setup, lens choice, bellows extension, available film choices, exposure, and reciprocity compensation associated with large format photography. Additional readings and screenings will provide examples of historical and contemporary work created utilizing large format photography, and highlight the cameras meditative qualities and excellent resolution and control.

Every idea has a medium most suited to its execution, but often not the one in which the artist is working. This class considers new ways of translating ideas into other media to develop a sense of possibilities beyond the straight photograph. Conceptual art has given us an understanding of the triggers that might provoke an investigation of layers of meaning within the simplest of ideas. Assignment encourage students to think beyond the usual way they work and include the use of collaboration, installation, audio, video, live feed, the internet, performance, and performative uses of photography.

The class will address the photographic book. we will investigate the numerous styles and how it influences meaning. we will question the limits of books where photography will be the main emphasis. this is not a class that will be primarily on structure we will not be making books beyond the most basic level. the quality and traits of print on demand publishing and visit with local publishers and editors will be arranged. an integral component of the class will be the chicago artist book fair. we will almost live in the joan flash artist book collection. the main text will be the structure of the visual book by keith smith. among courses that would work well in conjunction are - sequencing and structure and artist books.

Topics courses cover a wide range of aesthetic concerns and change according to the semester and faculty, allowing a more in-depth examination of specific topics within photography. The courses provide students access to the specific topics driving faculty research and practice, as well as allowing the department to nimbly address issues pressing to our current context and time. Additionally, these courses are used to address the interests of students not already covered in our curriculum. The format ranges in each section, but these six hour studio courses are meant to engage students in both research and making, developing their own artistic trajectory. The format is often experimental, modeling the artistic practice of the instructor and generously expanding the photographic medium.

Close-reading and discussion are essential; looking at and discussing art; creating new work and exchanging feedback. Recent topics have included: Decolonizing the Gaze, Desire, Representation and the Self, Screen Capture, Creative Production and Portfolio, Observing Power, Rich and Poor, The Archive, and Constructing the Rural. Readings are subject to individual course topics and not exemplified here.

Advanced Post-Production and Fine Arts Printing refines and expands the digital imaging skills learned in previous classes. Emphasis is placed on all stages of production that occur after image acquisition and streamlining digital workflow and mastering advanced editing skills in preparation for creating exhibition-quality prints. Workflow techniques include advanced image correction, color management, and advanced masking methods. Photo manipulation approaches focus on using Photoshop and other photo editing software addons and programs as creative tools for exploring the conceptual applications of retouching, image compositing, color grading, and other post-production methodologies.

This course utilizes a variety of technical assignments designed to build and reinforce digital skill-building. Students will progress through the technical material via structured assignments and the completion of self-conceived creative projects. Readings and discussions address contemporary theoretical issues surrounding digital imaging and the constant shift and development of new capabilities associated with digital output technologies. Since the toolsets related to color science, photographic manipulation and digital asset management software are in constant flux, assignments will also incorporate research methodologies and problem-solving specific to students? workflow and output needs. Students will gain new perspectives on current toolsets, and the skill to evaluate and stay current as toolsets associated with post-production continue to evolve.

Photography is everywhere. Sequences and series are the ubiquitous ways we most often see photographic images. Photographic meanings are pliable in shifting contexts from published sequences online and in print, to images in photobooks, exhibitions and installations. This class critically examines how series of images are structured and the significance those structures hold.

?That photography resists being shaped by any single set of imperatives or standards ? as it literally permeates our public and private and our rational and fantasy lives ? renders it, by its very nature unruly and hard to define.? Marvin Heiferman. This course will address the complex and continual shifting nature of photography; what influences our understanding of how a photograph functions while exploring a diverse array of photographic genres and applications.

Assignments develop skillful use and understanding of serial imagery by engaging narrative and non-narrative strategies in a variety of sequences, books, zines, portfolios, web-based projects, installations, videos, and projected presentations.

Exploratory Media examines the fluidity and connection between various forms of media. The course builds on the history of Conceptualism, an artistic practice born in the 1960s that prioritized the idea, allowing the medium to follow as well as the highly influential theory of the medium itself being meaning and message. This course will highlight the history of artists who worked with a wandering ¿nomadic¿ mindset due to access to new technologies such as video art collectives of the 1970¿s as well as photographers who work within a non-traditional lens based practice. This laboratory-like course encourages students to experiment and iterate: In this course students are asked to consider their artistic intentions through different kinds of media like performance, sculpture, sound, while also focusing on different outputs for lens based work such as alternative photographic substrates, performance, installation. The course structure relies on assignment-based projects, frequent hands-on studio experimentations, peer-to-peer feedback, and looking at other artists' work in a variety of mediums. Intermittent readings, lectures, and screenings provide a conceptual framework for this work.

Capturing Time is an online course that allows students to explore the close connections, similarities, and differences historically associated with cinematic and photographic images. The reading, screening, and research component of the class will delve into the specific historical, theoretical, and artistic practices, as well as a technique associated with still and moving images. The studio component is designed to ignite your creativity, encouraging you to experiment, develop skills in diverse mediums, and attempt to challenge the historically separated boundaries of moving and still imagery through class readings and screenings, a research presentation, and a final project. Course assignments will include readings from cinematic and photographic historians, theorists, and contemporary artists. Class readings will include essays by Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, Tom Gunning, Rosalind Krauss, and Rebecca Solnit. In addition to the weekly class readings, class screenings and presentations are assigned each week to supplement and support the texts. They will include cinema, photography, and multimedia installations from Chantal Akerman, Jim Campbell, John Cage, Maya Deren, Omer Fast, Hollis Frampton, Mona Hatum, the Lumiere Brothers, Christian Marclay, Man Ray, Chris Marker, Steve McQueen, Dwayne Michaels, Tsai Ming-Liang, Eadweard Muybridge, Tony Oursler, Pipilotti Rist, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Andrei Tarkovsky, Bill Viola, Andy Warhol, Gillian Wearing and more. The online course structure will provide three tiers of interaction: student to instructor, student to student, and student to content. The primary focus of the class relies on weekly assignment-based projects, peer-to-peer feedback, and self-paced visual material that will provide examples of photographic, cinematic, and interdisciplinary artists working with digital Media in various modes of production and presentation. Historical and contemporary readings and screenings provide a conceptual framework for the course work, including weekly reading responses in an online journal, short visual exercises, a research presentation on a specific artist, and a final project. Students are expected to produce substantial photographic and moving image work. *To complete this online course, a successful student will need access to a computer, an internet connection fast enough for streaming moving image material, and a camera capable of producing still and moving images (anything between a DSLR or Mirrorless camera and a mobile phone.)

In this course, we'll delve into the intriguing intersection of photography and printmaking, acquiring light and pressure-based printing skills and conceptually integrating them into an art practice that approaches print as a site-responsive medium, sensitive to light, pressure, and context. The introductory section explores the material sensitivity of embossing and frottage, treating them as akin to documentary photography. The second section introduces light sensitivity through cyanotype and gelatin silver processes, engaging directly with objects and surfaces. The final segment employs digital fabrication to create laser-engraved linoleum blocks and printed photogravure plates, enabling relief and intaglio inking techniques and printing processes.
The course will introduce pivotal artists associated with taught printing techniques and their historical context. We'll explore the works of artists such as Anna Atkins and Albrecht Durer, who played significant roles in the development of their respective techniques. We'll also examine figures like Alfred Stieglitz and Robert Overby, who influenced the trajectory of their media, and contemporary artists like William Kentridge and Do Ho Suh, who have reshaped our perception of print. Additionally, we'll read and screen 'Contact: Art and the Pull of Print' by Jennifer Roberts from Harvard, and invite her for an online discussion with our students.
The coursework will adhere to a media and technique-based structure, with the creation of six bodies of work with separate critiques.

In this course, we'll delve into the intriguing intersection of photography and printmaking, acquiring light and pressure-based printing skills and conceptually integrating them into an art practice that approaches print as a site-responsive medium, sensitive to light, pressure, and context. The introductory section explores the material sensitivity of embossing and frottage, treating them as akin to documentary photography. The second section introduces light sensitivity through cyanotype and gelatin silver processes, engaging directly with objects and surfaces. The final segment employs digital fabrication to create laser-engraved linoleum blocks and printed photogravure plates, enabling relief and intaglio inking techniques and printing processes.
The course will introduce pivotal artists associated with taught printing techniques and their historical context. We'll explore the works of artists such as Anna Atkins and Albrecht Durer, who played significant roles in the development of their respective techniques. We'll also examine figures like Alfred Stieglitz and Robert Overby, who influenced the trajectory of their media, and contemporary artists like William Kentridge and Do Ho Suh, who have reshaped our perception of print. Additionally, we'll read and screen 'Contact: Art and the Pull of Print' by Jennifer Roberts from Harvard, and invite her for an online discussion with our students.
The coursework will adhere to a media and technique-based structure, with the creation of six bodies of work with separate critiques.

This course embraces the concept of projection as a broad field of art practice. Starting with the magic lantern, the course investigates the history of projection related practices that shape the parameters of visual perception and communication. Deconstructing the concept of the screen, the course focuses on projection in sculptural and installation contexts.

Microcontrollers and Adobe software is used in unorthodox ways to shape visual elements for digital light projection. History of visual, technical and conceptual use of light is accessed to investigate the interactions of projections with objects and space.

This six-hour seminar is a professional practice class for life after graduation, focusing on how each student can build a sustainable practice based on their own strengths and working style. Students create a website, CVs, write grant proposals, artist statements, and statements of purpose, learning the different content and uses of each. Readings on contemporary artists and 'best practices' for editing, exhibition, and installation of artwork will support class work. This course embraces the understanding that developing a sustainable practice outside of school includes building creative community, developing an independent research practice and other activities related to each individual¿s work. As such, the highlight of this course will be bi-weekly visits and workshops from a diverse range of working artists, curators, residency staff and others to speak about these opportunities, as well as how to build a fruitful creative life. For example, we will develop strategies for talking about your work that fit your own personal style with a Chicago curator, and present grant materials to a mock panel to get productive feedback. The Junior Seminar is one of four required classes intended to function as a 'spine,' providing guidance and structure for SAIC's open and interdisciplinary curriculum.

This class concentrates on self-initiated work with an emphasis on student-drivencreative research and intensive project development. Students explore inventive ways to present work while experimenting with different strategies to deliver relevant contextual information. Independent work is reinforced with ongoing group discussions exploring broader issues around how artists and artworks communicate a complex of meanings. This class supports the production of a focused body of work and can be taken multiple times as well as in conjunction with Senior Capstone in preparation for your BFA exhibition.

Models of open-ended creative research, production and professional engagement is explored in readings, screenings and discussions. Class activities include combinations of lectures, discussions, workshops, critiques, independent work time and individual meetings. Students are expected to set personal goals while working through a single project or set of concerns for the entire semester to advance work that demonstrates technical facility and expanded knowledge of the conceptual underpinnings of the ever-evolving fields of contemporary photography and visual culture.

Participants refine statements and proposals, employ creative approaches to editing a body of work in preparation for presentation in various venues and formats while developing a broader understanding of how to support the promotion of the work.

This interdisciplinary capstone, with an emphasis on contemporary photography and visual culture, is structured as an intensive critique and mentoring class focused on the development and presentation of culminating work at the end of the BFA and the continued progression of studio work beyond the BFA exhibition. The course supports the production of self-initiated work, a successful BFA show and a road map for a sustainable art practice after graduation. Preparations for the BFA exhibition include workshopping project proposals, budgets, production schedules, the development of new work and an array of possible final presentation forms.

Readings, screenings and discussions will examine useful models of participation in cultural production and a critical framework for analyzing a range of platforms to share work online, in print and exhibition. Studio visits will provide insight into the day-to-day life of artists at various stages in their career ranging from current SAIC grad students to working professionals.

Online and printed portfolios utilizing an ever-evolving archive of work will be refined along with professional supporting materials such as statements, CVs and artist talks necessary for a professional practice beyond graduation.

Photographic Imaging Technical Seminar is a graduate-level class that provides students with an in-depth exploration of the technical and conceptual aspects of the photography department. Students will gain certification to use the equipment and facilities of the department while also learning about the department¿s acquisition, workflow, and photographic output capabilities. Examples drawn from contemporary art and current theoretical materials will be analyzed and discussed to enhance students' understanding of the subject matter. Additionally, students will present works in progress and begin producing new work at the outset of the semester. In addition to advanced certification in photographic equipment, the course allows students to develop their skills in individual project development while practicing and researching tools for production while focusing on developing students' familiarity with older, current, and developing technical processes. Students will also develop their ability to troubleshoot and resolve technical challenges encountered while producing finished work for critique.
In light of the simplified and automated photographic tools available today, students with diverse educational backgrounds are enrolling in SAIC's graduate program. This graduate-level technical seminar is designed for students with diverse technical backgrounds, including those with little traditional photographic experience. The course assumes that all students are proficient image makers and aims to level up their technical skills by providing a pathway to reinforce or introduce advanced photographic processes and control methodologies. Throughout the course, students will gain certifications and introductions to analog and digital cameras, darkroom techniques, facilities, studios, scanning, computing, and analog, digital, and alternative processes output facilities. To determine weekly exercises, the class will proactively survey students' technical needs and coordinate with the 5006 Photo Graduate Seminar. Additionally, students will work each week collaboratively to address technical issues and troubleshooting that arise during active image production. The technical exercises will help students build fluency and comprehension with various cameras, refine their personal workflow, and cover core lighting and advanced printing techniques. Technical lectures will build upon and reinforce these learned skills.
In light of the simplified and automated photographic tools available today, students with diverse educational backgrounds are enrolling in SAIC's graduate program. This graduate-level technical seminar is designed for students with diverse technical backgrounds, including those with little traditional photographic experience. The course assumes that all students are proficient image makers and aims to level up their technical skills by providing a pathway to reinforce or introduce advanced photographic processes and control methodologies. Throughout the course, students will gain certifications and introductions to analog and digital cameras, darkroom techniques, facilities, studios, scanning, computing, and analog, digital, and alternative processes output facilities. To determine weekly exercises, the class will proactively survey students' technical needs and coordinate with the 5006 Photo Graduate Seminar. Additionally, students will work each week collaboratively to address technical issues and troubleshooting that arise during active image production. The technical exercises will help students build fluency and comprehension with various cameras, refine their personal workflow, and cover core lighting and advanced printing techniques. Technical lectures will build upon and reinforce these learned skills.
Technical readings for the course may include:
Schewe, Jeff. The Digital Negative. Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press, 2012
Davis, Phil. Beyond the Zone System. Boston: Focal Press, 1996.
Additional suggested readings might include:
Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. New York: Hill and Wang, 1981.
Solomon-Godeau, Abigail. Photography after Photography. New York: Duke University Press, 2017.
Fusco, Coco, and Brian Wallis (eds.). Only Skin Deep: Changing Visions of the American Self. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2003.
Ritchin, Fred. 'Toward a Hyperphotography, After Photography.' Aperture, no. 124 (1991): 16-25.
These texts can provide students with further insight into photography's conceptual and historical aspects, and offer critical perspectives that can enrich their understanding of the medium.