Week 1 

The first week of any course is always a challenge and when that course is a challenging MA program in an academically strong University with a range of international students it is even more of a challenge.

Although I have studied at master’s level before it was in Manufacturing Systems Engineering and it was 20 years ago. I have no formal qualifications at any level in photography aside from a Licentiateship with the Royal Photographic society which was purely based on image submission. To be honest with a Batchelors in Management Science I have never studied any art subject since I dropped art at the end of the third year at Grammar School some 42 years ago!

However, I think (I’m told!) I’m a good photographer at least technically and from an image perspective-people like my images but I’ve never considered myself creative and have never looked at mine or other images in a critical manner, I know what I like and what images make me go wow, and I wish I had taken that but that was about as far as my critical analysis and opinion went.

For me, the MA is about developing me as a creative and an artist and identifying my style and what it is I want to achieve in photography and what I want to focus on in my practice. I’m a people orientated photographer, I like interaction and the chance to learn about the people I’m photographing. My main concerns are am I good enough there are some talented students with a much deeper artistic grasp than me and given that I’m pretty much fully employed as a management Consultant and travel often will I have the time to give it the justice it deserves. Having said that I want to do it and I’m passionate about my photography and want to stretch and enhance my understanding of all aspects of photography.