Research methods - Resubmission!
Bradford media museum
The museum was created to educate and inspire people to learn. They want the audience to engage and create media with the facilities available.
Bradford museum has a wide range of collections and display galleries, I was particularly interested in the large collection of photographic equipment.
The collection consisted of Fawkes bellows camera, Thornton Pickard Ruby camera, Nelrod liteflash camera, Rolleiflex camera, Brownie flash B camera, Nikon M camera and so many more.
There is also video equipment.
The archive is organised into three sections such as people, places and events. There are millions of photographs from celebrities to historical events and many more. Everything is kept on storage cabinets and in original filing boxes, this helps preserve the print away from light because this reduces the quality. The paper and materals vary, some include a large collection of cyanotypes to metal plates.
I would like to access the archive myself because it would be interesting to see the original print rather than looking in books and the internet, you get a feel of the image itself and can appreciate the original print quality because researching them doesn't give them justice.
I didn't get the benefit of visiting with the university itself so me and my partner took a trip with the children, I really enjoyed the visit but didn't get to really appreciate everything with the children wanting to look at games lounge and the magic factory. I would very much like to go again over the summer holidays and arrange to see some of the archives.
Primary research
Primary research is a collection of information from an original source (the main individuals) to answer certain questions and issues.
There are many ways to carry out this method such as in person/telephone interviews, surveys/questionnaires, observations, experiments and so many more.
Interviews: These can be completed with one-on-one interviews or in small groups to answer any questions or issues you may have. Interviews are a great source for gathering information, this is useful for expert and knowledgeable opinions with in your chosen subject. Tape recorders are regularly used to record the whole interview so you can listen back to anything you may have missed.
Surveys: Surveys are for questioning larger groups of people. They can provide limited amounts of information and are useful when you want to learn what a larger population thinks. These involve telephone surveys such as marketing and also printed surveys for people to complete. Surveys could be sent through the post, internet and many other ways.
Observations: Observations provide you insight about specific people, events, or locales and are useful when you want to learn more about an event or person etc. Observations involve taking organized notes.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each primary and secondary research.
Advantages:
* you can control what specific subjects you want to focus on and the amount of research collected.
* The researcher decides time, size and the goal of the each project.
* Researcher can focus on both qualitative and quantitative issues.
Disadvantages:
* Primary research could be expensive to carry out such as; costs of the equipment for experimentation and also paper prints for surveys/questionnaires.
* Time consuming.
* low responce rate due to surveys/questionnaires has to be expected.
* Some issues may not be discussed with the researcher because they cannot give out certain information.
Secondary research
Secondary research is collected from exsisting research data which someone else has carried out.
There are many methods of secondary research such as librarys, internet, books, archives, magazines, newspapers and many more.
Library: Many publish facts and history for people to read and familiarise themselves with specific subjects. This is a great way of finding facts for your research and help with understanding differrent theories. Books can be seen at libraries and be bought on the internet.
Internet: This is one of the cheapest options of research, You can access almost anything you wish to research although this can confuse some people because false information can be put onto webpages or peoples own theories.
Magazines: You can collect certain magazines that are to your interest, Photography monthly includes a range of equipment that can be bought, reviews, facts, techniques, perfessional photographers work etc. These can have a range of different facts and information you can collect for research. I use these myself for research such as image cuttings to stick in files to look back on later and also fact cuttings.
Again there are advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages:
* This can save time and money.
* Gain access to historical data.
* prove or disprove an arguement or theory with access to internet and instant information.
* Finding general Background information.
Disadvantages:
* consider reliability and validity of secondary research sources due to false facts or theories.
* permission to use certain information due to copyright.
*
Harvard referencing
Group research presentation
This was decided in the group and the chosen subject was street photography. I got very confused with what the idea was about because this was changed several times. We had to stand in front of the class and Because I didnt clearly understand what we was about I didn't know what to say. I felt there wasn't much communication going on throughout this project.
Personally I dont have a great interest in street photography.
Picture project
We had to go out and capture the letters of the alphabet in an abstract way of trees, posts or whatever you could find. Later we was to then arrange them into our name.
School photography research....
There isn't very many school photography services in or near blackburn but I did find several who are occassionally used by our local schools.
Nick-Clarke photography
http://www.nick-clarke-studio.co.uk/
School photographer based in darwen.
Tempest photography
Many local schools with in blackburn with darwen and surrounding areas use Tempest Photography.
http://www.htempest.co.uk/school-photography.htm
They have tried to bring school photography up to date and added a little fun into them. My childrens school also use these.
They do the individual and group photos.
I personally wasn't impressed with the prices of the packages.
One large, two medium and four small cost £30 for package of the individual child shot, I know grandparents would like seperate pictures of the children and one of them together. I have two children at school, a boy and a girl. That is three different pictures for me to buy. I asked tempest if i could have the three poses in one package for the £30 and they refused and told me the only way to get them was in three packages which would cost me £90 in total. This is very expensive and the quality of the photography is not great which I resorted in the end doing them myself with my own studio set up. Many parents I've spoken to refuse to pay the prices. I think it would be nice to give parents an alternative at more affordable prices and maybe giving parents the option if they have more than one child to have them in the same package.
Adventure photography
http://www.adventurephotography.co.uk/
Tel: 0845 226 6514
http://www.rochdaleschoolphotographer.co.uk/
Parents feedback
Netmums website on school photography...
My own personal research.
I asked what friends of mine thought of school photos.
Jessica sarah baldwin - "Expensive (when buying for parents etc) I didn't buy lexi's last year because they wasn't good, only got a choice of two and it was a forced pose and fake smile. I would of rather had a happy natural pose. Maybe the photographers should be more fun and get the children to laugh."
Kim whalley-pollitt - "Some I've seen over the years have been a little old fashioned and very pricey for what they are. My nephew lives in Kent and he's were very good and modern too, whole class including teacher in a line holding balloons with white backgrounds."
Ashlea Harrington - " Some are really good, others I could of probably taken better myself! I think they are overpriced."
Vicky Jordan Woodburn - "I think they are very expensive."
AOP - The Association of Photographers.
I looked on the website http://www.the-aop.org to find how many photographers specialise in family and children portraiture.
Overall there was 92 photographers available who specifically focus on children and families.
Below are three I took interest to from the aop website.
Mike Ellis
http://www.mikeellisphotography.com/info/
I like these because they are very candid photos, natural and colourful. They are school and family related and would look great in school photography.
Parents would see how their children interact with others and would take interest in these kind shots. Some may want simple images and this could be an option also.
The child looking at the science objects looks fun and educational, maybe bring fun like this into their individual shots?
Martin Brent
http://www.martinbrent.com/
This was created for a commercial purpose but I took interest because of the theme chosen.
The pictures do look rather grim but you still see the school influence. The settings is to why I chose to include this in my research, if we added fun to the setting this could also be an idea. Individual shots taken in different parts of the school so every parent is recieving something unique. The class photo could be the individual shots organised around one large image of your child so its individual and group combined.
Like this but each child is set in a different scene to each other, one outside head masters office, another in p.e, one in front of whiteboard etc
Taken from google images...
Caroline irby
http://carolineirby.com/
Again more children and school shots. These are very colourful similar to Mike Ellis. Different Colour represents happiness and fun and this we relate to children. so I myself would want to keep this in the theme. I notice she has added motion into some of these photographs, I could bring this into the idea but dont want to add to much of this because some parents on netmums website disapproved of too much movement within the shots. Some very candid but look great.
My research presentation.
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