wp1: how my camera gave my life purpose
For most of my life, my reasons to study and to learn were negatively motivated. In other words, I learned to avoid negative consequences, and because these consequences were external, learning was rarely internally fulfilling. However, transferring to the University of Southern California to pursue my passion for film this year reflected a major change in my intellectual journey. Because I’m learning about what I’m passionate about, my reasons to learn are now internal. I have changed from having a reactive approach to learning, to a proactive approach to learning, and in doing so, I have found tremendous internal fulfillment and personal growth.
My extrinsic motivations throughout school included avoiding disappointing my parents, avoiding bad grades, which meant avoiding not getting into a good college, avoiding falling behind my planned academic track, and avoiding falling behind compared to my classmates. But amongst all the things I was extrinsically motivated to learn, my passion for photography has been one thing that has always been intrinsically motivated. My interest in photography started during the summer before my 4th grade when my parents sent me to a summer camp to learn photography, and very generously gifted me a DSLR camera soon afterward. I didn’t realize it at the time, but my camera let me see the world differently, and this made me never want to stop learning and getting better at photography. Over a decade ago, photography started my journey of finding fulfillment through intrinsically motivated learning.
This motivation became especially apparent in high school, when I really admired an upperclassman for his contributions to our yearbooks through his beautiful photography. I too, wanted to help document this special time in our lives, and put my hobby to practical use. With this motivation, I used yearbook photography as an opportunity to increase my photography skill. Often before photographing an event I was unfamiliar with, I studied how professionals shoot the same event, through various online resources such as articles and YouTube videos.. With every event I photographed I was extremely active in learning. Before photographing events I was unfamiliar with, I prepared by studying professional work through online articles and YouTube videos. During events, I learned how to apply the techniques I prepared, and make them my own. After events, I was my harshest critic, nitpicking poor choices of lenses, composition, and exposure, and constantly learned about how to better post-process my images. Throughout my sophomore, junior, and senior years doing yearbook photography, I ended up snapping around 40,000 photos and grew tremendously as a photographer. Photography had blossomed from a “hobby” and an “interest” into a genuine passion.
Being so active in learning about photography was also rewarding to me in ways I didn’t expect. In photographing almost everything for yearbook, I learned about several areas of school life that I likely would never have had the chance to experience if it weren’t my “job” to photograph them. I found it admirable that the theater team were able to design, rehearse, and perform such elaborate and emotional performances while being under such high academic pressure. I found it inspiring that our football team always held their heads high despite consistently being the smallest players on the field. I found it heartwarming to witness the family-like spirit within the field hockey team. In teaching myself how to capture the most important moments of an event, and in actually experiencing those moments, I was unknowingly participating in a study on humanity. As I learned about the lives of my classmates through my camera’s viewfinder, I gained a deeper love for my school and for my classmates, and I found fulfillment in documenting important moments in their lives with photographs that they could look back on in the yearbook.
The peak of my photography “career” thus far has been photographing the wedding of a close family friend. They had helped me and our family tremendously in the past, and I saw this as an opportunity to return a small favor on their special day. This time I took holding myself to a professional standard to the max. I rented a brand new high-end camera and lens so that I could deliver the highest quality of photos possible, and also to experience and learn a new camera system. Trying to capture every important moment put me under immense pressure and truly put all the skills that I had learned through yearbook photography to the test: knowing the autofocus system of my cameras like the back of my hand so that I wouldn’t miss focus at critical moments, being able to switch lenses in the matter of seconds, adjusting exposure in the blink of an eye, and having backup memory cards and batteries in case anything went wrong. Thankfully everything went smoothly. They were thrilled with the photographs I delivered, and in knowing that I had done a good job of preserving that day’s memories with photographs they will hopefully cherish for decades to come, I felt proud, happy, and fulfilled.
Since deciding I would take photography seriously, I have been constantly learning how to become a better photographer. It was my active meaningful knowledge seeking that directly led me to discover my biggest hobby which I might turn into a part-time profession, and one of the most fulfilling activities in my life.
Perhaps the most significant thing photography has done for me is introducing me to video. As class historian in my junior and senior years, I was responsible for making the class spirit videos, which were broadcasted to the entire school as part of a homecoming event. I used these videos as an opportunity to communicate inspiring and motivational messages, such as to not compare ourselves to stereotypical definitions of success, to always dream big, and to always support each other. The videos made many of my counselors, teachers, and friends cry, and a few classmates told me that rewatching the videos helped them through moments of hopelessness. I realized that I can make a direct and tangible impact on people’s lives through filmmaking by using my camera as an extension of my thoughts. Helping others brings me the greatest fulfillment in life, and in knowing that film was an avenue for me to help others, I knew that I had found a purpose for my life.
Discovering my love for cinematography has been like discovering my passion for photography all over again. Knowing that I have the ability to make the world a better place through cinematography has driven me to be constantly and actively learning. In every YouTube video I watch, even during the commercials, I’m analyzing the cinematography and how the images are used to tell stories and convey emotions. While I’m driving or walking to class or doing the dishes, I’m spending time listening to cinematography podcasts to expand my knowledge about the industry, the profession itself, and cinematography itself as an art. Realizing that cinematography is how I want to spend my life is what caused me to make perhaps the biggest change in my life, which was leaving six years of studying computer science to transfer to USC for film.
As I wrote in my first blog post for WRIT 150 (paraphrasing): “ever since I transferred to USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, I have felt so incredibly ALIVE. I’m no longer learning because external reasons force me to avoid negative consequences. Instead, I voraciously devour information and I’m still hungry because I learn in order to chase positive consequences. Learning has become an active process that’s internally motivated.” My journey with film has only just started, but FINALLY, learning has become fun, and I couldn’t be more grateful for this.
WORKS CITED
Ding, F. (2020). 16mm film emulation [WRIT 150 blog post]
