IGCSE Art & Design - Photography

The iGCSE in Art and Design, Photography, aims to support student development of a unique creative response through engagement with sustained and independent enquiry on this 100% online course. Photography may be defined as the creative journey through the process of lens- and light-based media. It could include work created using film, video, digital imaging or light sensitive materials. With the developments of new affordable lens-based technologies, students should attempt to use the photographic mediums to explore and create a body of work, which develops and refines both the process and the concept. All the work for this endorsed title can be produced in digital form. Students can choose to focus on Documentary, Photojournalism, Studio, Location, Experimental Imagery and/or the Moving Image.

Students will demonstrate an understanding and application of the formal elements and principles of art, design and photography which can be the outcome of personal experience alongside response to observation in new and unique ways.

This course supports the development of students’ knowledge and understanding of:

• the uses of light as the most important element in photography
• view-points, composition, depth of field
• darkroom techniques involving the recognition of appropriate paper types, developing and printing, emulsions, exposures, tone and contrast (through an in-person workshop during Term 1)
• manipulation of the image, either silver-based technology or digital format, through electronic and mechanical means including lasers, computers, scanners and photocopiers.

Students should use a variety of tools and materials, as appropriate, for recording their surroundings and source materials.

The word ‘photography’ could be taken to mean ‘a graphic representation with light’. In this way, a photograph can take on the qualities of a drawing. Drawing methods such as pen or pencil on paper may enhance students’ development and understanding of photographic ideas, for example to plan shots, analyse and deconstruct their own imagery, or record ways in which practitioners have used formal elements and visual language. Students should use a variety of tools and materials, as appropriate, for recording their surroundings and source materials.