Sink or Swim: A Reflection

I’ve completed my first week of ds106! I’m glad I got through the week, and am really excited to be in this class. I started out the week by creating the various social media pages that were required (Twitter, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Flickr)  . It didn’t seem too bad until I started working on my domain. I struggled to figure out WordPress for about 2 days before I finally got the hang of it and when I finally did I was really pleased with it! In a weird way, I’m glad I was able to struggle through because now I know how to use it and am not dependent on someone else.

I then started doing my Daily Creates. Honestly, those have been my favorite part of the class so far. They aren’t too terribly time consuming yet it gives me a chance to be creative in a way that I don’t get to with my classes. I’m a Chemistry major so creating any form of artwork isn’t really what we’re going for. For the photographs, I’ve set up an album on my Flickr account to keep track of them.

I then started on the readings about noir film. They provided a good background and gave historical context for the style. I enjoyed watching/reading  the listed examples of noir the most, particularly Watchmen. I read Watchmen for my freshman seminar class 2 years ago so it was really interesting to see it through a different lens. The first time I read it I was looking through the lens of science and science’s portrayal in the media. The second time, I was looking through the noir lens and I enjoyed seeing how the various elements related to noir but also to the science.

I noticed in the list of possible examples of noir to review there were none about photography or more modern forms. So, for my proposed noir, I set out to see if there were any photographers who captured noir elements in their photography. I stumbled upon Henri Cartier-Bresson who was the father of photojournalism. Between his artistic view of the world and his desire to capture real scenes, his photography really fit the elements of noir.

And with this post, I’ve completed my first week of ds106! I’m excited to see how the rest of the semester turns out.