Analog Photography

Course Description

Analog Photography covers the basics of camera handling and the guidelines to better composition, an introduction to the black and white darkroom, and digital camera operation and digital printing.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, PGY is the Photography prefix. Daytona State publishes the non-suffixed PGY1100 at 3 credits with a $40.00 lab fee, offered fall, spring, and summer. The C suffix denotes a combined lecture-and-laboratory format, giving approximately 60 contact hours, consistent with the published PGY1800C and PGY2801C in this repository.

The pairing in the description is deliberate and worth understanding: the course teaches film and digital together, because the underlying decisions are identical. Aperture, shutter, and sensitivity behave the same way in both, and a student who learns them where mistakes are visible and expensive tends to understand them permanently.

⚠ Daytona State publishes the entire PGY prefix without the C suffix

A prefix-wide pattern worth checking before assuming any photography course transfers.

The Florida course inventory carries C-suffixed forms across this prefix; Daytona State's catalog publishes every PGY course without a suffix — PGY1100, PGY1800, PGY2210, PGY2470, PGY2750, PGY2801 and the rest. This repository's published PGY guides carry the C forms (PGY1800C, PGY2210C, PGY2470C, PGY2801C), so the divergence runs through the whole family rather than affecting one number.

The suffix is part of the course number and SCNS equivalency does not cross it, even where the content is identical. This repository's audit found the pattern in 246 of 1,889 queue identifiers — about 13% — and it is the most common numbering hazard in Florida course data. The same prefix-wide behaviour appears in DSC's interior design listing (IND1233, IND1429, IND2210, IND2500 all published without suffixes). Have any substitution evaluated in writing.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Operate a camera in full manual mode with confident control of exposure.
• Describe the exposure triangle and the effect of aperture, shutter speed, and ISO on the image.
• Use aperture deliberately to control depth of field.
• Use shutter speed deliberately to control motion rendering.
• Meter a scene correctly and describe metering modes and their failure cases.
• Select lenses and focal lengths appropriately for a subject and intent.
• Apply focus technique, including selective focus and hyperfocal distance.
• Apply compositional principles and evaluate their effect on a photograph.
• Describe the properties of light: quality, direction, colour, and intensity.
• Load, expose, and process black and white film correctly.
• Mix and handle darkroom chemistry safely and to specification.
• Produce black and white prints using an enlarger, including test strips and exposure determination.
• Apply contrast control through paper grade or variable-contrast filtration.
• Apply dodging and burning to control local density.
• Evaluate a print for exposure, contrast, and technical quality.
• Wash, dry, and finish prints archivally.
• Operate a digital camera and manage raw capture.
• Process digital images and produce a digital print.
• Manage files, backups, and a basic digital workflow.
• Present work for critique and discuss photographs analytically.
• Apply darkroom and studio safety practices.

Optional Outcomes

• Describe the zone system and apply it to exposure and development.
• Use medium format or large format equipment.
• Apply alternative or historical processes.
• Describe film types, characteristics, and their selection.
• Scan negatives and produce hybrid workflow output.
• Begin assembling a photographic portfolio.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• Camera handling and manual operation
• The exposure triangle
• Aperture and depth of field
• Shutter speed and motion
• Metering and its failure cases
• Lenses and focal length
• Focus technique
• Composition
• The properties of light
• Film loading, exposure, and processing
• Darkroom chemistry and handling
• Enlarging and print exposure
• Contrast control
• Dodging and burning
• Print evaluation
• Archival washing and finishing
• Digital capture and raw files
• Digital processing and printing
• File management and backup
• Critique
• Darkroom and studio safety

Optional Topics

• The zone system
• Medium and large format
• Alternative and historical processes
• Film selection and characteristics
• Scanning and hybrid workflow
• Portfolio development

Resources & Tools

• The Camera, The Negative, and The Print (Ansel Adams) — still the clearest technical writing on the subject, and the source of the zone system.
• Photography (London, Stone & Upton) — the standard survey text covering both film and digital.
• A film camera with full manual control. Used 35mm SLRs from the 1970s and 1980s are inexpensive and excellent; check whether the programme lends equipment before buying.
• Film, paper, and chemistry — budget for these; see the cost note below. The $40.00 lab fee covers facility use, not your materials.
• The Massive Dev Chart (digitaltruth.com) — free, and the definitive development time reference for every film and developer combination.
• Ilford and Kodak technical datasheets — free, authoritative, and the correct source for development times and handling.
• Safety Data Sheets for every chemical in the darkroom — legally required to be available, and worth reading.
• Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop — the industry standard, with a photography plan; Darktable, RawTherapee, and GIMP are free and fully capable alternatives.
• A calibrated monitor where available — colour and density judgements made on an uncalibrated screen do not survive printing.
• An external drive and a backup routine. Losing a term's work is common and entirely preventable.

Career Pathways

• Photographer — portrait, wedding, commercial, editorial, and event work; overwhelmingly self-employed.
• Photo assistant — the standard entry route in commercial photography, and where the trade is actually learned.
• Studio photographer — portrait and school photography operations employ staff photographers.
• Photojournalist and documentary photographer — a contracting market, honestly, but the skills transfer widely.
• Retoucher and digital technician — technical roles supporting commercial production.
• Product and e-commerce photography — steady, unglamorous, and where a lot of the reliable income is.
• Real estate and architectural photography — a substantial Florida market.
• Theme park and attraction photography — Orlando employs photographers in volume.
• Archival, museum, and cultural heritage imaging.
• Transfer to a B.F.A. or B.A. — Florida institutions offer photography and fine art degrees; portfolio review is normally required for admission.
• SOC code 27-4021 Photographers. Income is characteristically project-based; most working photographers assemble it from several sources.

Special Information

⚠ Darkroom chemistry is genuinely hazardous — handle it properly

The safety content this course requires, and it is easy to underestimate because a darkroom looks benign.

• Developers are skin sensitizers. Common black and white developing agents cause contact dermatitis and allergic sensitization, and sensitization is cumulative and can become permanent — a photographer who develops a reaction may be unable to work in a darkroom again. Use tongs, and wear nitrile gloves. Never put your hands in the trays because it is quicker.
• Stop bath is dilute acetic acid — irritating to eyes and airways, and its vapour accumulates in a poorly ventilated room.
• Fixer contains thiosulfate compounds and, in some formulations, sulfite; it is irritating and it must not go down the drain in quantity. Spent fixer contains dissolved silver and is regulated waste — follow the facility's collection procedure, which exists for legal reasons rather than tidiness.
• Ventilation is a control, not a comfort. A darkroom must be ventilated; if it is not, raise it rather than working through a headache.
• Never mix chemicals except as directed, and never combine anything with bleach or ammonia-based cleaners.
• No food or drink, and wash your hands before leaving.
• Read the Safety Data Sheets. They are required to be available and most students never look at one.
• Special caution with some toning and alternative processes — selenium and several historical processes involve materially more hazardous compounds and require specific handling. Do not improvise with these.

The general point: the hazards are manageable with routine precautions and unforgiving of casualness. Gloves, tongs, ventilation, and hand-washing cover almost all of it.

⚠ Why film is still taught — it makes the decisions visible

The pedagogical argument, which is stronger than nostalgia and worth understanding rather than tolerating.

• You cannot check the back of the camera. Film forces you to understand exposure before you press the shutter rather than iterating toward it, and that understanding transfers directly to digital work.
• Frames cost money, which changes behaviour. Thirty-six exposures per roll produces deliberation; unlimited frames produce spray-and-hope. Students who shoot film become measurably more careful digital photographers.
• Latitude is unforgiving in one direction. Learning that highlights clip and shadows can be recovered — or the reverse, depending on medium — teaches the shape of the exposure problem in a way automatic modes conceal.
• The darkroom teaches what editing software abstracts. Dodging and burning with your hands under an enlarger explains what the digital tools of the same name are actually doing, and why local contrast control matters.
• The feedback loop is slow, which forces you to think about a negative rather than reshoot.
• It is also just a distinct medium. Film has a look, it is used commercially and artistically by choice, and there has been a genuine revival — knowing how to shoot and process it is a marketable differentiator, not a museum skill.

The practical corollary: keep a notebook of exposures. Frame number, aperture, shutter, lighting, and what you intended. When the negatives come back, the notebook is what converts the result into learning.

⚠ Budget for materials — the lab fee is not the cost

An honest practical warning, because film costs have risen substantially and students are frequently surprised.

• Film, paper, and chemistry are consumables you buy, and prices have increased sharply over recent years. The $40.00 lab fee covers facility access, not your materials.
• Ask the instructor for a realistic term estimate in week one, and buy in bulk with classmates where the programme permits it — this reliably reduces cost.
• Bulk-loading 35mm film from a hundred-foot roll is substantially cheaper than buying cassettes, and many programmes have a loader.
• Buy the camera used. Manual-focus SLRs from major makers are plentiful and cheap; a working body and a normal lens is enough for the entire course.
• Check what the programme supplies before buying anything — many lend cameras, and most supply chemistry.
• Do not waste paper. Test strips exist so that you do not expose full sheets to find an exposure; using them properly halves your paper consumption.

⚠ Critique is the instructional method — learn to use it

How the studio-format course actually teaches, and students who misread it lose most of the value.

• Your work will be discussed publicly. The discipline to internalize immediately is that critique addresses the photograph, not the photographer.
• Do not explain before showing. The photograph has to work without your narration, because in every professional context it will be seen without you standing next to it. Listen first, explain after.
• Take notes during your own critique. You will not remember it, and the specific observations are the value.
• Watch everyone else's critique. This is the cheapest learning in the course — you get twenty critiques for the price of one.
• Learn to give useful critique. "I like it" helps nobody; "my eye goes to the bright corner instead of the subject" is actionable. Describing your own response as a viewer is always legitimate.
• Print for critique properly. A badly presented print invites comments about presentation instead of about the photograph.
• Shoot more than you show. Editing — selecting which frames to present — is a real skill, and showing everything signals that you cannot judge your own work.

How Florida course levels affect transfer

The first digit of an SCNS number denotes the year of offering, not transferability. Courses at the 1000 and 2000 levels transfer transparently between Florida public institutions, and 3000 to 4000 is unproblematic since both are upper division. The boundary that actually matters is 2000 to 3000, where lower-division credit generally cannot satisfy an upper-division requirement.

PGY1100C is 3 credits with an estimated 60 contact hours under the C-suffix combined lecture-and-laboratory convention, and a $40.00 lab fee. It is a studio course: assessment is by portfolio and critique, with darkroom access booked outside scheduled hours, so the real time commitment exceeds the timetable.

Transfer requires the suffix check described above. Photography A.S. and A.A.S. degrees are applied and do not carry the A.A.'s junior-status guarantee, and note that art and photography baccalaureates normally admit on portfolio review regardless of transcript — so building a strong body of work matters more than the credit count.