Photography as Art Form: Basic Camera

Course Description

Photography as Art Form: Basic Camera covers the basic theory and practice of black and white photography as an art form, with emphasis on understanding the technical aspects of the camera and exploring its potential as an artistic tool and the development of basic techniques and aesthetic concerns in relation to the photographic image. UWF states it includes basic darkroom experience, invites all students, and that a material and supply fee will be assessed.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, PGY is the Photography prefix. The University of West Florida publishes this at 3 semester hours through the Department of Art and Design, College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities. It is offered at approximately 17 Florida institutions.

⚠⚠ This is a black-and-white FILM and DARKROOM course, and that is the first thing to understand about it. The statewide inventory title is the generic "Photography I"; UWF's is "Photography as Art Form: Basic Camera," and the description specifies black and white photography with basic darkroom experience. If you are looking for digital photography, that is PGY2801C Digital Imaging, a different UWF course.

⚠ "Invites all students" is a deliberate and welcome phrase. This is an art course open to non-majors, and it is one of the better general-education-adjacent choices in the catalog for a student who wants to make something.

The obvious question deserves an honest answer: why learn film when nobody shoots film? Several reasons hold up. Film forces deliberation — a roll has 24 or 36 frames and each costs money, so the reflex of shooting hundreds of frames and sorting later is unavailable. The darkroom makes exposure and development visible as physical processes rather than as sliders, and students who learn them there understand digital exposure better afterwards. And the aesthetic decisions — light, composition, tone, subject — are identical in both media, which is the actual subject of the course.

⚠ It is also worth being straight about the practical side: film and paper cost money beyond the course fee, darkroom time is scheduled and finite, and the work cannot be done the night before. Ask the instructor for a realistic total cost before the term starts.

⚠ The contact-hour figure is derived — the University of West Florida publishes none

UWF's catalog publishes a credit value in semester hours, the college and department, prerequisites, repeat limits and fee notices. It does not publish contact hours or terms of offering for any course. Every contact-hour value in a UWF guide in this repository is derived. ⚠⚠ This is a studio course carrying a C suffix, and the lecture convention does not apply to it. Studio art courses conventionally meet twice the scheduled time of a lecture course of the same credit — the studio convention of 60 contact hours for 3 semester hours, which is what is recorded here. This matches the figure used for the live ART studio guides in this repository. Confirm the meeting schedule with the department.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Describe the historical development of photography as an art form.
• Describe camera types and the function of each major control.
• Explain the relationship between aperture, shutter speed, and ISO.
• Apply the exposure triangle to achieve a chosen result.
• Use a light meter and interpret its reading critically.
• Control depth of field deliberately through aperture and focal length.
• Use shutter speed deliberately to render motion.
• Describe lens characteristics and the effect of focal length.
• Describe the properties of black and white film and its response to light.
• Load, expose, and process black and white film correctly.
• Develop film and evaluate negative quality.
• Produce a contact sheet and use it to edit a shoot.
• Make black and white enlargements in the darkroom.
• Apply dodging, burning, and contrast control in printing.
• Apply archival processing and print finishing practice.
• Apply safe handling practice for photographic chemistry.
• Apply principles of composition and visual organisation.
• Describe and use the qualities and direction of light.
• Translate a colour subject into black and white tonal terms.
• Develop and sustain a coherent body of work on a subject.
• Present work for critique and articulate the intent behind it.
• Give useful critique of others' work.
• Describe the ethical and legal considerations of photographing people.

Optional Outcomes

• Perform or exhibit work publicly.
• Give and receive critique constructively.
• Build a portfolio, reel, or repertoire list for audition or application.
• Relate the work to its historical and cultural context.
• Describe the professional practices of the field.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• History of photography as art
• Camera types and controls
• Aperture, shutter speed, ISO
• The exposure triangle
• Light metering
• Depth of field
• Rendering motion
• Lenses and focal length
• Black and white film characteristics
• Film loading, exposure, processing
• Film development and negative evaluation
• Contact sheets and editing
• Darkroom enlargement
• Dodging, burning, contrast control
• Archival processing and finishing
• Chemical safety
• Composition and visual organisation
• Quality and direction of light
• Colour to monochrome translation
• Developing a body of work
• Presenting work for critique
• Giving critique
• Ethics and law in photographing people

Optional Topics

• Public performance or exhibition
• Critique practice
• Portfolio, reel, or repertoire development
• Historical and cultural context
• Professional practice in the field

Resources & Tools

• A manual-capable 35mm film camera — ⚠ ask the instructor what is required and whether the department loans equipment before you buy anything. Many programmes have cameras to lend, and a used manual film body is inexpensive on the second-hand market — this is not a course requiring an expensive camera.
• Film, paper and archival supplies — ⚠ a real cost beyond the course fee. Ask for a realistic figure before term, ask what can be bought in bulk with classmates, and ask what the department supplies.
• The darkroom, and its scheduled hours — learn the access procedure in week one. Darkroom time is finite and shared; students who plan around it do well and students who leave printing until the deadline do not.
• The text the instructor assigns — London's Photography and Adams's The Camera, The Negative and The Print are the standards; Adams is still the clearest writing on exposure and tonal control in print.
• A notebook for exposure records — free, and the fastest way to learn: with film you cannot see the result for days, so a record of what you did is the only way to connect a decision to its outcome.
• Museum and gallery collections online — free; the Metropolitan Museum, MoMA, the Getty and George Eastman Museum all publish substantial photographic collections. Looking at a great deal of photography is not optional preparation; it is the main way visual judgement develops.
• Florida's own subject matter — free; coastline, light, weather, architecture and wildlife are unusually strong material and they are outside the door.
• A UWF librarian and the library's arts collections — included in enrolment; scores, recordings, image and film databases are subscriptions a student already has, and most never find out.

Career Pathways

• Photographer (SOC 27-4021) — predominantly self-employed; portrait, wedding, event, commercial, real estate and editorial work. ⚠ Business skill determines income more than technical skill does, which is the single most useful thing to know entering this field.
• Photojournalist and news photographer — a contracting market; increasingly combined with video.
• Commercial and product photographer — steadier than editorial, driven by e-commerce.
• Photo editor, retoucher, digital imaging technician — salaried roles that use the training without requiring self-employment.
• Graphic designer and content creator (SOC 27-1024) — photographic skill is a strong differentiator in design and marketing roles.
• Archivist, curator, gallery and museum work (SOC 25-4013) — generally requires graduate study.
• Art teacher, K-12 (SOC 25-2031) — ⚠ requires Florida teacher certification through an approved programme.
• ⚠ Florida context: a very large wedding, event and tourism photography market; real estate photography sustained by high transaction volume; theme park and cruise line photography operations that employ at scale; and marine, wildlife and landscape work.
• ⚠⚠ Build a portfolio and a business practice in parallel with the coursework. In this field the portfolio is the credential — clients and employers ask to see work, not a transcript.

Special Information

⚠⚠⚠ Darkroom chemical safety

• Photographic chemistry is not harmless. Developers, stop bath and fixer are irritants and sensitisers, and repeated skin contact can produce a lasting allergic dermatitis that ends a person's darkroom work.
• ⚠ Use tongs, not fingers, and wear gloves if you are prone to skin reactions. This is the habit most students skip and most regret.
• Ventilation matters. Work with the ventilation running and report a system that is not working rather than continuing.
• ⚠⚠ Tell the instructor privately if you are pregnant, have a respiratory condition, or have chemical sensitivities. This is not a bar to taking the course; it is information the department can only act on if it has it.
• Chemicals go to designated disposal, not down a sink, and spills are reported immediately however small.
• No food or drink in the darkroom, and wash your hands before you leave it.

⚠⚠ Photographing people: ethics and law

• In public places in the United States, photographing people is generally lawful — but lawful and ethical are different questions, and this course should ask both.
• ⚠ Commercial use is a separate matter and normally requires a model release. Editorial and artistic use is treated differently from advertising, and the distinction is worth learning before you need it.
• ⚠⚠ Photographing minors requires particular care, and photographing on school, hospital, or private property requires permission regardless of how public it feels.
• Consider the subject's position, not only your right. Photographing people who are unhoused, distressed, or unable to consent meaningfully raises real questions that "it was legal" does not answer.
• Florida is a two-party consent state for audio recording — relevant the moment a photography course extends into video, which several in this prefix do.

⚠ Where this course sits in the UWF photography sequence

• PGY2401C is the entry point and is the prerequisite for PGY3420C Photo Art II, which develops advanced black-and-white technique.
• PGY2801C Digital Imaging is the parallel digital course, and PGY4104C Creative Darkroom and PGY4940C Photography: Personal Directions continue the sequence.
• PGY3152C Photography for Non-Majors exists as well — ⚠ but note that this course already "invites all students," so a non-major has more than one route in. Ask an advisor which serves your requirement.
• ⚠ Every photography course in this prefix carries a material and supply fee. Budget across the sequence rather than one course at a time.

⚠ A material and supply fee is assessed

• UWF publishes that a Material and Supply Fee will be assessed for this course. It is charged in addition to tuition.
• ⚠ The catalog does not publish the amount. The department or the Cashier's Office is the only reliable source — ask before the term rather than discovering it on a bill.
• ⚠⚠ In studio arts the course fee is rarely the whole cost. Personal materials are normally the student's own expense and can substantially exceed the fee. Ask the instructor for a realistic total before the term starts, and ask what can be shared, bought used, or deferred.
• Every photography course in the UWF PGY prefix carries this fee, so budget for it across a sequence rather than one course at a time.

⚠⚠ What the suffix does and does not tell you in the arts

• SCNS offers institutions a limited set of suffix options — none, C for combined lecture and laboratory, and L for laboratory — and none of them describes a studio, a rehearsal room, or a private lesson.
• ⚠ So arts departments fit real formats into the nearest available designation, and the fit is frequently poor. UWF publishes TPP2101L and TPP3102L as acting studios under a laboratory suffix, TPP2710C as voice under a combined suffix, and TPP2110 as acting under no suffix at all — three suffixes for what are all studio-format courses.
• The description records the course; the suffix records how it was filed. When they disagree, believe the description — and when transferring an arts course, send the description and the syllabus rather than the number alone.
• ⚠ The same number is frequently published with a C at one Florida institution and without one at another, which is why the statewide inventory and a given catalog so often disagree on suffix. SCNS equivalency does not cross suffixes, so this is evaluated by hand.

Transfer, articulation, and how Florida course levels work

In the Florida Statewide Course Numbering System the first digit is the level: 1 and 2 are lower division, 3 and 4 upper division, 5 and above graduate. ⚠ A lower-division course generally cannot satisfy an upper-division requirement. SCNS equivalency runs on the number and the content, so a course transfers as what it is rather than as what its title resembles.

⚠⚠ The arts carry a transfer complication that most disciplines do not: admission is frequently by audition or portfolio, not by transcript. A performance or studio programme may accept your credit and still require you to audition or submit a portfolio for placement into the major, and placement can put a transferring student back a level regardless of the credit awarded.

Programmatic accreditation matters here. Many music programmes are accredited by NASM, art and design programmes by NASAD, and theatre programmes by NAST. ⚠ Accredited programmes carry specific curricular requirements, so a course that articulates may still not satisfy the requirement it appears to match. Ask the receiving department, not only the registrar.

Course format and position in the curriculum

• Scheduled studio or class sessions with substantial required preparation outside them.
• ⚠ Attendance in a studio or performance course is not comparable to attendance in a lecture. The work happens in the room, with other people, and a missed session cannot be made up by reading. Attendance policies in these courses are correspondingly strict.
• UWF publishes no contact hours or terms of offering. Arts sequences are frequently offered in one term only, so a missed course can delay a degree by a full year — confirm with the department.

PGY2401C is 3 semester hours at the University of West Florida.