1. The Photo Essay:
The Photo Essay is one of the most important developments of 20th Century photography. The
Photo Essay’s perfection is often credited to W. Eugene Smith (1918-1978), who popularized
this type of professional photography.
The Photo Essay can be described as: a group of photographs, usually with supplementary text,
that conveys a unified story and is published as a book or as a feature in a magazine or
newspaper. To create a photo essay we use candid photography, documentary photography and
photojournalism.
Project Details:
For your First Project of Semester 1, you are being asked to create a Photo Essay. This is a
more independent project but please note that it should culminate all of the techniques and
methods you have learned from last year. This means my expectations for quality and care
will be higher than your previous projects. Here are the stipulations of this project:
1) Ten (10) Photographs
 Strong composition
 Contrast & clarity
 NOT used for any other project
 Your choice of subject matter and theme
1) Each photograph must capture a moment
2) MUST relate to one another through a common theme
3) Photographs must sequence in order to tell a story
4) Each photograph must have a subtext of at least two (2) sentences furthering
the connections & dictating elements of the story NOT seen in the photograph
 Do not simply describe the photograph
 Report information that corresponds to the photo
 Tie this information together
1) All ten (10) photographs must be presented in a PROFESSIONAL DISPLAY
with the text typed, spell-checked and grammatically correct
Unemployed men vying for jobs at the American Legion
Employment Bureau in Los Angeles during the Great
Depression. Over a third of the country was unemployed.
“I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother
who asked me no questions. I did not ask her name or her
history.” – Dorothea Lange