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Childhood Memories A Photo Essay By Tarrah Martinelli

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Childhood Memories

When attempting to conjure up ideas of what to photograph, I immediately turn to important parts of my past. A photograph

is often a representation of a memory, something that you want to hold onto. I take pictures of times and places that I know I will

want to remember for a long time. For this reason, I chose to photograph the softball field that I grew up playing on. Softball became a

huge part of my life at an early age. I started playing year round from the time I was nine years old until I graduated from high school.

The field became my safe haven. It was somewhere that I could take all of my negative energy and turn it into something posit ive.

In this photo essay, I started out wanting to show what a positive thing softball was in my life. I wanted the photos to

represent how much fun I had, and how much I grew through what I learned on the field. After looking back at my pictures, I realized

that wasn’t at all what I had captured. I felt an emptiness and a loss when I looked at them. The photographs represented a place that

I can no longer go. I realized that I have barely picked up a ball since the last game I played in almost five years ago. Due to this strong

connection, I decided I wanted to showcase the feelings of emptiness and loss through the photographs to my viewers.

I have ordered the photographs similar to the way that I used to move around the field on a typical practice or game day. I also

chose to do it this way because it allows the viewer to start outside of the field, move around to the batting cages, enter the field, and

once again move back outside of the fence. I want my viewer to be able to travel around the field rather than just look at pictures of

different areas.

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In order to come up with my selections for this photo essay, I went to the softball field that I grew up playing on. Using my

Canon Snapshot, I began taking photos of the different parts of the field, trying to capture the significance of each part. As Kuhn

states, "The photograph is a prop, a prompt, a pre-text: it sets the scene for recollection” (396). Even though these are my memories, I

want my reader to use these photographs as a “prompt” to connect with the feelings that I want to convey. I chose my Canon

Snapshot camera for a couple of different reasons. At first, I planned to use a throw-away camera that can be bought at most local

drug stores. When I was in high school, I lost my digital camera and heavily relied on the throw-away to capture memories. Through

further deliberation, I decided to stick with the Canon Snapshot. I wanted to be able to distort the images through editing with

Picasa and Picnik in order to give them the feel that I was going for. I didn’t think I would be able to do this as successfully or easily

with a throw-away.

I took over two hundred photos and started narrowing them down. Out of the photos that looked similar, I chose the ones

that were most appealing, but also captured the feelings I was searching for. Once I narrowed the photos down, I began editing. I

used Picasa and Picnik interchangeably on all of the photos (they have almost all of the same effects). As stated previously, my goal

through editing was to give the images a feel of emptiness and loss. Kuhn explains that, "Memories evoked by a photo do not simply

spring out of the image itself, but are generated in an intertext of discourses that shift between past and present, spectator and image,

and between all these and cultural contexts, historical moments” (397). In these photographs, the past and present are meant to be

evident at the same time. That is, by looking at the softball field it evokes memories of when I used to play there, which are followed

by the emotions that I feel presently since I can no longer go back to that place. Of course, I can visit, but I will never be able to play

there with my team the way that I used to.

The first time through editing, I played with a lot of different effects until I discovered what worked best. I found that the best

way to capture the feelings I was going for was to drain almost all of the color out of the photos. I did this on every photo using the

saturation effect. Draining the colors also made them look as though they are fading. On most of the pictures, I altered the color scheme

by using the cross-process or cinemascope effects. I did this because they gave the pictures a more calming appearance, and altered the

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colors to be mostly hues blue and yellow. Getting rid of

the natural colors of the photographs further exaggerated

that they represent memories. The last photograph in the

essay is almost fully black and white. I did this because I

wanted it to be more dramatic than the others.

Some of the other effects that I used were soft focus

and filtered black and white. These effects served two

purposes. First, they allowed me to exaggerate the

intended focal point of the photograph (this is shown

best in photos 7, 9 and 12). Second, to exaggerate the

feeling of loss by making parts of the picture look as

though they were fading away. Lastly, I altered the

highlights and shadows of the photographs. I did this to give

them a stark appearance which enhances the unpleasantly clear feelings of loss that I have when looking at the photographs.

To go into more depth about the composition of the photographs, I have chosen to specifically discuss the photo above. The

focal point is dramatized by both the soft focus and filtered black and white effects. According to the rule of thirds, the intended focal point

is just above where the bottom horizontal line would go across the picture. More specifically, the photo adheres to the golden section

rule where the focal point is a small area dead center of the photograph. Although it is not perfect, there is also a sense of symmetry.

The building in the background and the ball are centered in the picture, with parts of the dugout showing equally on both sides.

There is depth to the picture due to the focus being on the dirt in the foreground, but the picture continues past the building and into

the trees. The trees also act as natural framing around the building.

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Works Cited

Kuhn, Annette. "Rememberance: The Child I Never Was." Wells, Liz. The Photography Reader. New York, NY: Routeledge, 2003. 395-

401.