Pulitzer Center Update

Everyday D.C. Workshop 3: A Video Chat About Photography

December 10, 2014 | General news, Education news
By
Amanda Ottaway

A student gets close to the computer to ask Peter DiCampo a question during their video chat. Image by Amanda Ottaway. Washington, D.C., 2014.

Pulitzer Center grantee and Everyday Africa co-founder Peter DiCampo video-chatted with students at The Inspired Teaching School in December. Image by Amanda Ottaway. Washington, D.C., 2014.

Pulitzer Center grantee and Everyday Africa co-founder Peter DiCampo showed some of his work via video-chat with students at The Inspired Teaching School in December. Image by Amanda Ottaway. Washington, D.C., 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

This image was shot by a student at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School as part of a series of Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. workshops run there in partnership with teachers, the Everyday Africa project, the D.C. Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative and the Pulitzer Center. Washington, D.C. 2014.

The novelty of having Peter DiCampo’s head projected at many times its normal size on a classroom wall at The Inspired Teaching Demonstration Public Charter School in northeast D.C. added a fun element to students’ latest Everyday Africa-Everyday D.C. photography workshop there.

Everyday Africa is a photo-sharing initiative in which professional photographers living and working on the continent capture images of everyday life in an effort to challenge Western stereotypes of Africa.

Peter said that as part of the project he wanted to “photograph things in a basic and normal way but also a way that’s beautiful, to get people to look at them.”

The fifth and sixth-graders at The Inspired Teaching School have spent the fall taking photos of their own communities, telling their “everyday” stories. Chatting with the classes via Skype from his home in Seattle, Peter, a photographer and co-founder of Everyday Africa, asked the students what they’ve learned so far.

“Angles could make the picture look different,” one student noted. During the discussion that followed, the classes considered use of lines, color, framing, symmetry and what makes a good action shot.

“I learned that sometimes a photograph can tell a story,” another said.

Peter shared them some of his own work; then the class examined a number of their own photos, taken here in D.C., while they discussed what made them particularly good “everyday” examples.

“You got much more comfortable taking pictures of people” between the first and second workshops, Peter said. “That’s great because when we take pictures of daily life…you’re trying to connect with whoever’s looking at the pictures on the other end.”