Assignment 6 - Formative feedback

Overall Comments

Dear Jennifer

Thank you for sending me your sixth and final assignment.

Overall, this critical review is a good start and you have chosen two interesting photographers to write about. Some of the sentences need a little editing out as they do not appear relevant and do not really support any sort of argument or debate surrounding the photographers you have chosen.

There are some pertinent points which still need to be addressed and this is sometimes easier after you have written the essay and put it to one side for a while, so that you yourself can reflect on what you have written and read it with a fresh approach. I shall detail this more in the section below.

Feedback on assignment

Demonstration of technical and Visual Skills, Quality of Outcome, Demonstration of Creativity

Firstly, I would recommend that you choose a title for your essay. The OCA assignment brief does recommend this. A title will ensure that you do not go off track and that your essay will remain focused on the question which you can keep referring back to. You will probably find that you have a title of sorts within the body of your essay e.g. something on the lines of ‘Have the social and political barriers that women photographers have faced…?’

I would not recommend that you write in Comic Sans. This is quite a controversial font that you have used and many essays have been written on this font alone! I would recommend that the usual Arial size 12 font is more usual, with large quotes being in a smaller size 10 font to give a more professional feel.

Avoid typing things like ‘Introduction’, ‘Section 1’ or ‘Conclusion’. Treat the essay as an academic research document. By all means, use sub-headings, but better to use a sub-title which identifies the ethos of the section you are writing about. 

You are over the word count although there is usually a 10% leeway under or over. However, I would recommend that some of your information is edited out as it does not really add anything to the essay and it is just using up valuable word count.  For example, your opening sentence is about how long you have been studying at OCA and that you have been researching photographers. This is a given, so we can edit this out. If you had a title, this opening sentence could have had more impact, such as: This essay will investigate the similarities between the photographers… [insert names].

Try to avoid saying anything negative in your essay that brings you down e.g. that you have never heard of a particular photographer, as again, this does not really add anything to your essay and does not really critically analyse their work, or your own.

In one paragraph you have begun to analyse the work of Cameron (re: likening them to fairytales). This is great! I would like to see much more of this! Also, some Harvard Referenced images interspersed throughout the text would have been really beneficial, especially at this point. 

At the end of Section 1 (and Section 2), you have cited some references, but these would all go at the end in the bibliography. Better still, to have used some direction quotations from these sources which you could have analysed and used to back up any statements you have made.

Section three and the conclusion is well written and you have made use of the compare and contrast technique. 

Bibliography at the end – correct use of Harvard Referencing is needed. You also need to remove blue hyperlinks and authors are written in alphabetical order by surname.

Coursework

Demonstration of technical and Visual Skills, Demonstration of Creativity

I have looked at your Blog and it looks like there are still elements which need updating. I would recommend you set some time aside to ensure this is done, as you had started out so well with it.

Research

Context, reflective thinking, critical thinking, analysis  

A lot more practice needed on critically analyzing work. I have suggested a good book in the relevant section below, which I mentioned in the previous assignment feedback. 

Suggested reading/viewing

Context

Barnet, S. (2010), A Short Guide to Writing About Art, London: Pearson

Pointers for the next assignment / assessment

Please set some time aside to re-read all my feedback from each assignment and re-do any relevant sections which I have recommended to you.  

Tutor name	Katrina Whitehead
Date	30.03.17