Includes bibliographical references (p. 145-149).

Invitation to participate -- Foreword -- Introduction -- A short note on assignments -- Master assignment : show the world through your eyes -- 1. Exploring the medium : assignments based on technical or process issues -- Introduction -- Employing first principles, experiment with the physical and formal qualities of your medium -- The analog photogram -- The digital photogram--direct scanning -- The pinhole camera -- Process based approaches -- Non-silver processes --

2. The eye : assignments based on perceptual and/or observational issues -- Introduction -- pt. 1. Light and color -- Make the trace of the patterns of light that constitute a photograph, the subject of your image -- When photographing, consider carefully the nature and quality of the light you choose -- 1) Observing light -- 2) When creating a lighting set-up -- Create a simple setup to enlarge the size of the light source -- Refine your observational skills with respect to the interaction of light and color -- Describing the color of light -- A series of practical exercises -- Juxtaposing color -- Photographing with different light sources -- Photographing with mixed light sources -- Observing the direction of the light source -- Make an object you know to be one color look as though it is a different color -- Mix warm colors with cool colors -- Juggle many balls -- pt. 2. Time and space -- Make time itself the subject of the photograph -- Specific assignments on time -- Show and/or compare the same subject over a period of time -- Juxtapose non-visual accounts of the past with contemporaneous images -- Create an artifact that when exposed to the elements will change over the passage of time -- Photograph an event, either in series, or with an extremely long exposure, so that the image literally takes a long time to make -- Use a slow shutter speed to introduce blur--not to show movement as is often suggested--but instead to suggest a moment extended -- Use various post-production methods such as handcoloring, toning, drawing into the photograph etc. to engage the viewer for a longer period of time -- Find a point of stillness and silence in the world of motion and noise -- The digital moment -- Set up a system where time is the criteria for making the exposure -- Extend a sequence in time and space, and/or, extend an image in time and space -- Experiment with different vantage points -- Eliminate the central point of interest -- Create or eliminate space -- When photographing, visualize the field of view as a box rather than a plane -- Related assignments -- Find words and letters -- Give chance a chance -- Exercise by Wynn Bullock --

3. The "I" : assignments on developing a sense of self -- Introduction -- pt. 1. The self -- Make two series of self-portraits, one where you are literally in the image, one where you are not -- Rationale : part one -- Rationale : part two -- Simile -- Metaphor -- Metonymy -- Synecdoche -- The equivalent -- Some ideas for metaphorical self portraits -- Self portrait rider 1 : the mask -- Make two sets of images, one about a mask that conceals, one about a mask that reveals -- Self portrait rider 2 : the faȧde -- Further assignments -- Multiple identities -- Visualizing the past : depict a significant memory -- Memento mori -- Other personal assignments more briefly expressed -- Photograph the seven deadly sins -- Photograph virtue -- Keep a journal assiduously -- Instead of attempting to define identity, adopt or create a role for your self instead -- pt. 2. The self and the world -- Find your place in the world and communicate through images, what it is about this spot that makes it yours and yours alone -- Finding your place : a case study -- While photographing, participate with, rather than do something to, the world -- Exercise by Minor White -- Learn to center yourself and see by shutting down the incessant internal chatter that passes for everyday consciousness -- Prove you are awake --

4. The mind : assignments based on developing cognitive and reasoning skills -- Introduction -- pt. 1. On history and research -- Make yourself aware of the history of the medium and use the results of this research in your work -- Rationale -- 1) Knowledge of the history of photography -- 2) Research as an on-going process -- Process : amplified reductionism -- Take from the whole, a part -- Make this part, a new whole -- Sample assignment of amplified reductionism -- Examine the practices and procedures employed by art museums and conceive a visual investigation based on an aspect of this research -- Related assignment -- Make a wonder cabinet -- pt. 2. On evidence -- Consider the nature and uses of photography in the construction of evidence -- Take images made as evidence for one world-view, function as evidence for a different perspective -- Accept the malleability of meaning inherent in the photograph (especially the historical photograph) and use it to create your vision of the past -- Create a digital conspiracy -- Create a fictional event and then make an (un)real document -- Create a performance to be photographed with the intention that the finished product be the image of the event as much if not more than the performance itself -- Create a narrative tableaux -- Construct a new reality by combining material from a number of separate images into a new single image -- Create body types, both idealized and abnormal -- Create a new landscape -- pt. 3. On words and images -- Devise a means to combine Words and Images in such a way that each equally participates in the generation of meaning -- Find or create a text and make images to amplify its meaning -- Photograph a word or section of text so that its meaning is altered by its new appearance -- Combine images in such a way as to use them as pictographic devices to tell a story. Create a visual alphabet. For precedents think of Native American smoke signals and the use of semaphore signals by ships at sea -- Find fragments of text in the real world whose meaning has been altered by neglect and/or the weather, or by framing the photograph to create new contexts and meanings -- Look up the meaning of the word palimpsest and employ the idea of over-writing to create new (or multiple) levels of meaning -- In PhotoShop, or in any program that permits, inter-weave words and images to create new (or multiple) levels of meaning -- Play with new relationships by writing down words (using various type styles and sizes) on pieces of paper and place them randomly on or near images. Observe how the meaning of both the word and the image changes --

Afterword : integrative strategies -- Arrange your images so they exhibit the quality of thoughtful authorship -- Bibliography and further reading -- Acknowledgements -- Notes.