Single-Serving Photo

There’s been more talk than usual lately about keeping a camera with you; taking it places you might not normally take it; the disappointment of missing what could have been a great image if only you had; and the question of whether having the camera with you, though not at the ready, would even help.

Opinions differ, but you can’t lose by having the camera around even if you don’t think you’ll use it. I happened to be driving around Narragansett Bay (actually, across it) in Rhode Island this weekend and, because I was there specifically to take some family portraits, I thankfully had my camera with me and was able to capture this scene.

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This was taken from the Newport side of the Claiborne Pell Bridge, which connects Newport (on Aquidneck Island) in the west to Conanicut Island (chiefly the town of Jamestown) to the east.

The following evening, I took some advice to heart, took the battery grip off of my old Canon 10D, strapped on my 50mm f/1.4 (my smallest lens), and went for a walk by the city pier. I enjoy walking down there because it’s quite scenic and with the harbor and train station in close proximity you never know what you’ll be able to see.

Here is an 8:15 Amtrak Acela departing for points unknown (probably Boston, eventually). I braced my camera against one of those I-beams you see ahead of me. No tripod necessary!

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A close-up of a vendor’s cart parked along the side of the pier, probably left over from Sailfest. I liked the reflection in it and the texture of it.

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A handsome public observation binocular lit by the lights on the pier overlooks the Thames River and the General Dynamics building on the far shore. General Dynamics, previously known as Electric Boat, is a major submarine defense contractor and a significant source of income for the southeast Connecticut shoreline.

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General Dynamics itself glimmers against the water. I was shooting JPEG (the 10D is so slow with RAW) and I set the white balance to “cloudy” for this shot to enhance its redness.

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On my walk back home, this sailor’s monument caught my eye.

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I think the moral of the story is that it’s better to have your “second string” camera with you, stripped down to its most convenient minimum, than to have no camera at all!

Thanks to Aaron Johnson of What the Duck for this eloquent visual synopsis of what I’ve been thinking about lately. Too often we get so deeply embroiled in our craft that we forget why we do it.

A debate has been raging for days on Usenet over the question of whether photography is art and, if so, when it becomes art. Although the very discussion is futile and has no practical outcome, I do think it’s important to take a step back from what you’re doing and think about what it is you’re gaining from it. This is going to be a heady philosophical post so if that’s not your particular brand of vodka, read some photo news instead. (more…)

There was a time, long ago, when photographs were conceived at the moment the shutter button was depressed. Darkroom techniques were limited at best (the idea that a photographic image could even be created was a modern miracle) and the photographer was required to make near-perfect exposures every time.

Things have changed a lot since then; it’s now possible to do amazing things long after the light has been captured by the camera. Today I’m going to explore some competing points of view and take a philosophical walk through the annals of photographic history to clear up some improper perceptions of digital post-processing. (more…)

My approach to artistic photography is simply walking. I take out my camera, have it at the ready, and simply walk around a location of my choice. Photography is all about seeing. Once you start to develop your eye, you begin to see things around you as though they’re compositions; you become more aware of shapes, textures, contrasts, lines, and so forth. I would even go so far as to say that photography is one of the greatest ways to enhance your observational skills.

Sometimes, though, inspiration doesn’t come. That’s when a few little tricks can come in handy to help you see the world differently, or to add interest to otherwise mundane surroundings. These are just ideas; they won’t always work, and there’s no guarantee you’ll even like them, but here they are anyway, for your approval. (more…)

Digital photography makes it possible for artists to create effects and apply treatments to their work that were once impossible in traditional photography. Is this an advantage that should be compensated for in competition and critique? Do digital photographers and traditional photographers have equal footing? Would the pioneering photographers who led the surge into traditional photography embrace today’s digital technology?

My opinion is that digital photography is, and should be treated as, entirely comparable and identical to traditional photography. Although the differences in process and technique bear investigation for the ambitious viewer and may play a role in serious competition and critique as parameters for comparison, they have no more bearing on the effect of the work as would the brand of pencils used by an illustrator.

In the field of art, competition and formal review should command the examination of an artist’s basic choice of media and execution. While even the casual viewer can deepen the experience of a piece of art with knowledge of its process, that information is only helpful insofar as it expands appreciation or increases understanding; all artwork is comparable given only the experience of it intended by its creator.

To give an example of what I mean, consider two paintings. Each painting was created with different types of paint and different brushes, one on canvas and the other on paper, one representational and the other abstract, one lacquered and the other not. Can these two works of art be compared objectively as paintings? My gut says they can. The majority of casual viewers would never seek out these differences because the two works can be compared and contrasted, fairly and completely, simply on the basis of their appearance.

Similarly in photography, two photographs may appear very much the same but may have been created in vastly different ways. In traditional photography alone, a myriad of chemicals and materials are available to the artist. Comparing two photographs, one traditionally printed and the other digitally created, should pose no problem to the viewer; only in formal competition and critique should this piece of information carry any weight, and that is also true for the painting example given above.

Digital photographers find themselves, in many cases, having to defend their work on the basis of its production methods rather than its artistic integrity, and it saddens me. When, in the history of art, have its methods come under such scrutiny? Producing new work in new ways has always been a core value of the field of art as a whole.

What is saddening is not that a photographer would spend time and energy defending his or her craft, for that seems to me a noble endeavor. What saddens me is that anyone would spend time and energy criticizing digital photography, in particular, on the basis of its process rather than its results. Few other fields of art come under such scrutiny; perhaps because many fields of art are less commercialized or because they occupy areas of the art world not very well traveled by the mainstream. Whatever the reasons may be, I hope that the future brings a greater acceptance of digital photography as a photographic methodology, not to be treated differently than the many ways in which light has been captured and reproduced in the past.