An Experience
Tag: experiences
A Lasting Friendship
Curiosity
State Of Mind
When you go out to photograph, what ‘state of mind’ are you in?
Do you go out with an idea in mind, or do you ‘free-wheel?’
Both approaches are valid, depending on what you want to achieve. I have to say that for many years I would either pick a subject e.g. I might choose to photograph a Sunrise but have no real goal of what I wanted to capture, and so I would come home with anything, or sometimes I would just set off with my camera and ‘follow the light’ and see where it would take me.
Both of the above approaches produced some excellent images, some average images and of course many ‘learning experiences.’
One day at a meeting of a ‘Photo Group’ I was involved with, we were viewing a of my images when one of the members, Chris Donaldson asked me ‘what I was trying to communicate with the image?’ My answer was that “I wasn’t trying to communicate anything” I just merely took the image for fun.
As Chris mentioned, whether or not I was intentionally trying to communicate anything, didn’t matter as I was still communicating. That day, I changed the way I viewed photography. Up to that point (even though subconscious
ly I knew I was communicating) I wasn’t photographing for that reason. I was just photographing because I had fun.
I still have fun to this day, but since that conversation I have approached photography in a different way, in a more thoughtful way.
Next time you go out to photograph, think about why you are going and what you want to communicate?
Written by David Johnson
November 2016
New Dimension
Renewal
A Long, Thin Road…
“I am not interested in shooting new things, I am interested to see things new.” Ernst Haas
I was leafing through an old photography book and I came across the above quote by Ernst Haas. He was (and remains) a great influence on me.
There are quite literally millions of things to photograph and no photographer could rightly claim to have photographed everything there is, however we do not need to.
I often hear the comment, ‘there is nothing to photograph…” An amazing statement really… As I look out the window (in suburbia currently), I see many subjects and many ideas come to mind of what/how I could photograph them.
The problem isn’t the lack of subject matter. The problem is that we wander around blissfully unaware of our surroundings and we also get caught up in the world, rushing here rushing there.
STOP! Just for one moment wherever you are reading this! Look around.
Do you see a tree? Yes. Look at it as if it is not a tree, but an idea generator, branches as conduit bringing forth ideas (leaves) and photograph it accordingly…
Do you see a fence? Yes. Look at it as if it is not a fence, but a palette. A palette that has light dancing over it creating form and texture, lines and shapes.
Are you a glamour/nude photographer? View the body, not as a body but as a sculpture; view it as part of the landscape and photograph it accordingly…
Are you a flower photographer? View the flower, not as a flower but as a person with a personality…
It is not lack of subject matter, it’s a lack of ideas.
The continued challenge as a photographer is that we need to reinvent and apply new ideas to the subject matter or as Ernst Haas eloquently puts it…
“I am not interested in shooting new things – I am interested to see things new.”
Ernst Haas
David Johnson
October 2016
For more information on Ernst Haas
http://www.ernst-haas.com
Breathing From A Page…
The Traveller
Communicating Creatively 