Photography: An Eightfold Path Toward Self-Discovery

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Interesting article by Andy Ilachinski at The Luminous Landscape.

True photography, as a creative medium meant to express (and only rarely just to impress) requires a lifetime of dedication, practice and patience. In an age of ready access to all kinds of photo gear, from low end to high, and near instant self-gratification with “Wow, another stunning shot!” tweets from friends and family admiring our constant stream of smartphone image uploads, it is easy to forget that. The result is not an immediate, but ultimately short-lived, reward; rather, it is a slow, meditative, Zen-like journey toward self-discovery.

via Photography: An Eightfold Path Toward Self-Discovery – Luminous Landscape.

The following are the 8 steps.

1. Joyful snapshots of anything and everything.
2. A passive stirring of aesthetic value.
3. Willful engagement of the environment.
4. Recognition of the power of expression.
5. One picture is not enough.
6. Need to tell a story.
7. Stories of Stories.
8. Self-discovery.

It’s not always easy to understand from the titles exactly what the author means and sometimes the differences between the various steps are quite subtle so you really have to read the article to get a good sense of what he’s saying.

I don’t altogether agree with him. It seems to me that the article is very much specific to his own situation. He has felt the need to get beyond the single image and to tell stories, but I’m not sure that that necessarily applies to everyone. I must say though that I feel that I’m going in the same direction. So which stage am I at? I’d say stage 5, possibly stage 6.

Seagull Landing

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We went to Danbury Fair Mall yesterday. My wife dropped me off at Barnes and Noble (see At the Bookstore) and after I’d spent a while there I walked back to the mall to wait for her. As I was walking back across the parking lot I came across a group (flock??) of seagulls lying down in the sun and thought to myself: “There must be a picture there somewhere”. As I got closer it occurred to me that they’d eventually take off and I might be able to get a picture of one of them in flight. Sure enough this is what happened. They did take to the air, but didn’t fly very far – just far enough to get out of range. I managed to get this shot just as one of them was coming in to land again. To me it looks a bit like a drawing. The bright sunlight made it very contrasty and I increased the contrast even more to get the look I wanted. I also liked the look on his/her face, as if to say: “Ha! Thought you could catch me did you?”

Doll on a pole

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I was walking the dog around the lake yesterday when I came across this doll. It seemed like it would make a slightly quirky picture. Seeing it made me wonder about why it was there. It was pinned to one of the poles that carry the electricity wires. I guess it’s a child’s doll that had been dropped, or maybe fell out of a stroller. Perhaps someone had picked it up and attached it to the pole in the hope that the child, or a parent would return to reclaim it. I’d noticed the doll before when I didn’t have a camera so I know that it had been there for some time. While I’m sure that someone would have noticed that it was missing they may not have realized exactly when or where the disappearance occurred. I often pass this spot and I’ll keep an eye open to see if anyone removes it.

At the Bookstore

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Source: Creativity Corporation by Mr. Fish via And Then The Fun Began

I’ve always been an avid reader and before I got my Amazon Kindle part of my weekend routine was to visit our local bookstore and spend an hour or two browsing. Now much of my reading is done electronically (although not photography books which I still buy in hard copy. The photographs just don’t work on the Kindle), but I still go to the bookstore from time to time. I find a couple of interesting books, go to the coffee shop, have a coffee and read for a bit.

Of course, I always look at the photography books. Generally there are two sections. One, called “Digital Photography” that for the most part contains books on photographic technique and cameras. The second is usually called “Art and Photography” and contains books by photographers e.g. I recently noticed books by Sally Mann, Annie Leibovitz, Dorothea Lange, Drew Barrymore and a bunch of books by Ansel Adams.

Of late I’ve noticed more of a certain kind of book in the first section, books not focused on individual cameras, not focused on what f-stop to use in a certain situation. For want of a better word I’ll say that I’m seeing more books devoted to inspiration, vision, creativity etc. Some Examples:

Achieving your potential as a photographer.
The Creative Fight.
Inspiration in Photography.
Learning to see creatively.
The Essence of Photography.

Can it be that photographers (mostly amateur photographers I imagine) are finally realizing that sophisticated cameras and a good knowledge of photographic technique can only take you so far? The problem is that it’s quite easy to learn how to use a camera. It’s a bit more difficult (but not much) to learn photographic technique. At a certain point I realized that I was buying books on photographic technique and my pictures weren’t getting any better. I knew as much about technique as I needed to. Now it was just practice and developing some kind of vision. The latter is the hard part. I’ve read some of the above books and, while interesting, I’m not at all convinced that they helped much. In my darker moments I think that either you have vision/creativity/inspiration etc. or you don’t – and if you don’t there’s not a lot you can do about it. Then the gloom dissipates and I start to think that with persistence, resolve and practice some kind of vision will evolve. As Henri Cartier-Bresson once said: “Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst.” Someone I came across on a photography forum added something like: “And in my case the second 10,000 are not much better”. I couldn’t agree more.