photography
"One of the downsides of the disposable camera is that it’s fun, which is in strict contrast to real professional photography which must always be stressful, or else you go to photography jail." - Casually Explained (YT)
Photography is the best excuse to go explore the world. Even better, to discover a whole new dimension that has always been there, hiding in plain sight. The camera is a superpower. But it all starts with a pair of comfortable shoes.
This photo by photojournalist Evan Vucci is already an iconic image of our times. The amazing Imitative Photography YouTube channel has a great video showing how that photograph was made - a rare example of how great photography is done.
And yet, some still miss the point. “Right aperture / exposure / iso”, “there’s nothing special about being on this spot, they literally were right there” are some of the comments. Go figure.
Now, I have no idea what the exact settings were. Evan had much more important things to focus on, so it is likely that they were already dialed in for the conditions, or that he was shooting in some semi-automatic mode. In any case, he could've missed on some of those settings and the image would've still been as iconic as it finally turned out to be.
Indeed, the image is iconic not because it's perfectly exposed, it has no noise, or because the color balance is accurate. No, it's all about the story it tells. And making it might look easy, but it was anything but that.
What those commenters are missing is that the image was made because of Evan’s vision, who was able to anticipate what was going to happen next by moving to the right spots; the big balls it takes to point a camera at a presidential candidate when armed forces are looking for a shooter (who you don’t even know if is still active!); the experience it takes to frame your subject perfectly in a chaotic environment without thinking much about it; and the practice it requires to know how to use your camera as fast as Evan did, literally an extension of his body.
When something looks easy but yet only a few manage to do it, you know they are some of the best at what they do. Of course, there’s nothing especial to that shot, provided you are at the right spot, at the right time, ready and with the skills and experience required to make it happen. Other than that, nothing to see here.
In a world that is constantly trying to sell us shortcuts and workarounds, it's important to realize that the road to great photography is rather unassuming and kind of boring. It is the accumulation of great work made over the years with hard work that we can start building a body of work. It is a very simple path, but not easy to follow.
In order to make great photographs, we need to know what makes them great in the first place. Developing a photographic taste is crucial, both internal (our own taste) and external (the objective truths of the medium).
In this video, we dive deep into this topic and talk about how we can get better as photographers by improving our taste.
I am a huge advocate of daily photography. I try to take photographs wherever I am, whatever I’m doing. One reason is that there’s always an image waiting to be made, but also because I believe the more we do it, the better we get at it.
Surely, blind practice can be detrimental in deterministic scenarios, like basketball: sticking to a bad shooting technique when you are missing all your shots can make you a worse player in the long run. Practice doesn’t always make perfect without feedback and corrections.
But what does “perfect” even mean in photography as an art?
When we take photographs often, we become more familiar with our camera, our process, dealing with different subjects and lighting conditions, and post-processing.
More importantly, spending a bit of time every day paying attention to our surroundings, looking for something worthwhile to capture, can only make us better observers.
And above all, mistakes are not to be avoided in photography. Experimentation is fundamental to growing as an artist, even if it doesn’t seem like it at first.
There’s never been perfection in art, and there will never be.
I don’t believe in location scouting when it comes to landscape and fine art photography.
It’s not that I don’t find value in exploring a place before a planned shoot; it’s just that I don’t do it with the only purpose of “gathering information”, as it’s usually understood.
There’s only a first time for everything: you’ll only see a place with completely fresh eyes once. The second time you visit a location, you’ve already built some preconceived ideas about it. Over time, we may only be able to see a very limited amount of images in that location.
It is during that first time that our minds are most open. If we have a camera with us, we can play and experiment more freely; if we leave it at home, we prevent ourselves from even trying.
Deciding beforehand what the “right” and “wrong” time might be for a location we don’t even know can be a costly mistake.
Many photographers dismiss the idea of creating for an audience. “Create for yourself”, they say.
But even for those who despise the notion of creating with others in mind, there's a very special kind of audience we all should consider: our future self.
Time tends to add emotional distance between then and now. If the images we create fail to resonate with others today, they might also fail to resonate with us in the future.
This is why I believe we should reflect on our images from a more objective and detached point of view. So our audience of one doesn't end up becoming an audience of zero.
I used to think that good photographers consistently take great photographs, and only rarely they make something subpar. Surely, their “keeper rate” was much better than mine.
This was one of the most harmful beliefs I held when I was taking my first steps in photography. Because when you don’t allow yourself to fail, you play it safe; and when you play it safe, there’s no growth.
Making a bad photograph is not the risk: the lack of experimentation and play is the real danger.
In this video, I expand a little bit more on the post from a couple of days ago, Who are you creating for?.
By the way, this video is from my second channel, @aows.jpg, where I talk all things photography. One I created to keep my main channel cleaner, but you can read more about that here.
Scotland has been quite a challenging place to photograph, to say the least. For most of my time here, the rain and wind made my job incredibly difficult.
My gear took some damage (exhibit 1, 2 and 3), but I also had to endure the elements myself.
And yet, these challenges made me a better photographer. Scotland pushed me, but it did so in a very positive way. I had to work hard, really hard, but without being overwhelmed by impossible conditions, even though I did face some of those moments.
I feel like I've grown as a photographer more in the last 2 months than in the entire past year, since I went on a similar adventure across Norway. It was tough, even painful at times, but I cherished every minute of it.
Testing our limits, wherever they may lie, is key to growth and progression. Photography is no exception.
From my experience, a photographer's audience is comprised of mainly two groups: people who enjoy their images; and other photographers.
The latter is a much larger group than the former, and that's why many photographers seem to be creating for others like them.
Take a look at the screenshot above showing the most watched videos on my YouTube channel: many more people want to hear about an 8-year-old camera that is not being made anymore, than to see what can be done with it.
Photography is such an accessible medium (everyone with a smartphone is a photographer!), that most people will come at it from the perspective of a photographer rather than a passive viewer.
Everyone wants to become a better photographer, the faster the better. That's why talking about camera gear sells, or why arguments over ISO values are a thing.
Some photographers have had so much success with this approach that they all but stopped taking pictures. They've become extremely knowledgeable about cameras and lenses, but they might have forgotten how to use them.
However, I'm not here to shame anyone --that expertise is extremely valuable, and we should consider ourselves lucky enough to have it available out there, mostly for free.
But I doubt this was what most of us had envisioned when we first picked up a camera. This is simply a reminder to everyone out there -including myself- to never forget why we started taking pictures in the first place, and who we are creating for.
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Sometimes, I'll rewatch some of my older videos. I love the work I did in the Great Salt Lake, or in the beautiful Lofoten Islands, among many others. But I have never, ever, rewatched any of my top 10 most viewed videos -- the ones focused on camera gear or the technical aspects of photography. And I think that speaks volumes.
Still, the reality of photography is what it is, and that's one of the reasons why I decided to create a second channel a few months ago. I haven't uploaded any video for a while there, but I'm about to start very soon. That is "content" aimed to photographers and nothing else. The main channel will become a sort of sacred place where I shall talk less and less about photography, and more about the why we create.
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Update: I expand on this a bit more in this video.
Cormac McCarthy died yesterday at the age of 89. According to Wikipedia, McCarthy is "widely regarded as one of the greatest modern American writers".
What I didn't know about him is that after 26 years of writing, none of McCarthy's novels "had sold more than 5,000 hardcover copies". He was labelled the "best unknown novelist in America".
He spent half of his long writing career as a mostly unknown writer. Success did eventually come to McCarthy, though, and only then his early work was appreciated the way it deserved.
The arts, and that includes photography, are not a meritocracy: good work, even outstanding work, is not a guarantee of success.
Another lesson we can take from his example and many similar others is that success is a lagging indicator. The same goes for failure, by the way.
We do not become what we are today overnight; it's only after weeks, months, years, decades, of hard work (or the lack of) that we achieve results (or not). It took McCarthy 26 years of dedication, of not giving up, to get significant recognition.
At the same time, in order to survive for that long, we should not make that kind of success our end goal. Would you be able to yearn for public recognition for a quarter of a century and still find the strength to keep going? I know I would not, I would've given up.
It's only when we find joy in what we do, and when we set our own definition of success, what that looks like for us, that we have a chance to succeed. And even if that never comes, at least we have poured our souls into our work and shared it with whoever was there to listen to us.
I watched with interest the recent presentation of Apple's AR/VR headset, Vision Pro. I was hoping for a use case that wasn't playing games, watching TV, or pretending to be a legless avatar.
While Vision Pro seems to be a device geared towards consumption for the most part, I can see huge potential on the productive side of things as well.
I was very happy to see that the headset can work as a portable, private, and pretty big monitor to a Macbook. As someone who doesn't have a permanent home, much less an office, this can be a big deal for me. Especially when I'm on the road.
During photography road trips, I spend most nights in my car, where space is... well, very limited. I still haven't found a way to work on my computer for long periods of time that is comfortable and doesn't break my back.
An AR/VR headset could solve this problem. I can't wait for the day I can have a 27" virtual monitor (or two, or three) to work on Lightroom and Final Cut Pro in the back of my small SUV.
I'm still a bit skeptical (is the resolution of the headset going to be enough for this use case?), even more considering the price point of this thing, but I'm excited for a future where I could work from anywhere as comfortably as I would in a proper office.
Photographers may or may not make a living by photography, but they are alive by it ~ Robert Adams
The spring is a very challenging time for me. Foggy, rainy and cold days are mostly gone, as hot and sunny weather takes over. But even worse than that are my allergies.
Going out to take some photos becomes an exercise in overcoming the discomfort, pushing through the misery at times.
Thankfully, I started taking an allergy pill that seems to be working. It's not perfect, but it makes being out bearable. So I've been taking more pictures lately and the change in my mood has been nothing short of amazing.
I went from feeling a bit sluggish, tired, to feeling more alive and optimistic. And I didn't have to go anywhere to feel that way! Just walking the very same roads, streets and paths I walk everyday. That's the power of the camera.
Just another reminder (in case I needed one!) that this is what photography... daily photography, does to us.
An idea from Lynda Barry's What it is that resonated with me. The image as a place you create; similar to the real one you photographed, but different. A place that used to live in your imagination, and is brought into existance through your camera.
Creating a meaningful body of work takes time -- a lot of time. We need to be patient, believe in yourselves, and keep looking for images everywhere, everyday.
Remember that photography is a long term game, something we need to do as often as possible. Because even the tiniest contributions add up.
I've been working on some old photos. I just got to the ones I made in the magical forest of Fanal, in Madeira. It's been more than a year and a half since then, and I still get goosebumps when I see those images show up on my laptop.
Even though going through so many photographs takes quite some time, I really appreciate the fact that I took that many. Take the ones above as an example: the same composition, captured several times with just slight variations.
While always important, this is even more relevant when there is an interplay between the subject and other elements, or when there are two or more subjects (like in these images, you could argue).
All of the photos above could've worked just fine, as they all captured what I saw there. Two stunning trees entangled in a beautiful dance. The small variations I captured here don't make that much of a difference and yet, I always find one or two that I like more the rest, for whatever reason.
That's why I find it so important to take multiple shots of the same composition, with tiny variations. It can be very hard to decide which one is the best one in the field, especially when the conditions are changing by the second (like they do in Fanal).
As I usually say, if it feels right, shoot it. Make the call later.
“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future” - Steve Jobs
Unlike many other photographers, I don't have a specific mission to accomplish with my work. No bosses, no clients, no guidance of any kind. I have no idea what I will be photographing next week, let alone in 5 years.
With this incredible flexibility comes a huge amount of doubt: where to go, what to photograph, where to share it, which camera I should use. It's all to me, and it can be a heavy burden at times, as I second-guess myself very often. Did I make the right call?
It's hard to see the path when it's being carved right after you. Only when I look back (contact sheets are great for that) I see it clearly. It's not a straight path but a very windy one, with plenty of detours and diversions. But it's a path.
I don't know here it will lead me, if anywhere at all. All I can do is to have some faith, to embrace the unknown of what lies ahead, and keep pushing.
In the end, it will all make sense. Or so we hope.
Put the camera away and enjoy the moment. Or so they say.
Certainly, there are moments when we should drop everything and just take it all in, especially when there's interaction with other people.
And there's no better way to worsen the experience than sharing the pictures right away, while you are still in that moment. That's why I don't like phones for photography.
A standalone camera, though, will never take you away from the moment. It will only enrich it.
It makes the experience better because it is through the camera that we try to find what makes a moment especial, a face beautiful, a place memorable. We examine what we have in front of us through the camera, and see things we wouldn't have otherwise. It makes us pay closer attention.
This is the gift photography gives us: a tool to see what we weren't able to see before.
