This is the fifth in a week long series on Photography. Check out Monday’s offering to get the scoop on it from the beginning.
One of my favorite artists, Robert Irwin, has a saying that became the title of his biography. ‘Seeing is forgetting the name of the thing one sees’. That is why drawing instructors teach on how to see negative space because negative space doesn’t have a name, it doesn’t make you conjure up what an elbow is suppose to look like, or a breast, or a tree or a couch. It is just a shape and it is just defined by the line or the shadows or texture, that’s all.
So, when wondering what to take a photo of, don’t worry so much about the ‘thing’ you are trying to photograph, all named and defined, but look at it without naming it. Find the line or tone or texture or color that is within it and make an image of those things. Your photos will be much better, I promise.
This is the fourth of a week long series on my take on photography. Go to Monday’s posting to see the series from the beginning.
Actually, I say stand too far away or too close… or too low or too high. The demon of creativity is often the eye level shot and the ‘just right’ distant shot. Break the plane of your own eye level, of the model/photographer comfort zone and the resulting ‘well composed’ but boring shot. If you are worrying about what someone will think, the model or an onlooker or whoever, then go back to your house and sell your camera because you are only going to create something that looks like someone elses work, since you are allowing someone else to decide what you do while in the act of creating an image.
This is the third in a week-long series on my take on Photography. Go to Monday’s posting to see it from the beginning.
The rule is to get the whole face in the frame, the whole person, everything perfect. But my rule is that that rule sucks. Are their times to do that? Sure. But for Christ’s sake (and everyone else’s) don’t be a slave to the perfect shot. Try getting the persons face just partially in the frame with most of the image being a background or something else. Try working with angles and composition in an abstract way instead of worrying so much about the subject matter being perfectly upright.
Here is the important thing though. Don’t think every experiment is just so cute and precious that you just have to show it to the world. Remember, chances are every experiment you are attempting a lot of other people have tried it as well. So go look around, see what other people have done. Be self-critical but NOT self-condemning. There is a BIG difference. Being Self-critical means you evaluate and look honestly wat what you have done in context of your own work and others. Self-condemning means you deride yourself for not being perfect or more like someone else, etc. It is boring and selfish and oh so last century to wallow in that. Get over it.
This is the second in a week long series on my take on photography. Go to Monday’s posting to see the series from the beginning.
Whatever you do, LEARN what your camera can do! Do not brag about ‘Oh, I don’t know how to do that’ or ‘Yea, I don’t read manuals’. Both are excuses masking laziness or fear. Read, practice, goof off, experiment. But for God’s sake (and anyone else’s) don’t put a stop sign in your head just because you are afraid. And don’t think that taking bad photos is something to avoid. Take the photo, dag nabbit! How else will you know what is good or not? Do dancers wait until they are perfect to dance? No, they practice knowing they are going to make mistakes and fail. Do the same.
Every day this week I am going to post a page from this book. I found it back in the 80s. It is a hobby book for young children, helping them learn how to take photos. At the time I wasn’t a big believer in all the ‘rules’ of photography (I am still not)and appropriated it by putting my own ‘bad’ photographs over the photos in the book. It was my way of playing with the ideas of ‘good photography. Come back every day all week to learn my way of taking a good photo!
This book was exhibited in an exhibition entitled ‘children’s toys’ at the Young Gallery in Saratoga, California in the early 90s.
My daughters’ threw a party at our house back in 2002 on the last day of school. One of their friends had her whole arm tattooed. I saw her sitting in this chair and next to her I could see the same colors from her tattoo reflected subtlely in the wall beside her.
We were in San Francisco for a mini vacation and took a tour of the south of Market gallery area. This San Francisco gallery was airy and the assistant had great eyebrows and there was an interesting painting with the word penis in it and there was a colorful potted tree outside and a wall of tile and next thing I know I have a collage.
This car, a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere, was buried June 19th, 1957 in front of the Tulsa County Courthouse. It was exhumed fifty years later with the hopes it would be in pristine condition. It was instead found to be in the condition you see here, having been under water for most of the 50 years it turns out. They put in on display anyway along with an invitational car show that included some beautiful Belvederes.
I noticed the woman in the distance drawing me while I waited at the coffee house for my friend who was going to model for me. When she arrived I did some drawings of her, then some photos. All the while the woman in the background was drawing me. This was quite ironic since I had met my model while drawing her at another coffee house just days before.
We were right next to a big picture window and my friend had this luminous glow on her skin from the sky reflecting into the space. Meanwhile back in the establishment the woman doing the drawing was bathed in indoor incandescent light. I loved the contrast and did my best to get both in one image. I could have worked out an image that had both in focus but I liked the blurred image in the back since you could see all you needed to in it without the focus.
