In a weird twisted turn of events, I stumbled on Jeff Wignell’s Photo Tip of the Day blog. Looking through it, I found a link to a The Art of Manliness. Strange website for a photography blog to lead me to, but that wasn’t what brought me there. It was the title of one post, Lessons in Manliness from It’s a Wonderful Life. I love Jimmy Steward and that movie is a holiday classic. Figuring out what you could learn about manliness from it was interesting.
The author breaks it down into seven basic ideas.
- Be a hero where you stand.
- Treat women well
- Love your family
- Facilitate others’ success
- Stand up for what is right
- Know your faults and correct them
- Live your life with gratitude
All great ideas and life lessons, but how do they relate to photography? OK, not all of them do, but some are great lessons for both life and photography.
Be a hero where you stand – You don’t have to travel far to take great pictures. Sure, Mono Lake is an awesome location and Alaska would be a great place to shoot, but there are great photographs to be taken where you live. Your backyard, the neighborhood park, or a nearby mall can produce some great images if you are creative. On a business point of view, if you have a photo business, don’t try to be the biggest, baddest photographer in the nation or state. Try to be the best in your town.
Facilitate others’ success – Dane Sanders calls them Grumpys. Photographers who don’t/won’t share because they are afraid that by doing so, they will be giving something away. Don’t be a Grumpy. Share ideas, lessons learned, and techniques with others. Don’t worry about the end result, the reward isn’t in the outcome, the reward is in the sharing. When I am on vacation, I love to watch a couple try to take pictures of themselves in front of a landmark. They hand the camera to one of them while the other stands in front of the scene and then they switch places. After they are done, I always go over and offer to use their camera to take the two of them together. In doing so, I make the composition the best I can because I think sometimes it is the only time that they have an image of themselves together while on vacation. I don’t ask for money or anything, I just give. I do the same thing when I see someone struggling with their camera. I offer to help. It is the reason I went out of my way to learn how to use a Canon camera.
Know your faults and correct them – in photography terms, this is easy. Recognize your weakness’ and make them your strength. Mine? Posing and lighting. That is why one of my goals this year is to take a posing lighting workshop. Figure out your weakness and work on it. Maybe yours is macro photography or post production. Whatever it is, don’t shy away from it, embrace the challenge and get better at it.
Live your life with gratitude – this is one that I learned recently. You can be upset that you aren’t shooting in Alaska or on the road to Yellowstone or you could be happy that you get to shoot where you are. You are doing something you love. Enjoy it. Don’t fret about how it could be better, just learn to live in the moment.
There are three others. Treat Women Well and Love Your Family are just good life lessons. But the last, Stand Up For What is Right should be the cornerstone of everyone’s life. It isn’t always easy, but when you do, it always feels good.
Please use the form below to leave a comment and let me know what you think.
Rosary Hand
I listen to a lot of podcasts including Tips From The Top Floor with Chris Marquardt. Usually, it is a great podcast in which he answers a lot of questions on photography ranging from beginner to advanced and does a pretty good job with it. But I have to disagree with his latest topic on his show. In show #488, he reads one of his blog posts called The Post Digital Era.
Now I don’t have any issues with people who like or use film. Just like I don’t believe that there are any real good arguments for or against Canon, Nikon, PC, Apple, Toyota, Nissan, Ford, Chevy, etc. I think you need to find the thing that works for you for whatever reason and use it. I have written on that subject in the past.
I think that people are interested in film for a variety of reasons. One, we all like to go back in history. Look at styles of dress, cars, and movies. Film lets us go back and “re-live” the old days that we all love to do. Two, as people become more proficient with their cameras, they embrace the challenge of being more precise with film. Finally, I think that film, like Mr. Marquardt says, gives a different look to peoples images.
If that is what you are looking for, by all means, go out and shoot film. More power to you.
My issue is with the blog post is that in some ways, it makes individuals who use digital seem inferior. Chris talks about a clean darkroom vs. the digital darkroom. Cropping, framing, and getting it right in the camera. I agree. I think you should always try to get the image right in the camera, but with today’s technology we have the ability to crop, fix, alter, and enhance an image.
He mentions HDR and how it was over the top when it first came out. True, but if those are the type of images you like, produce them. It doesn’t make you a bad photographer. He goes on to say that digital photography has produced a “spray and pray” mentality. It has. For some. For others the spray and pray mentality has made their photography better. As they learn how use their camera to view the histogram, check the composition and framing, and control their tools to capture the vision they have, they start producing better and better images. And they do so with less shots.
All of those are fine and I can see his point. What I don’t understand is the idea that we should embrace imperfections. He claims that “you are bound to realize that for more and more photographers the digital way is becoming less and less satisfying.” Seriously, I just don’t see that happening. I think you see more and more photographers seeking a different look. Take a look at Flickr, there are tons of photographers who are posting images that look different. They have found a process or method that shows their vision the way they want it seen.
As he states, some photographers are adding grain to enhance the feel of an image. He lists programs and apps such as Hipstamatic, instagr.am, and Best Camera add a look to your photographs that you can’t get straight out of the camera. Does that mean we all need to return to film or that we are unhappy with digital? No.
In fact, I think it implies just the opposite. With the programs we have available today, we can take the picture and then add a variety of filter and affects to achieve the image feeling we visualize in our mind. Take the picture, apply the filter, get a certain look. If you don’t like it, you can go back and start over with the same shot at no cost of time or money. You can’t do that with film. Ok, you can take the film, scan it, import it into a program like Photoshop and then manipulate it, but isn’t that extra steps in the workflow just to work digitally?
He goes on and discusses the music world and how we seem to like our flawed products. He states that we like the impure sound of music that is produced by an amplifier or a “humanizer circuit”. I disagree. I think that we like a sound that is real. We like images that show our vision. We want images that produce a certain feel in the viewer. Just as the music industry wants a certain sound to create a feel for the song.
He writes “Instead of fully controlling every aspect of their work, more and more photographers deliberately introduce elements into their workflow that are hard to reproduce exactly the same way. Look for instance at some of the instant film materials you can get through the Impossible Project at the moment. Predictable results? Hardly. Or look at double exposures. Taken by different photographers. Did you know you can buy exposed film on eBay to add your own second layer of exposures, then develop it to find out what you’ve got? What an element of surprise! Some deliberately shoot film that is far beyond its best-before date and take advantage of the interesting characteristics some aging film materials get. Some expose the whole 35mm film, including the sprocket holes, and some even partially remove the lenses from their cameras and tilt them to achieve effects similar to lensbabies and tilt lenses – that’s called “freelensing”. Or the deliberate manipulation of the medium, as seen in the emulsion lift, where integral instant film is taken apart and the photo emulsion gets transferred onto a different material.”
He is right, more and more photographers are trying new and different things. They’re thinking outside of the box, but I think the question is why. I think the answer is because they want to be different. They want to make their images stand out while still showing their vision. And in some cases, they just want to see what happens. They experiment and experimenting is good.
Mr. Marquardt is right. I think film is becoming more popular again, but it isn’t because we are dissatisfied or unhappy with digital or that we like imperfections. It is because it is different and “new”. It is a challenge to get the shot right in the camera the first time. And because it is unique, not a lot of people are using it. And I definitely don’t think you are inferior if you shoot digital. Or film. Or Canon. Or Nikon. Or medium format. Or you use a Chevy to get to your shooting location. Who cares! Use the tools that make you happy and help you capture the image that matches your vision. That is the bottom line.
I will continue to listen to Chris Marquardt on Tips From the Top Floor. I recommend that you do also. He is informative and entertaining. If anything, he will make you think once in a while. And that is a good thing.
Posted 1 year, 2 months ago. Add a comment
I was looking through the [b]school’s forums and came across a GREAT idea.
It was one of those “DUH!!” ideas. You know, the ones that say, “Why didn’t I think of that?!??!?”
Lawrence Kent, a photographer in Augusta, GA is issuing a challenge to his blog readers that for every comment he gets on his blog during the month of December, he will donate a can to the local food bank.
Ok, like I said, DUH!!!
I think this is a great idea. Like Lawrence, my goal is 100 cans and I will be counting the comments already made during the month. Which isn’t too many. Eight to be exact.
So, we have a LONG way to go to get to the goal of 100.
Like always, please feel free to comment, but now you can do it and give back to the community.
Posted 2 years, 1 month ago. 6 comments
About month ago, I attended Dane Sanders Real Time Community one day presentation that included Dane Sanders, Chris Becker, and Scott Bourne. My whole intent was to listen to Mr. Bourne and ask him about being a nature photographer. I got that chance.
He recommended using some of the online forums, the first being NatureScapes.net. I had already signed up for it previously, but have since become much more active in the community. That is how I ran across this photographer and saw his amazing work.
I was going through the NatureScapes.net forums and found a couple of posts by David Courtenay. He seemed to know what he was talking about, so I checked out his website.
One word: WOW!!!
The front page is a flash page with some AMAZING images on it. If you delve deeper into the site those images don’t stop. He has 25 different galleries and in none of them can I find what I would consider even a mediocre image. They are ALL breath taking and VERY well composed and captured.
I have a couple of favorites. One of them is#9 in the Indian Tiger portfolio. Most people would take pictures of a tiger in the wild and you would see the tiger and Mr. Courtenay has twelve other images that do that very well. This image is of a paw print in the mud and it is WELL done. I have seen images of tigers and if I went to India, I would have some good images of tigers also, but I think the image of the paw print shows a different view. There is enough in the image to give a sense of the size of the tiger.
The other is #27 in the American Mammal portfolio. It has a deer standing with it’s neck turned, looking to the right. I swear that he had to be laying on the ground in front of the deer to take the picture. I contacted him about it and he said that he used a remote on a camouflaged camera to capture the image. I don’t care, it is THE best deer picture I have ever seen.Images of deer are a dime a dozen, but none that I have ever seen are as good or from the perspective as Mr. Courtenay’s. I have seen images of tigers and if I went to India, I would have some good images of tigers also, but I think the image of the paw print shows a different view. There is enough in the image to give a sense of the size of the tiger.
All of them give you a fresh perspective on the subject. In the American Mammals portfolio, Mr. Courtenay has fourteen images of a squirrel. A SQUIRREL!!! Anyone can take a picture of a squirrel!! But not with the impact of his images.
His photos are what I want to be able to capture images similar to his. They are tack sharp, well composed, and convey the sense of the viewer actually being there. This is the skill that I want and need to develop in my images.
After reading his bio, he has been active in photography for quite some time and has lived in many places giving him access to some great areas to photograph. I realize that that experience has contributed to the excellence of his images, but as his squirrel photos demonstrate, you don’t need exotic subjects to make captivating images.
You need the skills and the vision to capture what is before you. This is what I aspire to achieve in my photography. I need to see the picture and become good enough to be able to capture it while it is in front of me.
I am going to have to step up my game to reach that goal.
Posted 2 years, 2 months ago. 1 comment
