Postcards from the Creative Journey

If the Cameras are Better, Why Aren’t the Photographs?

The Heckman Homestead Shack,

A Sense of the Seasons

The other day I got an email touting a new small rangefinder camera. It was really a technological marvel that will technically out-perform my “big” DSLR camera. Today’s photographers have the best technology (well, at least until the next generation of cameras come out) in the history of photography. Why is it, do you suppose, that these cameras are not producing the best photographs in the history of photography? The answer is, “Photographers make photographs, not cameras.” The person behind the instrument is responsible for determining what the photograph is, not the instrument itself.

Even though the technology has made astounding advances since I started photography, it has advanced only as far as the aesthetics of the photographers.

We all look at wonder with the latest technical advances, but they are just better tools and really have no value until someone figures out how to use the better tool to advance the artistic process. These advances are coming so fast there is little time for any of the practitioners to “settle in” with the various tools. We drift from toy to toy and seek to impress each other with technical legerdemain. We become adept at manipulating our toys but don’t spend to discover how to use them to advance their art.

 

Supporting the Arts

Self Portrait, Interior,

Heckman Homestead Shack (outtake)

A Sense of the Seasons

I attended a photographic art exhibition recently. It was an event planned to “give back” in support of the local art community. As I elbowed my way through the throngs showing up for the opening night while avoiding the crowd three and four deep at the cheese plate, I thought about who was giving what back to the local photographic community. The folks at the event were chowing down big time on the wine and hors d'œuvres certainly didn’t seem to be giving back to the arts community, in fact it seemed quite the opposite. At an event such as this, wouldn’t giving back to the arts community be more clearly demonstrated by the purchase of art on display rather than vacuuming up the hors d’oeuvres? The real support of the arts community does not come from gallery owners and philanthropists sponsoring events, but from the local citizenry (including artists) supporting the community through the purchase of local, original art.

I will go back to the gallery later for a more sedate and less crowded look at the exhibit. I wager there will be few or no “red dots” by the photographs on the wall. It’s sad when support for artists runs out when the hors d’oeuvres do.

Not Changing My Stripes

Print Shop, Pioneer Village,

Crosby, North Dakota

Tigers don’t change their stripes. A few posts earlier I described myself as a former view camera user. After thinking about it a bit, I guess I still am a view camera photographer who continues to employ a view camera methodology (sorry about the consultant speak) with my digital camera. No, I don’t use my dark cloth anymore because the EVDs are so much brighter than they used to be. I very rarely take my camera off its tripod and do lots of perspective correction (in photoshop, for sure) to make sure all my verticals are straight. Decades of photographing with view cameras has deeply imprinted on me an aesthetic and way of working that cannot be shaken no matter what type (or size) of camera I have (on a tripod) in front of me. The view camera aesthetic lives on in a digital format.

Keeping Current Is Important

Pioneer Village Print Shop,

Crosby, North Dakota

A few weeks back a contestant on Jeopardy told Alex Trebek he was a photographer. He proclaimed is chosen medium as film and he used an old view camera from the 1940’s. As a (former) view camera user myself I thought this was a good thing for photography. In the category of “logo mania,” the following symbol was the clue:

 

 

The photographer rang in and promptly answered, “What is People Soft?” Not keeping current can be expensive. I wonder if his photo buddies heaped a bunch of abuse on him because he did not recognize the logo of the most popular photo editing software in the world, or received kudos from those eschewing digital technology in favor of the chemical processes.