Robert Campbell
Well-known member
OK, no problem, but do you promise to read it?Hi Bertie
I think you should explain the connection properly in a post of not less than 25,000 words
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OK, no problem, but do you promise to read it?Hi Bertie
I think you should explain the connection properly in a post of not less than 25,000 words
Hmmm, first of all, did you read my long boring post?OK, no problem, but do you promise to read it?
Thank you AminI appreciated your entire post, Jono, and have a few comments about the bit quoted above as I can relate to it. The bulk of my photographs are simple family pictures. Many of them are prints that I enjoy viewing. A fraction of those are enjoyable to family and friends. Probably very few communicate something of value to acquaintances and strangers. One of my early projects for 2009 is going to be to try to select photos from that last category and set up a website for them.
Yes, but it was interesting, not boring.Hmmm, first of all, did you read my long boring post?
That's quite enough thank you! However, I get the point quite clearly, and I do agree.Yes, but it was interesting, not boring.
Your potential change of career reminded me of -- I think it was A Adams -- the quotation about selling shoes, while the creativity continued -- which I think is what you have done.
If you are a nihilist, the point is the old Persian Carpet in Somerset Maugham's story The Razor's Edge [?] -- there is no meaning to it, it's all for nothing -- but them Maugham was getting on a bit then, rather soured.
Otherwise, the point is a form of creativity, and at the peak of Maslow's pyramid. It doesn't have to be justified. Doing it purely for commercial gain comes lower on his pyramid -- it's work, like any other -- you may well enjoy it and there may be creativity in your work, but it's for someone else's benefit; getting people to rise up the pyramid is a well-known managerial tactic -- for employees. [From the general tenor of posts on this forum, it seems to me that people here are either amateurs doing it as a 'hobby' or self-employed pros -- but not people employed to take pix.] For pros -- in the sense of commercial photogs -- creativity will be limited by the clients requirements and demands, and I guess the room for manoever is limited. Very few artistic photographers shoot exactly what they want and make a living from it -- it's not impossible, but uncommon. And not all commercial photogs have photography as a hobby.
So, I see it as artistic creativity; it's an expression of self-actualisation. Justification is neither necessary nor required.
[How much more, Jono?]
Once he's up the pyramid, get him onto Hertzberg -- money is hygiene, not motivation, see how he reacts!That's quite enough thank you! However, I get the point quite clearly, and I do agree.
Although I wasn't aware of it, I'm certainly trying to get our new employee to rise up the pyramid (and he is). Interesting stuff.
Agreed. Keywording isn't so interesting, harder still is getting the organisation and structure of the keywords right at the beginning -- and I only do it for funAs I'm sure you understood, my thesis was that if you want to shoot 'communicative' photos, then you need discipline, and clicking away and then passing the responsibility to the viewer to search you out AND to bother to look through thousands of disorganised photos at once is a little fanciful!
I've just emailed a link for him . . I should be careful though, he's young, and has a good degree in philosophy, which, basically means that he is quite sure that he's right and really good at arguing, (respectively) !Once he's up the pyramid, get him onto Hertzberg -- money is hygiene, not motivation, see how he reacts!
Absolutely, but my feeling is that unless you do this reasonably well you end up with a 'sea of images' . . . and the answer to the original 'What's the Point' is . . . None!Agreed. Keywording isn't so interesting, harder still is getting the organisation and structure of the keywords right at the beginning -- and I only do it for fun
Yes indeed, I couldn't agree more . . . . . but if you present the viewer with a box with 5,000 slides in it . . . . . or a computer library with 5,000 shots, then the depth the viewer wishes will be no depth at all, they'll pass on the opportunity and do something else.This thread makes me ever more mindful of what a simple example of Homo sapiens I am.
Images to me, whether mine or others, are simply a means of freezing actuality so that detailed examination can be carried out to whatever depth the viewer wishes. If that examination triggers high order feelings and appreciation...fine. Otherwise, move to the next image.
Depends if you particularly care if people look at them. If you take them for your own benefit then why not. Bit like the difference between cooking yourself supper and being a chef, food is still good when you only cook for yourself, still achieves a worthy purpose.The subject of the thread was
'What's the point' with a good image
My point was that unless people look at them, the answer is 'no point'. Hence my points about making them palatable to view.
Hi BenDepends if you particularly care if people look at them. If you take them for your own benefit then why not. Bit like the difference between cooking yourself supper and being a chef, food is still good when you only cook for yourself, still achieves a worthy purpose.
I really like Neil's point about being inside the moment, and not even needing a camera, and I'm certainly in Oxide Blu's camp in that I cannot stop taking pictures. Perhaps this goes into the 'process' section above, I think the idea that snapping away is training in looking is splendid - perhaps for me it's the biggest personal bonus photography has given me.So, after my preamble, let me get to my point. Leaving out commercial photography (which, for my point we could describe as pictures taken for someone else's purpose) I think there are 3 reasons people take pictures:
1. The Process
i.e. pictures taken for the sake of taking them - this might be comparison of one camera to another, experimentation, or just to play with our new toys. This site is full of such shots, it's a perfectly valid reason to own a camera, and it makes a fine (if expensive) hobby.
2. Recollection
Pictures taken to remember an event, a person, a scene or holiday. Nothing else needs to be said - although if they also communicate then my points below are probably relevant.
3. Communication.
Pictures taken to communicate to others.
. . . and how much MORE rigorous one would have to be then!One way or another, painting or photography is seeing with a purpose. IMO, that purpose involves "others" seeing what you saw. If I wanted to share what I saw without a picture, I would have become a writer.
What an excellent idea - another way of providing images in a format which actually gets looked at.As a side note concerning sharing: with my wedding work the single best thing I've recently done is provide a client's wedding story on a USB-2 Jump Drive. It has profoundly altered how many people get to see the end result because the Bride carries the darned thing in their purse, and everyone has a computer. Mundane? Perhaps. However, I strive to make the work anything but mundane, and the challenge is to transcend that mundane purpose by snatching those precious nano seconds out of the thin air of eternity.
I have a close friend that is a very successful painter, oils. One day I was asking her about learning to paint. She commented about how long it would take to go thru the learning curve, and then how many 'great' painting would I be able to make in what is left of my lifetime? Enough for a show? I told here all I wanted was just one.... But I hold to my point that if you have any artistic pretensions, then the photographs are designed to communicate something, and in that case it needs to be seen by someone to have a point, and it's the artist's duty to make that job easy.