Book

wrote in message
oups.com...
"The part that is a shame is that I get the feeling that there are some

photographers who are so frightened that they might take a photograph
that looks like a snapshot that they miss photographing what is
important around them. "

I guess the question is; important to whom? It seems that you're
questioning the sincerity with which some photographers image the world
around them, and castigating those who sink so low as to make a pretty
picture, or even aknowledge aesthetics. I would argue that there is
nothing of inherent value in a purely documentary image void of
aesthetic consideration. It seems to me that one extreme is no better
than the other.

Jay


I agree.

Instead of capturing the life and times around them many photographers
would rather photograph that one perfect blade of grass.

In that instant that blade of grass is "life" and "times" ... nothing else
exists.

BernieM

Scott W wrote (in part):

Instead of capturing the life and times around them many photographers
would rather photograph that one perfect blade of grass with a perfect
drop of dew refracting the morning light just so. Or a forest covered in
snow with sunlight filtering down through a light fog. There is nothing
wrong with these kinds of photos, but there is no sense of place and
time.

Some times, perhaps, the photographer wants the eternal, not the present.
And that is tricky with a medium as "real" as photography. That is why, for
example, photographs of pretty women with clothes on look dated (not
necessarily the worse for that), whereas a well done nude can be more
eternal and undated. At least at the time. Of course, I meant "less dated"
here, as the way people look, smile, etc., does change over time anyway.

The part that is a shame is that I get the feeling that there are some
photographers who are so frightened that they might take a photograph
that looks like a snapshot that they miss photographing what is important
around them.

Gary Winogrand sure did not worry that his images might look like
snap-shots. In some circles, he is regarded as a great photographer.

--
.~. Jean-David Beyer Registered Linux User 85642.
/V\ PGP-Key: 9A2FC99A Registered Machine 241939.
/( )\ Shrewsbury, New Jersey http://counter.li.org
^^-^^ 06:45:00 up 3 days, 22:12, 6 users, load average: 4.16, 4.18, 4.16

wrote:
UC wrote:
Keith Tapscott wrote:
I noticed that the author, Gretchen Garner lives in Columbus Ohio, do you
know her?

See my last post.



"UC" wrote in message
ups.com...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/080...lance&n=283155


" There seems to be two broad groups of photographers,
those who set out to take a pretty photo and those who wish to capture
the life and times around them."

Is it inconceivable that one could set out to capture the life and
times around them in a way that communicates one's appreciation for,
and recognition of the beauty of the world around them? I don't see the
two as mutually exclusive.

They tend to be. It requires a different approach and mind-set.


Jay

Jean-David Beyer wrote:
Scott W wrote (in part):

Instead of capturing the life and times around them many photographers
would rather photograph that one perfect blade of grass with a perfect
drop of dew refracting the morning light just so. Or a forest covered in
snow with sunlight filtering down through a light fog. There is nothing
wrong with these kinds of photos, but there is no sense of place and
time.

Some times, perhaps, the photographer wants the eternal, not the present.
And that is tricky with a medium as "real" as photography. That is why, for
example, photographs of pretty women with clothes on look dated (not
necessarily the worse for that), whereas a well done nude can be more
eternal and undated. At least at the time. Of course, I meant "less dated"
here, as the way people look, smile, etc., does change over time anyway.

The part that is a shame is that I get the feeling that there are some
photographers who are so frightened that they might take a photograph
that looks like a snapshot that they miss photographing what is important
around them.

Gary Winogrand sure did not worry that his images might look like
snap-shots. In some circles, he is regarded as a great photographer.

I will refer you to the link for the book that UC provided in his
original post, the author speaks more elegantly to this issue then I
can.

I have known people who ended up with a lifetime of photographs that
missed capturing anything at all that would give a sense of time or
culture. I inherited my grandmother's photographic collection when
she pasted away, she took large number of photos during the 50s and
60s. She was and advanced amateur and was considered to be a good
photographer. And whereas her photos are well enough composed you can
go through just about the whole collection and not see any clue as to
when they were taken. They were all landscapes and there are no
people, cars or anything else dealing with people in any of them. Now
I love looking at old photos, and when I received the collection, all
slides BTW, I looked forward to seeing life through her eyes, what I
got was devoid of any real interest.


To a large extent I use the missed photographs that I did not take 30
years ago as a guild for what I photograph today. I also look at what
my parents missed photographing in their life, the photographs that
would have real value to me today but at the time were not deemed
important enough to be worth a photo.

There are parts of life that seem so ordinary at the time that people
don't even think to take a photograph of it. As just one example
part of my life growing up was when the TV stopped working we would
remove all of the tubes and take the bunch to the local hardware store.
There we would one by one put them in the tube tester, once the bad
tube was found the clerk in the store would go to the shelves an get us
a new tube. Now a photo of someone checking a bag full of tubes at
the time would have seemed silly and boring, but it is a slice of life
that I would have loved to have had captured and have now.

Now photos of a forest in the fog are a easy to find, and they are
quite nice to look at, as an example
http://search.pbase.com/search?q=forest+fog&begin=10

But think about this, photography is very much like a time machine, it
lets us go back and get glimpses of the past. Imagine you have 10
minutes to use a time machine that lets you view the past on a given
date, say to the time when you were 10 years old. You can wander
around and view the world frozen in time what would you look at? I
would want to look at the people I knew and are gone. I would want to
look at the house I grew up in. I would want to look at the old stores
I use to go to as a kid. I would look at the drive-in we used to go
to. I would look at the people, the cars and the city, oh and that
tube tester.

There is nothing wrong with photographing forest in the fog with the
sunlight coming though just right, I do it myself. But these are in
some ways the easy shots. You see something that is beautiful, where
the play of light looks just right and you capture it. What is harder
and for me personally more important is to try and capture want is
around me now that will be interesting 10, 20 or 100 years from now.
There is nothing that says you can't take both kinds of photos.

Scott

I have been writing about this here and in other forums for quite some
time. It is an extremely unpopular stance to take today. My own work of
late has been aimed squarely at documenting the old manufacturing sites
in my home town, and some of the people I find in the areas where these
factories used to be.

It's MUCH harder to do this than to find a pretty scene, and I don't
mean physically difficult. It's harder to distill the essence of a
situation into what HCB called the 'decisive moment', a phrase often
misunderstood. What he meant was a photo that captures enough of the
surroundings that what is happening or about to happen can be
understood.

I think the best use of photography lies precisely in capturing the
essence of the moment. To me this is so obvious that I have great deal
of difficulty understanding the dismissal of it, and the condescension
on the part of the large-format zonazis, for whom anything other than a
20 x 24 inch toned zoan cistern print of a waterfall is a meaningless
piece of crap.

If these people can get their heads out of their rectums for a
nanosecond, they will see that their so-called 'fine-art' prints will
be forgotten almost instantly, whereas the capture of life's sometimes
most mundane moments creates irreplaceable treasures.


Scott W wrote:
Jean-David Beyer wrote:
Scott W wrote (in part):

Instead of capturing the life and times around them many photographers
would rather photograph that one perfect blade of grass with a perfect
drop of dew refracting the morning light just so. Or a forest covered in
snow with sunlight filtering down through a light fog. There is nothing
wrong with these kinds of photos, but there is no sense of place and
time.

Some times, perhaps, the photographer wants the eternal, not the present.
And that is tricky with a medium as "real" as photography. That is why, for
example, photographs of pretty women with clothes on look dated (not
necessarily the worse for that), whereas a well done nude can be more
eternal and undated. At least at the time. Of course, I meant "less dated"
here, as the way people look, smile, etc., does change over time anyway.

The part that is a shame is that I get the feeling that there are some
photographers who are so frightened that they might take a photograph
that looks like a snapshot that they miss photographing what is important
around them.

Gary Winogrand sure did not worry that his images might look like
snap-shots. In some circles, he is regarded as a great photographer.

I will refer you to the link for the book that UC provided in his
original post, the author speaks more elegantly to this issue then I
can.

I have known people who ended up with a lifetime of photographs that
missed capturing anything at all that would give a sense of time or
culture. I inherited my grandmother's photographic collection when
she pasted away, she took large number of photos during the 50s and
60s. She was and advanced amateur and was considered to be a good
photographer. And whereas her photos are well enough composed you can
go through just about the whole collection and not see any clue as to
when they were taken. They were all landscapes and there are no
people, cars or anything else dealing with people in any of them. Now
I love looking at old photos, and when I received the collection, all
slides BTW, I looked forward to seeing life through her eyes, what I
got was devoid of any real interest.


To a large extent I use the missed photographs that I did not take 30
years ago as a guild for what I photograph today. I also look at what
my parents missed photographing in their life, the photographs that
would have real value to me today but at the time were not deemed
important enough to be worth a photo.

There are parts of life that seem so ordinary at the time that people
don't even think to take a photograph of it. As just one example
part of my life growing up was when the TV stopped working we would
remove all of the tubes and take the bunch to the local hardware store.
There we would one by one put them in the tube tester, once the bad
tube was found the clerk in the store would go to the shelves an get us
a new tube. Now a photo of someone checking a bag full of tubes at
the time would have seemed silly and boring, but it is a slice of life
that I would have loved to have had captured and have now.

Now photos of a forest in the fog are a easy to find, and they are
quite nice to look at, as an example
http://search.pbase.com/search?q=forest+fog&begin=10

But think about this, photography is very much like a time machine, it
lets us go back and get glimpses of the past. Imagine you have 10
minutes to use a time machine that lets you view the past on a given
date, say to the time when you were 10 years old. You can wander
around and view the world frozen in time what would you look at? I
would want to look at the people I knew and are gone. I would want to
look at the house I grew up in. I would want to look at the old stores
I use to go to as a kid. I would look at the drive-in we used to go
to. I would look at the people, the cars and the city, oh and that
tube tester.

There is nothing wrong with photographing forest in the fog with the
sunlight coming though just right, I do it myself. But these are in
some ways the easy shots. You see something that is beautiful, where
the play of light looks just right and you capture it. What is harder
and for me personally more important is to try and capture want is
around me now that will be interesting 10, 20 or 100 years from now.
There is nothing that says you can't take both kinds of photos.

Scott

UC wrote:
I have been writing about this here and in other forums for quite some
time. It is an extremely unpopular stance to take today. My own work of
late has been aimed squarely at documenting the old manufacturing sites
in my home town, and some of the people I find in the areas where these
factories used to be.
Some of your ideas have merit, but your people skills are shall we say
a bit on the weak side.

Scott

Scott W wrote:
UC wrote:
I have been writing about this here and in other forums for quite some
time. It is an extremely unpopular stance to take today. My own work of
late has been aimed squarely at documenting the old manufacturing sites
in my home town, and some of the people I find in the areas where these
factories used to be.
Some of your ideas have merit, but your people skills are shall we say
a bit on the weak side.

Such is life. Not everyone has the same set of skills.

I'm VERY single. Does that give you a clue?




Scott

Jean-David Beyer wrote:
Scott W wrote (in part):

Instead of capturing the life and times around them many photographers
would rather photograph that one perfect blade of grass with a perfect
drop of dew refracting the morning light just so. Or a forest covered in
snow with sunlight filtering down through a light fog. There is nothing
wrong with these kinds of photos, but there is no sense of place and
time.

Some times, perhaps, the photographer wants the eternal, not the present.

Impossible. Photography is not an d cannot be art. It is directly
connected with this or that particular time and place. Thinking
otherwise leads to crappy photos in an attempt to do the impossible.
Photography's 'hereness' and 'nowness' should be celebrated, not fought
against.

And that is tricky with a medium as "real" as photography.

It's not 'tricky', but impossible.

That is why, for
example, photographs of pretty women with clothes on look dated (not
necessarily the worse for that), whereas a well done nude can be more
eternal and undated. At least at the time. Of course, I meant "less dated"
here, as the way people look, smile, etc., does change over time anyway.

The part that is a shame is that I get the feeling that there are some
photographers who are so frightened that they might take a photograph
that looks like a snapshot that they miss photographing what is important
around them.

Gary Winogrand sure did not worry that his images might look like
snap-shots. In some circles, he is regarded as a great photographer.

--
.~. Jean-David Beyer Registered Linux User 85642.
/V\ PGP-Key: 9A2FC99A Registered Machine 241939.
/( )\ Shrewsbury, New Jersey http://counter.li.org
^^-^^ 06:45:00 up 3 days, 22:12, 6 users, load average: 4.16, 4.18, 4.16

"UC" wrote in message
oups.com...
I have been writing about this here and in other forums for quite some
time. It is an extremely unpopular stance to take today. My own work of
late has been aimed squarely at documenting the old manufacturing sites
in my home town, and some of the people I find in the areas where these
factories used to be.

It's MUCH harder to do this than to find a pretty scene, and I don't
mean physically difficult. It's harder to distill the essence of a
situation into what HCB called the 'decisive moment', a phrase often
misunderstood. What he meant was a photo that captures enough of the
surroundings that what is happening or about to happen can be
understood.

I think the best use of photography lies precisely in capturing the
essence of the moment. To me this is so obvious that I have great deal
of difficulty understanding the dismissal of it, and the condescension
on the part of the large-format zonazis, for whom anything other than a
20 x 24 inch toned zoan cistern print of a waterfall is a meaningless
piece of crap.

If these people can get their heads out of their rectums for a
nanosecond, they will see that their so-called 'fine-art' prints will
be forgotten almost instantly, whereas the capture of life's sometimes
most mundane moments creates irreplaceable treasures.


For this work, why are you exposing film? I'm not being a smart ass, it
just is my thought that documentary, reporting, sports and such subjects
where content is the focus rather than vision, is the realm of digital. Not
meaning to start a religious war but, how much "interpretation" is in your
images rather than pure documentation? Not to say there isn't a crossover
as even Adams said that the next evolution in photography will be
electronic. I'd bet anything that if he were around today, he'd be a
"Photo-chopper" in addition to burning silver.

Silver is used for what silver does, which is different than what CCD's do
and different than what the eye sees. My opinion is that the craftsman uses
whatever medium at his command to best accomplish a goal so you have to
admit that you are doing more than just "documenting" things or you have WAY
too much time on your hands. Why are you exposing film?

You want to see an old manufacturing plant? I still have leather belted
overhead shafts in my 100+ year old building, lit moodily by skylights. I
even have ghosts!

Tom Gardner nospam wrote:
"UC" wrote in message
oups.com...
I have been writing about this here and in other forums for quite some
time. It is an extremely unpopular stance to take today. My own work of
late has been aimed squarely at documenting the old manufacturing sites
in my home town, and some of the people I find in the areas where these
factories used to be.

It's MUCH harder to do this than to find a pretty scene, and I don't
mean physically difficult. It's harder to distill the essence of a
situation into what HCB called the 'decisive moment', a phrase often
misunderstood. What he meant was a photo that captures enough of the
surroundings that what is happening or about to happen can be
understood.

I think the best use of photography lies precisely in capturing the
essence of the moment. To me this is so obvious that I have great deal
of difficulty understanding the dismissal of it, and the condescension
on the part of the large-format zonazis, for whom anything other than a
20 x 24 inch toned zoan cistern print of a waterfall is a meaningless
piece of crap.

If these people can get their heads out of their rectums for a
nanosecond, they will see that their so-called 'fine-art' prints will
be forgotten almost instantly, whereas the capture of life's sometimes
most mundane moments creates irreplaceable treasures.


For this work, why are you exposing film? I'm not being a smart ass, it
just is my thought that documentary, reporting, sports and such subjects
where content is the focus rather than vision, is the realm of digital.

HUH? I don't understand you at all. I have a camera, film, and
darkroom, and I know how to use them. I want my images to last, so I
shoot B&W.

Not
meaning to start a religious war but, how much "interpretation" is in your
images rather than pure documentation?

Some. I want to do this project on a long-term basis. No-one else would
do it in exactly the same way.

Not to say there isn't a crossover
as even Adams said that the next evolution in photography will be
electronic. I'd bet anything that if he were around today, he'd be a
"Photo-chopper" in addition to burning silver.

What difference does it make to someone 100 years from now if the print
he holds was made with a negative or from a file?


Silver is used for what silver does, which is different than what CCD's do
and different than what the eye sees. My opinion is that the craftsman uses
whatever medium at his command to best accomplish a goal so you have to
admit that you are doing more than just "documenting" things or you have WAY
too much time on your hands. Why are you exposing film?

See above. I like film. I'm good at it. I'm used to it. I want them to
keep making it. I want others to keep using it.


You want to see an old manufacturing plant? I still have leather belted
overhead shafts in my 100+ year old building, lit moodily by skylights. I
even have ghosts!