Exposed For The Shadows

Sorry it has taken me so long to get this written…I should know better than to make promises when I’m traveling. All the things involved with my trip to Florida just made it impossible to find the time to sit and think and write. But I’m home now. I finished editing one magazine shoot today while I was waiting for the makeup artist for a new shoot for the same magazine. So this evening I have a bit of time before Dirt comes on at 10…

Anyway, what I want to write about is the importance, or lack thereof, of technical mastery in photography. Just how important is it for a photographer to really understand the medium and all the tools involved in it?

Now, I want to begin by making it clear that I consider technical knowledge to be a good thing. It can be very helpful. I found the transition from film to digital very easy because it was just an exchange of tools. The basics of photography are the same with either tool and I do understand the basics of photography.

I’ve talked before about the repeated resistance to any change that I’ve seen among photographers throughout the 40+ years that I’ve been calling myself a photographer. I started out with a manual Nikon F and a hand held meter. I still have my Nikon F and my Gossen Luna Pro. I don’t use them anymore, but they are still in the cabinet at the studio. And I learned things with them that I still use today with my D200.

But, the matrix meter in the D200 is much better at finding close to the right exposure than I am with any hand held meter. All that stuff I learned about exposure over 40 years is programmed into the D200 meter. What I know is when to not believe the meter. But that’s easy now too because I can look at the histogram and see actual math for the exposure I’m getting and I can adjust those numbers to get exactly the exposure I want…any exposure reading with a meter, no matter how good, is an estimate. The histogram is exact math. Why would anyone want to essentially guess when they can have precision?

OK…that’s wandering from my stated theme. Sorry.

Anyone can become a master of the technical aspects of photography. It ain’t rocket science. The medium is pretty well understood and has no real secrets. If any person of average intelligence applies him/herself to learning the technical things involved, they will succeed. And they will be able to produce technically excellent negatives and prints…or digital files.

But that is no guarantee that they will produce any photographs of any value. Great photographs, even good photographs, are not created by being technically proficient. Producing good photographs is, in fact, completely independent of technical ability.

I know a number of excellent photographers who have very little understanding of the working of the medium. They let their automatic cameras provide excellent exposures of their very well seen ideas. They make art. They see. They make photos that I want to look at. Sometimes the photos are technically excellent. Sometimes they aren’t. Some of them work with junk cameras like the Holga and make stunningly beautiful photos. I hate Holgas. They are crap cameras and they offend my technical knowledge of photography. I’d much rather hang a soft lens on a good camera and make soft photos…so I do. I don’t have to worry about where and how to apply duct tape to control the light leaks. But, if you master the application of duct tape to a Holga, have you reached some level of mastery of the medium?

So, those of us who do understand photography tend to want to snob it over our less well educated fellow photographers. But it’s false pride. Knowing how the stuff works can make it a bit easier to get the results we are after…and attaining technical mastery can be a fun pursuit…but it doesn’t get you art…or even interesting or useful photographs.

Now, having said all that, I have to say that there is something wonderful about a technically perfect print from a technically perfect negative made by a photographer who is an artist and has something to say. So, I encourage anyone who is making photographs to study and try to master or at least understand the medium of photography. But I’d rather look at an interesting photo made with an automatic camera by someone who doesn’t know an f/stop from hyperfocal setting than a technical masterpiece with nothing to say.

The photo is one of my favorite models, Nemesis, photographed with my “Speed Holga.” That consists of my old Speed Graphic, a polaroid back, and a $3 magnifying glass duct taped to a blank front lens board. The photo was overexposed to create the high key effect. If I didn’t understand photography I wouldn’t have been able to figure out how to make that all work to make photos. But if you want to take photos like this you can just go buy a polaroid Holga and have at it…mileage may vary.

Finally got copies of French PHOTO and got it scanned. Here’s the cover and the page with my photo.

Back in Ohio after two days on the road. Still snow everywhere here, but the huge mounds are now black. Ugly and cold. But it’s still good to be back home. And it was a great trip.

Thanks, Mindy…you are a great model and a great friend.

We are packing up to head back to snowy Ohio. Weather here in Destin took a turn toward normal for this time of year and its now cloudy and cool after a couple days of heat and sun. But this is actually the kind of beach weather I most enjoy. Much better than weather you have to shovel, which is what awaits back home.

Don’t know if I’ll be able to get on here and post my threatened rant before we get home Sunday night or not…guess we’ll just wait and see.

Here’s another of Mindy at Lake Cumberland. That was a great two-day shoot last summer. Hot days, hot rocks…great model…We just cruised around the lake in a pontoon boat and tossed Mindy overboard every once in a while and took photos of what she did. She did great things, climbing and posing on the beautiful rocks that surround that lake.

Spent another great day at the beach in Florida today. I actually don’t care much for just sitting on the beach, but I do love walking along a beach and I enjoy just sitting in a comfortable room watching the sun set over the water. And I love being in a place where the temperature is in the 70sF while it is still way below freezing back home.

Downside is that we have to leave tomorrow and drive back to all the cold and snow. But at least we had a break from it for a week. Next week I have one magazine shoot to edit and get shipped to the magazine and another new assignment to shoot, so I’ll be busy for a few days.

Right now we are waiting for an old friend to arrive to go out to dinner with us. I’ll try to post one more Mindy photo tomorrow before we take off for the drive home. I’m also starting to work on an extended post about the need for skill and understanding of photography. The question I’ve been contemplating…brought on by a recent post on my friend, D. Brian Nelson’s Hotel Room Nudes blog…is just how important it is for an art photographer to understand the technical aspects of the medium? I have more thinking and writing to do before that post is ready to go here…but click on the Hotel Room Nudes link to the right and read what Don wrote about zoom lenses vs fixed focus lenses and the comment I made to that post if you want a preview.

I posted that last photo this morning. I don’t know why blogger put yesterday’s date on it.

We are in Destin now. It was in the low 80s here today. We have a nice room on the beach. Just for the record, I hate Destin. I can’t believe they built all these hotels out in the ocean on a sandbar in hurricane country. And the way they let these high-rise buildings block access to the beach for everyone not staying in the building is just wrong, and ought to be criminal. I’m only here because it’s a freebee and my daughter loves the beach, so I’m giving her a cheap treat.

Forgot to bring a hat, so we just drove up and down the “strip” looking for a cheap hat for me to keep my head from sunburning tomorrow. Settled on a cheapo white panama. Looks ok for with the beard. I’ll be signing autographs as Z Z Top tomorrow.

This is a shot of Mindy looking all strong and beautiful on the rocks at Lake Cumberland. Another shoot with temps in the 90s. And Mindy had to climb up those rocks from the boat to get into position. Mindy not only looks strong…she is one strong woman.

Well the trip to Florida is a success. My daughter has found the college she wants to attend. She loves it and so do I.

Today we drive to Destin for a couple days of relaxation, then we drive back home over the weekend. I don’t know how much access to the internet I’ll have during this time, but I’ll post more Mindy photos when I can.

Today’s Mindy photo is from the shoot we did in an empty house that a friend of mine was fixing up. It was a very hot August day and there were no utilities hooked up in the house when we were there…no water and certainly no air conditioning. It was a very hot shoot…and not in the good way…But Mindy worked hard and you can barely tell the temperature was approaching 100F.

Just wait, Iris…you’ll get your chance to sweat…

I’ve decided to declare this Mindy week on my blog, in celebration of her appearance in French PHOTO. Mindy is one of the best models I’ve ever worked with. Lots of fun and always willing to do what it took to get a photo.

This photo is a good example of just how far Mindy is willing to go. Many of the models I’ve worked with can testify that I like photos taken with the model in uncomfortable or dirty spots. It just works for the photos I’m after. I always warn models that if they work with me they will get cold and wet and dirty. Many models say no when I suggest something like this pose, and that’s always ok. But Mindy is up for just about anything that will make a photo. Thanks Mindy. Here’s just one of the many photos that Mindy made possible.

Here’s another photo of Mindy taken in my studio using a pinhole on my Nikon D100. This is one of those fancy, laser-drilled pinholes, not my homemade one. I have several versions of this set up. One is the “factory-made” job mounted on a body cap. I’ve also made my own version, mounting one of the laser pinholes on a T-mount adapter. That lets me put the pinhole at the back of the mount and get a wider angle view. You can’t see through the “lens” with these pinholes, but with a digital camera you get an instant view of what you’ve shot so you can adjust exposure and composition. I usually jack up the ISO and just hand hold the camera. I’ve never liked tripods. They seem to violate the nature of a hand camera…35mm or digital. I have a half dozen different tripods and often even carry one with me when I’m backpacking, but seldom use them, unless a specific photo absolutely requires it. With my new 18-200 VR the tripod comes out even less often.

Still in Florida. It got up to 77F today. Nice change from the foot of snow we left behind in Ohio.

Down in sunny Miami now. They are having a cold spell. It’s only in the mid-70s. I’m loving it.

Here’s another shot of Mindy at the farm. It’s all green like that down here. Have to wait a few months to see this again in Ohio.