“I want to talk to you sometime about photography”
I cringe at the idea of talking about some general notion of “photography”. I don’t want to talk about cameras and lenses. I don’t want to talk about locations. I just want to do what I do and you should find your own personal path to a creative vision.
My artwork and photography are the results of my lifetime of experience, my experimentation, my practice, and my doing.
Often when people see my work they either buy it or want to learn how to do it.
But you can’t be me. I can’t really teach you to see. I can’t teach you to experience and explore a location. I can’t teach you to previsualize an image before the button is pressed.
I can’t imbed the clients I have in mind when I look for a subject – fine art, book cover, magazine illustration. Your desire to take the photograph is probably much different than mine.
I make photographs with the intent they will be displayed in a gallery, on someone’s living room wall or to illustrate a best-selling mystery novel. Your intention might be to impress your friends on Facebook or the gang at the photo club or simply record an event. And artistic intent is the difference between fine art and snapshots.
Is this the vision of Wells Beach that everyone sees? I don’t think so, it is my personal vision based on my life experience and the intent of my photography.
I’ve built my portfolio from 35 years of observation, experimentation, and a lot of failures. Successes have come mainly from the past 10 years of intense obsession and work. I can’t teach someone passion. I can’t make someone obsessed. I can’t make someone carry a camera around all the time looking for great subjects.
An artist with a mature portfolio has a great many “masterpieces” because what you see is the culmination of years of hard work. You don’t see the failures. You don’t see the relentless editing out of the crap.
Do you get images like this by standing in the tourist-approved “Kodak Moment” spots?
Anyone just starting out is going to be disappointed that they have so few “good” images in their portfolio but understand when you see a well-established artist’s portfolio, they are showing you the best of the best from years of work. Be inspired but understand there are no shortcuts on road ahead.
A great photographer’s portfolio represents “being there” enough times to get “lucky”.
There are no “secrets” to jump ahead. No new camera gear that makes one a great photographer overnight. Heck, I’m often confronted by gear hounds with the latest, greatest gear, guys that know all the numbers, specs, and megapixels but produce the dullest, most boring images imaginable. Because they spend more time looking at gear catalogs than looking at the world around them.
Great photographers make their own luck by being in the right place at the right time, even if they have no idea what might happen.
