Hi List A wet Sunday afternoon again!! It is always galling to hear someone, (usually without having done much homework), belittling ones skills in their chosen profession. Sadly, photography suffers a great deal from this, simply because it is within easy reach of the masses. For 90% of the population their photography experience used to be a Christmas tree at both ends of a film, with a beach in the middle. I am not sure what it is now, with a camera card.
I read the other day that someone had been found out operating as a brain surgeon, without one single medical qualification to his name. I wonder what surgeons must have thought! Did they think that was a slight on their skills? I realise that perhaps getting the exposure wrong on that shot and opening someone's head and getting it wrong is perhaps at the two extremes but......please don't come back on that one!! But yes, it is the perception of skill required in the public's mind to do certain work that is often the irritating factor. A well known journalist who knew of my work, said to me recently that I must have a fantastic camera to take such pictures, to which I replied, I thought the way he wrote was equally amazing and that he must have an incredible pencil. Sadly, he failed to see the point I was making. I then had to suffer a lecture on how his thinking processes evolved, morning, noon and night. It is funny how some people believe they have a right to hold the intellectual high ground. The technical details of photography can be taught and learnt at various speeds. Some absorb the facts more quickly than others. However twenty eight days in a recent television programme, does seem a tad short to me. Aeons ago, I spent four years at three of the UK's leading photographic colleges. When I came out I was promptly told that it would take another 10 - 12 years to become a fully fledged industrial and architectural photographer, when all the edges had been knocked off! I got to that point some 25 years ago, but then had to concentrate on building a business for the next twenty years. 8 years ago the digital scene hit me and like many of you, I started all over again. You should never stop learning. Well, those of you who have started with digital, do not think you have heard the last of it. In twenty five years time, images will be created by a process that has not been thought of yet. Those that thought they could see their careers out in digital will have to start all over again! But by then I shall probably be tucked up in my Gandolphi in the sky!! Well, I would venture to say that the technicalities of photography are not that difficult. It is all the peripherals that have to be taken into account in creating images that is the difficult part. Setting up 20, 30 or even 50 lights in a large industrial or architectural interior takes some understanding, but to see the picture in the first place is more important. Here an understanding of art, composition and the effect of light on subjects is something that I believe people are born with in varying measures. To have an abundance of both technical and artistic skills makes for a very fortunate and talented photographer. From a business point of view, equally important is to understand clients requirements and illustrate the marketing objectives and financial profiles of their companies in terms of skills, personnel and investment. And then to be able to turn it on, again and again and again and particularly when you are going through your blue period! Yes, we all have them! In the end, ones technical ability should become second nature. It should not be necessary to have to think about f/stops, pixels, file sizes, joules or where to place lights for that effect. There are too many other things to think about for technology to get in the way. But this doesn't come in 28 days. At least not where this image maker is concerned. Because, when you have got all these things together, you can also stand tall with surgeons, lawyers and the like, in the knowledge that you have got something they mostly lack - a vivid imagination based on a unique talent!! Guard it with care. As Walter Nurnberg taught me: Anyone can take photographs - but few can make pictures. The mark of a truly professional image maker. Regards to all Norman Childs Mobile: +44(0)7831 519217 Telephone: +44(0)1256 767611 Fax: +44(0)1256 767612 Web site: www.greenshoots.co.uk =============================================================== GO TO http://www.prodig.org for ~ GUIDELINES ~ un/SUBSCRIBING ~ ITEMS for SALE
