Might seem a strange question but within photography do you ever get the feeling that everything you try to do has been done before, is there anything that would be completely new and revolutionary?
Might seem a strange question but within photography do you ever get the feeling that everything you try to do has been done before, is there anything that would be completely new and revolutionary?
Some things are worth doing again and again...
Newly made large format dry plates available! Look:
https://www.pictoriographica.com
Yes there are completely new and revolutionary things to do with photography, you have to imagine them first, then do them.
One problem is that many people will probably laugh, and many will be uninterested, because it is new and revolutionary.
The first question is always not "has it been done before" but is "can I do something personally meaningful with this". If you can accomplish the latter the former question will be irrelevant to you and your audience.Originally Posted by el pescador
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
Exactly; I have a personal project about a topic that has been covered thousands of times, in all kinds of media, by scholars, artists and lay people, many of whom have done justice to it far better than I think I ever could.
But I'm determined to go through with it myself because of what it means to me.
And even though the ground has been well-covered, it hasn't been covered by me before, so at the very least I can make my small contribution.
Or, if you're just looking for kicks, you can go skydiving with your 8x10 Sinar P and get some good aerial stuff.
YES! This! Well said Mr. Gittings.
Bruce Watson
If it weren't for this philosophy, I would have completely abandoned photography long ago. I just have no idea what constitutes "innovative". And I hate the way "art" finds itself as a slave to innovation, just because too many of us (me included) struggle to make traditional photos that have any meaning to let along anyone else.
It reminds me of music. A century ago and less, many composers had concluded that there was nothing left to be said in major and minor keys (two of the original "church modes"--scale patterns--developed centuries ago). They abandoned tonality altogether. But, as it turned out, there was still plenty to be said in major and minor keys, after all. It's just that they couldn't say it.
Rick "who takes very few photos any more, simply because personal meaning is often elusive" Denney
How does doing something that is personally meaningful make the question "has this been done before?" irrelevant to my audience?
Dang, I was just about to agree with Kirk, and you throw in this interesting monkeywrench!
There are several audiences. Forgiving (or not) friends and family. The General and his public. People who follow your work, perhaps for many many years. Fellow professionals (or forum members). Professionals in the field that is the subject of your images. I think relevance will vary with the audience...and how well one can communicate ones meaning. So hopefully your audience is one that appreciates meaning as well as uniquiness (sp).
I consider myself lucky. I live in an incredibly beautiful natural area with the finest groves of redwoods within an hour's drive north or south. I learned photography under the redwoods. I have studied, planted, saved, hugged, climbed over, and slept under redwoods. I sort of like them. Sixty mile per hour windstorm a couple miles in on a ridge trail with trees still 250 + feet above...listening to limbs break and begin their hundred or two hundred foot drop -- thinking, "I don't think the college 4x5 monorail was a great idea today." Rain. Wind. Sun when I wanted fog. Hiking up the middle of the creek because the trails had seen no maintenance in 6 years. Being surrounded by elk in the middle of an exposure. And no one. No one at all.
The redwoods have not been subject to deep study much -- a lot of passer-bys, some great ones. Ansel published a few photos of this area as he passed through. I love his Bull Creek Flat image. Weston had a hell of a time with his long exposures under the redwoods and only got a few good images on his trip(s) through Humboldt County. Probably the only thing I could have ever offered him advice on, since I have wasted countless sheets of film for the same reasons. And I am certainly not the only local photographer. There have been some good color photographers as well...a couple I know probably know Prairie Creek as well as I do. But few have been able to dedicate the time and deeply study of the light that makes it way through centuries of redwoods and reflects off the rain forest floor.
But with the amount of time I have spent photographing and walking under the redwoods, it has me thinking -- have I done this before? Sometimes yes and sometimes the same scene -- with a different format (I sort of look at it as enlarging the same negative to a different size print). I bring the experience of working with the same image and use it with a different format and new light. Sometimes decades later. But generally the question drives me to see more intently as I hike thru the trees.
My Yosemite work is also partially driven by "It has all been done before." What a challenge! After the fact, I have found 'my' images in the books of other more noteworthy photographers. Alas! (see Plate 46 in Listen to the Trees) Well, I still like mine better... But there is no reason for me to photograph in Yosemite Valley except to extract personal meaning or to celebrate the light, or whatever inspires me to set up the camera. Why make another image of Half Dome, unless I strive to make it my own.
"Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China
I think after seeing this question discussed from many angles over the years that this is the best response I have seen.
Carleton Watkins came to Yosemite and made photographs of the valley containing El Capitan and Half Dome. So based on the "Its already been done" theory I guess that should have been it. That would mean no Clearing Winter Storm and other wonderful photographs and that would be a loss for us all.
And despite all of the times that that scene has been photographed, wouldn't anyone who sees it know it needs to be photographed, even if they had never seen the work of Adams or Watkins or anyone else? I have photographed it many times and its not enough for me. And I somehow always find something I have never photographed when I am there too. Heck, sometimes just looking through the camera and clicking the shutter without a holder in the back makes me happy. :-)
Personally, I could care less if "it" has ever been done before.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks