Why do photographers have less artistic license?

[Donald Miller]

Not necessarily, you may be a great craftsman with a camera, you may also be an artist, but the two don't necessarily go hand in hand. Take musicians for example, who in this case is the artist, the guy who plays an instrument very well, or the guy who writes original score? How about the architect and the carpenter designing and building the same structure? In other words, there is nothing wrong with being a craftsman, but let's not confuse it with being an artist. Most people can tell if a craftsman is good or not, but it's more ambigious about the artist.

Very well and accurately stated.

[Walter Calahan]

Gary, did the artist who used your image to paint a picture to make money pay you a usage fee for your copyright?

Commercial usage demands compensation.

[Donald Miller]

Note that I only quoted a small part of your post, and addressed only that small part.

All my photographs depict my subjective reality, there is nothing objective there at all. They may be straight depictions of the scene I that happened to be in front of the camera when I was there, but the moment I decide that it might be worth taking a picture of it is the moment where sujbectivity begins and objectivity ends.

What does your subjectivity indicate? What does it tell you about yourself?


Is it? I can't see that one is more artistic than the other?

To the truely fanatical on film it seems to be the case. Why does the means of capture or presentation separate one as better than the other?

The only thing I'm certain of is that Jerry Uelsmann's way of doing it is a lot more work - at least some of the time.

Do any of Uelsmann's images have any meaning to you? If so which do and what is the meaning they have?

[Ole Tjugen]

This isn't easy to explain - if I thought it was I would be a writer, not a photographer!

My "subjectivity" simply shows that I'm human. The diffcult bit in photography in not seeing with the mind's eye, but really seeing with the eyes! Or the same in a different was - learning to see what is really there, instead of what you know is there.

Take a close look at a bunch of snaps by a non-photographer, and you will probably notice that they only see the main subject, and not the surroundings which in many cases makes up 90% of the image area. "Isn't this a great picture of aunt Hilda?" and you think "thanks for telling me - there's a lump in a flowery dress in the shadow under a tree there, I would never have guessed it was aunt Hilda if you hadn't told me"... But of course you are too polite to say so, and just make a non-committal grunt which the proud snapper takes as encouragement to show you the next 500 snaps from the summer holiday...

These pictures obviously have a meaning to the "photographer", but they do not convey that effectively or efficiently. So in a way they are more "subjective" than mine - but in another way they are less subjective, since they show more of the setting, and are not carefully composed, framed, staged or whatever.

The means of capture and presentation have no other meaning than insofar as they influence the finished work. I happen to prefer doing things the "hard way" with LF cameras and wet darkroom, possibly since I'm too lazy to bother to learn digital techniques. Or maybe it's more like a musician who continues to play a violin, even after synthesizers were invented?

As to the "meaning of Uelsmann's images" - I can no more explain that in words than I can explain the meaning of Brahms' "Ein deutsches Requiem". I could analyse either to bits, drawing on metaphors, art history, mythology and whatever, but only the work itself conveys the "meaning". Sometimes it may not be what the originator intended, but that only shows that both creation and interpretation are subjective.

[paulr]

There are axes getting ground on both sides.

1: If it's not straight photography, it's crap.

2: If it's straight photography, nothing creative is being done, so it's crap.

Both kinds of axe grinders are taking away creative license, imo.

For what it's worth, I too get bored by people making monotonous, cookie cutter images of the same rocks and trees in the same styles. But I think these picutures are the result of lack of vision, not straight photography. There's equally unimaginative work being done in the world of manipulatied photography and painting, for that matter.

[Donald Miller]

This isn't easy to explain - if I thought it was I would be a writer, not a photographer!

My "subjectivity" simply shows that I'm human. The diffcult bit in photography in not seeing with the mind's eye, but really seeing with the eyes! Or the same in a different was - learning to see what is really there, instead of what you know is there.

Take a close look at a bunch of snaps by a non-photographer, and you will probably notice that they only see the main subject, and not the surroundings which in many cases makes up 90% of the image area. "Isn't this a great picture of aunt Hilda?" and you think "thanks for telling me - there's a lump in a flowery dress in the shadow under a tree there, I would never have guessed it was aunt Hilda if you hadn't told me"... But of course you are too polite to say so, and just make a non-committal grunt which the proud snapper takes as encouragement to show you the next 500 snaps from the summer holiday...

These pictures obviously have a meaning to the "photographer", but they do not convey that effectively or efficiently. So in a way they are more "subjective" than mine - but in another way they are less subjective, since they show more of the setting, and are not carefully composed, framed, staged or whatever.

The means of capture and presentation have no other meaning than insofar as they influence the finished work. I happen to prefer doing things the "hard way" with LF cameras and wet darkroom, possibly since I'm too lazy to bother to learn digital techniques. Or maybe it's more like a musician who continues to play a violin, even after synthesizers were invented?

As to the "meaning of Uelsmann's images" - I can no more explain that in words than I can explain the meaning of Brahms' "Ein deutsches Requiem". I could analyse either to bits, drawing on metaphors, art history, mythology and whatever, but only the work itself conveys the "meaning". Sometimes it may not be what the originator intended, but that only shows that both creation and interpretation are subjective.

Ole, perhaps you and I are not that far apart in what we think. However you keep bringing some things into the discussion that I have not addressed...one of those is the matter of creation and interpertation. I wonder where interpertation enters into this matter since creation is an individual thing and interpertation seems to be including a "collective" of others. By the way, I have no difficulty expressing verbally what a given image means to me. Maybe that is because we have different knowledge of ourselves and our emotional responses...what they are and what they mean to us.

Let me see how I may approach this matter so that I can communicate what I am saying in a different way. Let's say that my brother and I are both photographers. Since you seem to indicate that the means of expression (digital or film) make no difference and I agree with you on this...much to the consternation of some in the film camp...it is not important what my brother or I, in this example use...

Let's say that I am a straight documentary type of photographer...suffice it to say that if I can't see it with my two eyes it is not "real photography" My brother, on the other hand is a more intuitive type of person and he is a deep thinker having lived a lot more life than I have...he is energized by the ideas of what might "be made and thereby become".

My brother and I go out and photograph one day and some weeks later we show what we have photographed on that day. I made a photograph of rock texture...it is abstract in all the glory of a Brett Weston print...my print is technically perfect and glows with all the light that a photographic print can engender. This image exists in objective reality now and at the time I exposed the sheet of film...in fact I can go back at some point in the future and redo this exposure if I so choose.

My brother, on the other hand, has arrived at a composite image in which a room is depicted having an open doorway at one end...coming through the streaming light emanating through the doorway comes a beautiful and nubile young lady with her right arm and hand extended. In her hand rests a bright red apple...There is nothing about this image that exists in objective reality now or at any time prior or subsequent. The viewer is left to experience and/or interpert that image from their own frame of reference dependent on their life's experiences and/or education.

Which of us, my brother or I, is being truly creative in our endeavors? I propose to you that it is my brother since "to create" presupposes that something new and previously non existent is brought into being. Now if one views this simply from the standpoint of a technically proficient and unique print than one could say that this photograph has not been made before...in fact it may not be made subsequently...but it is far less creative than my brother's image since I simply depicted what already existed while my brother brought into being far more than an image of an already existent reality...He brought into being through his imagery a thought, a question, a consideration that first and foremost existed within him at the level of his psyche.

I hope that we can agree that since we both used cameras in their production that both images are photographs.

This is what I am saying...for straight fanatical film based photographers to insist that if it is not "straight" then it can not be true or real photography seems to be quite silly to me.

[Greg Lockrey]

Very well and accurately stated.

Thank you, finally someone understands my meaning. BTW for the frustrated artists types: just because someone can draw, paint or mould clay doesn't make him an artist either.

[Eric_Scott]

Which of us, my brother or I, is being truly creative in our endeavors?

Answer: your brother.

Why? I believe Kirk Gittings started a thread about creativity. My concept of creativity is this: to bring into existence a *new* combination that previously did not exist. This is why I say your brother is being truly creative. He did just what one must do to be creative. You photographed an *existing* combination. There's no creativity in that, although you might have had a need to be quite resourceful in your manner of photographing that rock texture. Resourcefulness is quite often confused with creativity. Note that my comments have nothing to do with Art.

Vaughn, I shall point out something that exists in objective reality: the world. The world exists in both time AND space. You mentioned time, but forgot about space. True, the only thing that exists in time is the present. However, space lay outside of time. Time has it's origin in space: change in space is the concept of time. Without the concept of time I can still perceive the world in space. How's that for nonsense?

[janepaints]

There are axes getting ground on both sides.

1: If it's not straight photography, it's crap.

2: If it's straight photography, nothing creative is being done, so it's crap.

Both kinds of axe grinders are taking away creative license, imo.

For what it's worth, I too get bored by people making monotonous, cookie cutter images of the same rocks and trees in the same styles. But I think these picutures are the result of lack of vision, not straight photography. There's equally unimaginative work being done in the world of manipulatied photography and painting, for that matter.

Paul, your thoughts bring to mind a maxim learned from a friend who grew up in the eastern bloc, 1940s & '50s:

Under capitalism man exploits his fellow man, but under communism it's the other way around

Perhaps it's all crap--any method, any approach, but so what? Go on out and have a crap shoot anyhow, as long as it gives you the chill bumps.

Replace 'crap' in the above sentence with 'art' or 'sacred' and all is still OK.

There's a chair for everyone at the feast table. Many paths to the promised land. No universal answer. Just get to the feast on time. And bring a camera.

Whatever we think, it's more than that

Wonderful images straight, wonderful images altered, wonderful images lens'd, wonderful images brushed, or written or video'd.

As long as the images are wonderful, right? Ain't that the point entire?

A fave maxim from the Art World, (whatever the heck that is):

good artists copy,
better artists are influenced
but great artists steal

Quote that will drive ya nuts trying to untangle what it means:

I don't know much about art that I don't like.

Don't know who said that. It came from the liner notes of a CD without clear attribution.

Sometimes when all excited about making a photo I think painting is a lot of crap.
Sometimes when all gung-ho while painting I think photos are a lot of crap.
But that's when I'm grouchy. Usually I just think everything is amazing and wanna do it all and to heck with too much thinking about it.

[sanking]

Donald,

I though about a serious reply to your question but have decided instead to take a drive in the mountains with my large 7X17 film camera. The fall leaves are quite lovely now, and although there may not be much creativity in making photographs of fall leaves in B&W I anticipate that the drive will be quite enjoyable. Though perhaps not as intellectually stimulating were I to stay here by the computer.

So bye for now.

Sandy