The more one learns about and practices craft, the easier the art flows.
"Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China
… and to know when to walk away rather than capture an image that doesn’t inspire or work for you.
I still believe in visualizing an outcome before setting up. It’s easier for me perhaps since I am looking for color relationships and frame accordingly. B&W requires a much more demanding and refined management of the entire taking/development/print process to produce what is in the mind’s eye (to use a Yeat’s euphemism). Working within the zone system I think benefits outcomes.
For me, it’s the placement and expression of whites in a B&W image which makes or breaks it.
My opinion: In an infinite universe (for all practical purposes, considering one's lifespan), any limitations one puts on one's work (in my case, no cropping/burning/dodging) places no limitations on the number of possible images available for one to make.
I may not be able to make your* images, but why would I want to?
* -- a general 'your', not anyone in particular
"Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China
Sure. Let's say I'm photographing in the city, working rather close (think 90mm lens on 4x5), I've got a nice storefront that I'm photographing at an oblique angle. I really like the angles made by the converging horizontals and I want more; more converging in the distance and more in the field of view close-up.
So, I'll swing the camera back, in the direction of closer to perpendicular to the wall, till I get the horizontal lines to go where I want them. I can manage the image (within limits) to make the lines exit the image where I like; at a corner, whatever. Of course, in order to keep the plane of sharp focus on the façade, I need to compensate for the back swing by swinging the lens in the opposite direction (and shifting or panning a bit as needed). Yes, I could reposition the entire camera and then swing just the lens, but once set up at the point I want, swinging back and lens is much easier.
Or, the opposite case. Let's say I have little choice where to set up the camera and I'm off center on my subject a bit. Often, I'll just point the camera at where I want the center of the image to be and swing the back parallel to the façade to get the horizontal lines parallel. Then, I'll adjust plane of sharp focus with lens swing. This, in essence, is just applying shift, but is often faster for me in the field. Similarly, even when I set up parallel to the façade and use shift to frame the image, I often need to tweak the back position just a bit to get the horizontals parallel, which I do instead of panning parallel and then shifting to frame just because its often easier.
I work a lot with city images in which the optical center (lens axis) is not in the center of the image.
Here are a couple of examples of both cases: In the second image, I ran out of available shift, so swung both back and lens to get more.
Thank you DoremusS.! Helpful
Can I say it differently? No matter what limitations you impose or are imposed upon you (limited lens choice etc), there are still an infinite number of images one can make. So refining one’s style does not close any doors.
I can attest to this from a shoot 2 days ago with an on going project since 3?years. Same location, one lens, one camera, same aperture, but optimizing results due to ideal sky conditions. I took over 400 images (digital of course) and not one was identical, and only 2 were truly standouts. But the 2 really superseded my objective. Over the top good.
Sounds very good to me.
I have been photographing along the same stretch of creek with LF since 1979. Oh, I manage to get myself elsewhere, too. I found that photographing in places like Death Valley, or Yosemite Valley for that matter, gives me experience with light that I can bring back to, and benefit from while under the redwoods.
Camera movements:
The truth be it, in the forest I tend to use movements at a minimal level. It is too chaotic to have nice planes to work with. Its opposite, the 'grand landscape', gets away with minimum movements for a different reason...just don't need much. In between, especially all that city stuff, usually has all sorts of planes around to twist the bellows for!
1) Ossagon Creek -- 5x7 Eastman View No.2, front has only rise/fall, the back has swing and tilt only. It has take me a little while to adapt, but such a beauty is worth it...what movements it has are geared.
2) Two Redwoods -- 11x14 Eastman w/ limited movements. I have a Chamonix now, but this image did not need the extra movements I have now.
"Landscapes exist in the material world yet soar in the realms of the spirit..." Tsung Ping, 5th Century China
Ansel Adams’ best group portraits are, well, certainly memorable if not spine tingling.
My choice of word “memorable” might not be popular.
Many were client assignments, but following orders didn’t always rob him of his talents or luck.
Here’s one I’ve always liked – college kids in 1967 rehearsing the Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex, or, “My wife is my mother?” [translation mine]. The central woman has just been taken down from a noose and is taking her last breath. I think the standing person is their teacher-director. They lucked out with the fog! Ancient tragedy in the mist, memorable if not a masterpiece to me.
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