The Taking, Not the Seeing
© Dion McInnis
Some time ago, I had the pleasure of teaching two photography workshops to high school artists at the Visual Arts Scholastic Event held at the University of Houston-Clear Lake. Each group of 25 students participated in instruction, conversation and photography that reminds us all of what we are really doing as photographers. As part of the contingency of 1200 art students who were there, it was clear that they understand artistic principles. But, had they really learned to see yet?
Beginning each class with a few reminders about photographic principles, including that photography is "light drawing," i.e., no light, no drawing, depth of field, rule of thirds, perspective, angle of view, dimensionality and more, we then got to the heart of the matter: seeing. Then the group headed out to campus to take photographs, either with their own equipment or with the disposable cameras that VASE provided. After about 20 minutes, they returned to discuss what had happened.
"I'd like to know what you saw. And if you start out with 'I took a picture of…' I will cut you off. What did you see?" I challenged each class. The responses were amazing, ranging from the heavily symbolic ("I saw the contrast of animate and inanimate with the plant reflected in the glass of the building") to the curious ("I saw my own reflection in the glass and beyond that, someone walking up the sidewalk that looked sort of like me") to the sublime ("I saw a neat color contrast of the gray stones and the brown bricks"), but all were sincere and full of discovery. We then discussed the various techniques and steps they could utilize to emphasize in photos what it was that they saw.
A healthy question to ask ourselves while taking photographs, and reviewing our work later, is "What did I see?" All our techniques, software, printing options, and so on are merely tools to help us convey what we saw and the feelings/reactions inspired by the what we see. The classes were reminded that at times we shouldn't take photographs, but pause, absorb and then create. As we stand at dusk by a lake, do we grab the shot of colors and reflections, or do we pause to hear the sounds, feel the breeze and sense the fading heat of the day? If so, then we may choose a shutter speed to show the slight motion created by dusk breeze, or saturation options (digital or film choices) to emphasize the hot colors in the scene.
© Dion McInnis
Some time ago, I had the pleasure of teaching two photography workshops to high school artists at the Visual Arts Scholastic Event held at the University of Houston-Clear Lake. Each group of 25 students participated in instruction, conversation and photography that reminds us all of what we are really doing as photographers. As part of the contingency of 1200 art students who were there, it was clear that they understand artistic principles. But, had they really learned to see yet?
Beginning each class with a few reminders about photographic principles, including that photography is "light drawing," i.e., no light, no drawing, depth of field, rule of thirds, perspective, angle of view, dimensionality and more, we then got to the heart of the matter: seeing. Then the group headed out to campus to take photographs, either with their own equipment or with the disposable cameras that VASE provided. After about 20 minutes, they returned to discuss what had happened.
"I'd like to know what you saw. And if you start out with 'I took a picture of…' I will cut you off. What did you see?" I challenged each class. The responses were amazing, ranging from the heavily symbolic ("I saw the contrast of animate and inanimate with the plant reflected in the glass of the building") to the curious ("I saw my own reflection in the glass and beyond that, someone walking up the sidewalk that looked sort of like me") to the sublime ("I saw a neat color contrast of the gray stones and the brown bricks"), but all were sincere and full of discovery. We then discussed the various techniques and steps they could utilize to emphasize in photos what it was that they saw.
A healthy question to ask ourselves while taking photographs, and reviewing our work later, is "What did I see?" All our techniques, software, printing options, and so on are merely tools to help us convey what we saw and the feelings/reactions inspired by the what we see. The classes were reminded that at times we shouldn't take photographs, but pause, absorb and then create. As we stand at dusk by a lake, do we grab the shot of colors and reflections, or do we pause to hear the sounds, feel the breeze and sense the fading heat of the day? If so, then we may choose a shutter speed to show the slight motion created by dusk breeze, or saturation options (digital or film choices) to emphasize the hot colors in the scene.
Have our years of "taking" images dulled our senses, particularly our ability to see? What do we really see? It is, after all, the seeing not the taking.
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