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The Lazy Photographer- Photo Blog
The Lazy Photographer- Photo Blog
The Lazy Photographer-Photo Blog
Why PDF?
I have been asked several times why I am epublishing and why PDF?
a) I don't have a lot of money. In order to produce high quality printed material you have to spend money. Blurb, Lulu, Pikto etc, can produce good looking books, but their print quality is ok. I want the quality of these images to be better the ok.... I want them to be AMAZING... and that costs bucks. I lack storage and shipping facilities.
b) Disturbution. I don't want to spend time and effort sending out hard copies.
c) Ease of portability and viewing. PDF can be read on most tablets and computers, so the files are transportable and accessible.
d) epub vs PDF. Epub is a great file format for word heavy applications. If properly formatted the words flow, the Table of Content behaves well, and readers like the Kindle, Kobo, and Nookdo a great job of displaying text and making the reading experience enjoyable. The problem is that ePub mangles images. The ereaders that do a good job with ePub, do not display images very well.
A PDF has the ablity to be zoomed in and out, it holds the formating properly across platforms and is a stable format.
I like that fact that by not making paper copies of my material I am not using paper and ink and if the book doesn't sell that the discards will not end up in landfill.
What do other artists do?
When two painter get together, do they talk about their brushes and paints?
When two wordsmiths get together do they talk about their favorite pencil, or computer program?
Do sculptur's have flame wars on line about which clay is the best?
Or are these types of discussions only held by photographers?
Are photographers the only "artists" who discuss equipment all the time... But discuss technique so little, and creative process almost never?
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Uniqueness and vision
As I explore the ideas of creativity in photography I some times come across statements that get me thinking.
"Uniqueness is an issue of vision and style, not technique. Most often difference and novelty show in technique, and uniqueness is exhibited in point of view" (1)
Are you concentrating on technique over content?
It is doubtful that you can create a technique that has not been done before... and in some cases overdone ( have we seen enough HDR?). Technique is a tool to keep in your tool-belt, a knowledge on how to to create a vision .
Uniqueness is using technique to create your vision... this puts your stamp on an image.
Your vision is unique. It is how you see a subject, how you see the colour shape and form.
Uniqueness in style is how you capture and present this vision, it is not in the technique you use
(1) Rand G, Zarkia R. Teaching photography. Tools for the imaging education
Every Picture tells a story
Every Picture tells a story.....
As I am reworking myself, I have been thinking more about photography as story telling.
Is the story the photographer telling the same story as the viewer is seeing?
A lot of times the photographer knows the backstory behind an image. When where it was taken. They trouble separating the story the image tells from the memory and emotions that envleope the photographer when they see one of their images. I know this is an issue I have.
Is the story a simple one liner, a short story or a full novel?
In order to tell a story we need to have the tools and language to communicate our thoughts. The language of the written word is known to us ( you would not be reading this without it) but how well do you understand the language, the communication of the image.
Scott Kelby
He was promoting his new book, LIGHT IT, SHOOT IT, RETOUCH IT.
I like Kelby and have learned a lot from his books. He is a very talented retoucher, but as I was watching the event, I kept thinking, "Is he what is wrong with Photography?"
Most of the event was talking about technique... how to do this, how setting your lights like this will look this way, how to make this change in photoshop.
Very little was on interacting with the model, about the actual capturing of a compleing image.
I remember a debate on a fourm many years ago ( Garage Glamour?) about people and how they are becoming great at polishing turds.
Are spending too much time learning how to polish turds, and not enough time on creating great images to start with?
Learning Photography
I have been reading some books on Teaching Photography.
They have been very interesting.
A lot of what I do/ know/ practice in my teaching has been confirmed by the thoughts and essays in the books.
Photography has two components to it.
The technical and the artistic.
The Technical part of photography is very important, and needs to be mastered in order to be a good photographer.
Modern cameras make it easy to deal with the technical aspects, but due to their complexity, the modern digital camera is more difficult to master.
The limitations of film, and film cameras made the masterery of the technical side of photography easier.
The artisitic side of photography is hard ( for me) to teach. This is what I am working on, how to teach photographers how to see.
With the complexity of digital cameras, most photographers worry about f-stops, ISO, white balance, etc, and don't look at what they should be exploring as photographers.
Stay tuned as I explore this further.
Goodbye Sabrina
One lady I worked with a lot was a lady with a stage name of Sabrina.
She was always great to work with...smiling, laughing, nothing would phase her.
I learned a lot about how to deal with models from talking with her.
Today I heard the news that she is no longer with us. I do not know details, but Cancer has claimed another victim.
Goodby Sabrina
You will be missed.
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