Make Photographs About Something

Shortly after publishing my last blog post, I was catching up on some of my favorite nature photography blogs, and read a great post on Guy Tal’s blog (The Concept) about making your photographs about something, rather than merely of something. I couldn’t agree more. This distinction is something we should be keenly aware of in our attempts to create more meaningful photographs.

If the goal is to create significant art, significant at least personally, then simply making a photograph of a pretty place is not going to do it. And copying what’s already been done certainly isn’t going to cut it. Not that pretty places, or even places that have been photographed to death, are off limits in the pursuit of art, but there has to be something more, some underlying meaning or idea; something to give the image emotional or intellectual depth. The photographs that burn themselves into your memory aren’t about places or things; they’re power lies in feelings, emotions, stories, and symbolism.

Guy suggests, at an early stage in the photographic process that we try to actually express the concept in words, in order to “bridge the gap between the spoken language, which most of us are taught to communicate effectively in, and the visual language”. Articulating feelings about a scene can help us focus on what exactly it is that we’re trying to say with a photograph, or what exactly it was that made us stop and want to make a photograph in the first place.

Focusing on the concept or the idea behind the image is a sure route towards making images that express vision and depth. As Ansel Adams famously said, “there is nothing worse than a sharp photograph of a fuzzy idea”. Defining the concept can help photographic artists, working in any genre of the medium, make clearer and stronger photographic statements.

3 Tips for Better Landscapes

I’ve been thinking about the purpose of this blog, and how besides helping me to develop as a writer, I’d like it to be of some value to the audience I naturally tend to write for. Namely, people captivated by the sublime beauty of nature, and especially artists concerned with improving their ability to express personal vision through nature photography. Hopefully at times I’ll have something relevant to say for beginners as well as those more seasoned, while at the same time keeping it interesting for nature lovers and those interested in creativity and the philosophy of art. I know that’s a pretty tall order, even for a good writer, but I also know that you learn by doing. So, here’s to more doing.
Following are three tips to help jumpstart your creativity, and hopefully inspire you to get out in the field to create more compelling landscape photographs. The images are three of my top 30 images from 2012 that didn’t make the top 12 cut.

1. Put the Sun in the Frame

Eternal Sunrise, Salt Lake City Foothills, Utah

The sun can create a focal point, a resting place for the eye in a complex forest scene, shot with a wide angle lens. Or, it can be a primary subject, as in the photo above. I used a 300mm telephoto lens to make the sun look huge in the frame. Whether working with a wide angle lens or telephoto, putting the sun in the frame will draw the eye, therefore placement is important.
Lens flare is usually my chief concern when photographing the sun. For this image, photographed without any filters, partially blocking the sun with the mountainside was the only way to transmit an image without any objectionable flare. I was able to shift my position back and forth to fine tune exactly what portion of the sun was blocked by the mountainside. This image contains nothing but pleasing flare, accentuated by a slightly smoky sky from late summer forest fires. Not so great for breathing, sometimes smoke can work to your advantage photographically. With careful placement and attention to detail, including the sun in the frame will make an impact.

2. Photograph Silhouettes

Russian Olive Silhouettes below Little Black Mountain, Utah

Silhouettes are quite simply the outline of an object filled in with black. Although, or maybe because of their inherent simplicity, silhouettes can make a powerful photographic statements. Working with silhouettes always forces a close examination of the separation between shapes in the frame.
Trees against a twilight sky have long been a favorite silhouette subject of mine. But it’s not necessary to wait until twilight to photograph silhouettes. Image number 1 could also fall into the category of silhouettes, and it was photographed hours after the official sunrise.
No matter what time of day, if the sun is out, or the sky is bright, you have the chance to photograph silhouettes. The chance to let the contrast between light and dark define the relationship between elements in the frame, the chance to look closely and apply the fundamental elements of design. Line and shape for instance.

3. Photograph in Bad Weather

Sudden Downpour (Wide View), City Creek Canyon, Utah

Don’t be afraid to get your camera wet. While it is challenging to keep raindrops and blowing snow off the front of the lens, it’s usually worth trying. A lens shade and a chamois cloth go a long way toward maintaining sanity. I’ll also drape a t shirt or a jacket over the camera/lens in an effort to keep them somewhat dry, being careful to keep it out of the frame.

When you’re out in the thick of it is often when you can create those best of the year images. It’s a little more work to photograph in the rain and snow to be sure. Generally the best opportunity for photography is right at the edge of the storm, either right as the storm is rolling in or as it’s breaking up. It is undeniably more difficult to head up the trail in the middle of a storm than to be out in a great location and have the storm come to you, but both approaches can lead to dynamic landscape imagery. The important thing is not to leave your camera in the bag.

Best of 2012

I’ve been editing my photos from 2012 all week. I’ve been trying to distill the entire year into just twelve images. The first part of the process was to wade through the thousands of photographs I created this past year and cull the best into a folder that eventually contained about 140 images. From there it was easy to pare the selection down to my top 30 images. The selection of just 12 images was more challenging. Maybe half of my final selection got picked again and again, but the other half could have just as easily been replaced by other images from my top 30. Of course, I see these photos in a way that no one else can, I have emotional attachments to the places and moments in which these images were created. Although I try to be as objective as possible, your choices may be quite different from mine.
I shot more photographs last year than in any other year of my life. While at the same time I made a conscious decision to stay close to home. I only traveled more than fifteen miles from home for photography a handful of times, less than any year before. I can practically count on one hand the number of photo excursions I had beyond that fifteen mile radius.
And now I’m asking myself, was it worth it? Did I accomplish what I had hoped to, by staying close to home and photographing more frequently? Did the volume of work lead to more individual stellar images? Or, did the lack of exceptional landscape locations lead to a less inspiring collection of photographs?
I knew at the outset that I would be forced into looking more closely at details; that intimate landscapes and close-ups would be my bread and butter rather than grand landscapes. And yet at the end of the year my top images were filled with picks from the few ventures I made to more dramatic locations. Why were images from one week spent shooting in California, disproportionately represented in my top 30? Was it the novelty of these images to me, their relative newness, or is it just the fact that all places are not created equally, that regardless of season or time of day, the Earth makes more magnificent gestures in some places?
Undoubtedly the best thing to come from this experiment was that my photography went in new and unexpected directions as my affection for birds and my interest in photographing them blossomed. I began to see birds as ready subjects, and I began to take a different approach to address a completely new set of photographic challenges. One of the main things this did for me was to open up the middle of the day, light I had previously shunned, I found useful. Indeed, most of my shooting this past year took place outside of the golden hours of sunrise and sunset. In fact, it’s almost impossible to capture anything but the silhouette of a bird at the edge of the day.
With most of my time spent photographing birds coming in the second half of the year, I was encouraged to have created quality portraits of at least fifteen different species by year’s end. And when I compare my best bird photographs with my best landscapes, some of them hold up pretty well. Five bird images ended up making my top 30. Bird photography, or attempted bird photography, did however account for the thousands of worthless images ending up on my CF cards and hard drives, which is why it took me a week to edit.
Editing all of your images from the year to the best dozen is an incredibly useful exercise. And when you compare these images with your best from past years you can really see the trends and changes in your style. When I see all of my best images from the year in one place, I’m both proud of what I’ve accomplished and humbled by the possibilities for improvement.