What Photography is to YOU

Kodiak

Member
Joined
Mar 16, 2017
Messages
28
Location
Toronto
Format
35mm
I was professional Photographer and Painter until year when job I did turned toward digital imaging. Today my world is very different, I am happier and I am performing only for myself, and have zero interest in showing my photographs to other. No points in it I found.

To me:

1. It is my memory on the past moment important in my life. If I see something that matters to my life I will not skip it. I will take my Camera which is always with me.

Examples are
Food I like and ate
Bed where I sleep
Reflections on rainy day


2. It is proof for some facts I am interested to prove to myself, so make identity Portraitures with Lifestyle or Candid shooting style and with specific category

Examples are:
Aging of my Wife and me,
My cherished boots
My beloved Lexus
Canadians


So now is you turn
 

Rick A

Subscriber
Joined
Mar 31, 2009
Messages
9,966
Location
Laurel Highlands
Format
8x10 Format
It's physics and chemistry. At least that's what I tell people when asked about my hobby. I tells them physics and chemistry, they give me that "oh shit" look and back away slowly. Then I don't have to entertain their dumbass questions if I had said photography. Best response to my 5x7 camera in the field, "I bet it takes neat old pictures". I prefer to avoid imbeciles.
 

jim10219

Member
Joined
Jun 15, 2017
Messages
1,632
Location
Oklahoma
Format
4x5 Format
All of the above. Photography is a means of self expression. Plus it's cheaper than painting and less hard on my finger joints than music. I also like the physics and chemistry aspect, plus I enjoy all of the engineering and repair projects that come along with it. It's one of those things that just keeps expanding in different, unexpected directions.
 

KenS

Member
Joined
Jan 2, 2005
Messages
941
Location
Lethbridge, S. Alberta ,
Format
Multi Format
A two dimensional 'capture' of a three dimensional reality
Ken
 

NB23

Member
Joined
Jul 26, 2009
Messages
4,307
Format
35mm
It’s a fuzzy wuzzY
 

Berkeley Mike

Member
Joined
Jun 4, 2018
Messages
651
Location
SF Bay Area
Format
Digital
I've been working in film, alternative and digital capture. From that perspective, the essential principle of photography is:

light captured and retained by a sensitive medium creating an image.

What we do with that is a whole 'nother thing. What materials and process we use or prefer does not effect that.
 

NB23

Member
Joined
Jul 26, 2009
Messages
4,307
Format
35mm
It’s Boogie Woogie

.
 

George Mann

Member
Joined
May 14, 2017
Messages
2,878
Location
Denver
Format
35mm
Back in the good old days of Kodachrome and Pan-X, it was about seeing the world through my creative vision. But these days, its more about how the world looks with the current emulsions thru my various lenses.
 

kevs

Member
Joined
Aug 21, 2006
Messages
711
Location
North of Pangolin
Format
Multi Format
A way of recording things I want to remember;
A visual language;
A way of seeing;
A way of communicating / sharing my seeing;
A means of self-expression;
A set of skills;
An arts practice of sorts;
A way to waste money, time and materials;
A reason to lug equipment to locations;
A way to tell myself I'm not dead yet.
 

Ko.Fe.

Member
Joined
Apr 29, 2014
Messages
3,209
Location
MiltON.ONtario
Format
Digital
I do show my pictures because due to Ottawa politics only few people from my country are allowed to be in Toronto and Canada.
We are talking about mass discrimination. Same level they turned away ships with immigrants.
So, here is very many discriminated people who wants to be in Canada, but could only see my and others pictures about it.
Some of my earlier pictures and stories about Canada were stolen and replicated all other internet.
Only once I was approached by mass media to ask permissions to publish my stories about Canada.
 

Andrew O'Neill

Moderator
Moderator
Joined
Jan 16, 2004
Messages
12,201
Location
Coquitlam,BC Canada
Format
Multi Format

?
 

jerrybro

Member
Joined
Feb 20, 2005
Messages
395
Location
Philippines
Format
Large Format Pan
A means of totally controlling a process to achieve a specific desired result. Therapy.
 

flatulent1

Member
Joined
Oct 7, 2008
Messages
1,505
Location
Seattle USA
Format
Multi Format
Photography is what motivates me to get off the couch and go for a walk.
 

blockend

Member
Joined
Aug 16, 2010
Messages
5,049
Location
northern eng
Format
35mm
A form of obsessive compulsion, mainly, with positive spinoffs. Like a record of the people and places I've lived among that were missed by less compulsive types. Don't overthink it is my advice, just press the shutter. Look at the shot in five to twenty years time and decide if it was any good. This is totally against current prevailing wisdom, which says take the picture and post to Instagram immediately.
 

Arbitrarium

Member
Joined
Sep 28, 2016
Messages
112
Location
United Kingdom
Format
35mm
Taking photos: an excuse to get off my arse.
Developing photos: an excuse to do the washing up.

But seriously, it's another creative output. It's a byproduct of wanting to get out more and explore. It's cathartic, it slows down the world a bit. Clears my head. It's therapeutic.
 

jtk

Member
Joined
Nov 8, 2007
Messages
4,943
Location
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Format
35mm

Photo is just a time sink if you don't know why you're doing it. Like Facebook.
 

blockend

Member
Joined
Aug 16, 2010
Messages
5,049
Location
northern eng
Format
35mm
Photo is just a time sink if you don't know why you're doing it. Like Facebook.
That isn't what I said. I said it was a compulsion, the reward for indulging it is an ongoing record of my life. Given that this is the mode in which I work, short term goals are inappropriate. Especially take, post online, review, adapt, which is the currently popular way of exhibiting work. I'm more interested in the slow evolution of the immediate environment and the people in it, including myself. I'm not a Facebook user, which is the opposite to my approach to photography.

I would be too easily influenced by people's approval and changing taste, and might get side-tracked or derailed from more useful goals.
 

TheFlyingCamera

Membership Council
Advertiser
Joined
May 24, 2005
Messages
11,546
Location
Washington DC
Format
Multi Format
It's my everything, my raison d'être. I take photos to document where I've been and how I see those places. I take photographs to communicate what I felt when I was looking at those places. I make my photographs in a particular way because the method impacts the message as much as the content.
 

awty

Subscriber
Joined
Jul 24, 2016
Messages
3,681
Location
Australia
Format
Multi Format
A means to an end.
I want the pictures in my head on paper and this is the only way I know how. May take awhile if ever, I'm a slow learner and not sure I have the competency.
 
Cookies are required to use this site. You must accept them to continue using the site. Learn more…