Monday, September 12, 2011

The School in Prehistoric Notions

The camera is a writing tool.

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Digital photography allows an infinite amount of second chances and I must be careful that I don't "overwrite" my photoshoots with many versions of the same photograph...Meaning if I had a roll of film with 36 exposures on it I would use the whole roll and hope that there were at least 10 good pictures on it.  I would then develop a contact sheet and choose a few that I really wanted to take the time to process and I would spend the afternoon in the darkroom perfecting those images.  Sounds almost prehistoric but it really taught me to decide which photographs summed up the moment the best whether it was an ominous day at the beach or photographing a newborn baby. Just like a book that is long winded and wordy, too many photographs can distract from a beautiful story as well. One of the most memorable things I read recently implored photographers to take thousands of photographs but delete almost all of them in the end...that is when you start to SEE your photographs and of course, learn how to let some go.