Cameras Again

From HiveWiki

After purchasing a new dSLR, Matthew lamented:

Modern photography is still full of technical jargon that I don't

begin to understand. f-stops, focal lengths, and even flashes come

with reams of technical details that are going to require lots of

research.

Graham replied:

That's backwards.

Photography is about capturing "this" on film, and not "that".

The more clearly your audience can see the "this", the more connected

they will be to your shot. Your definition of "this" is up to you.

By way of a concrete example, maybe your "this" is a ladybug sitting on

some grass. But if you take a picture of a whole lot of grass, how do

you ensure your viewer looks at the ladybug? The ladybug might be lost

in the noise, all they can see is "that" grass, not "this" ladybug.

Now, your technical knowledge of the camera kicks in.

You might choose to make "this" in focus, and "that" out of focus. Your

viewer's eyes are likely to lock onto "this" which is in focus, and

ignore "that" which isn't. This is called using "depth of field",

explained in grotesque technical detail in your manual.

Second concrete example, maybe a racing car is moving, and you want to

show that it is moving. Your "this" is the car, your "that" is the

track. Take the shot at a high speed, and your racing car looks like a

car parked in a car park. Boring. So, you purposefully choose a lower

speed, and pan the camera with the car. "This" car remains clear, "that"

background becomes smeared, and your shot tells the story that your

subject is moving. The manual will tell you the technical details of

choosing a shutter speed.

Another way of focusing on "this" is by removing "that" from the image

entirely. A bird against a clear sky might make a more striking image

than the same bird against some foliage. I say "might", that's the

beauty of it, there are no hard and fast rules.

You might catch "this" to be the smile on the face of a person.

Eliminating the "that" in such a photo is an art form in itself. As is

getting them to smile at your camera at all. This is where it gets hard

(and interesting).

In all these cases, you want to capture "this", and you reach for the

functions your camera gives you based on the method you've chosen to

eliminate "that".

It's also why the "automatic" mode on cameras ultimately gives you

disappointing results in most cases. If the only photos in the world

that stirred the soul were pictures of people with gormless smiles on

their faces, then automatic cameras with "face detection" would be fine,

but from experience they aren't. The world is far more interesting that

that.

The real trick with photography is to choose your "this", and quickly

use the technical tricks your camera gives you to capture "this" before

the moment is gone. The technical stuff is just a means to an end, not

the end in itself.

Graham's Pet Peeve:

I have a pet peeve: A camera is *not* a gun sight.

People have a habit of going "a photo of Jack and Jill, let me put the

bullseye of my gun sight, er, I meant camera on the forehead, and go for

the kill shot, er, I mean picture".

What do you end up with? A picture of the back of the room, with some

people in the way at the bottom of the picture.

Yuck yuck yuck yuck.

So I would encourage framing the images in all sorts of imaginative

ways, as long as it's not the awful common cliche.