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I was reading this post by Julie today. She doesn’t write very often, but when she does, more often than not it is a treat and it is thought-provoking. Her post dealt with taking large quantities of pictures. In particular, I latched onto this one particular portion of her post:
…How does that affect what you then shoot afterwards?…
This can be taken a couple of ways, so I’ll explore both of them, briefly. Firstly, I thought of a feedback loop wherein one can modify the way pictures are taken (technique). I would guess that she might have meant that looking back through the latest haul of pictures, one could refine their technique, or approach, to taking pictures. Seeing other possible angles that they hadn’t thought about or perhaps learning better techniques with the camera to reduce or eliminate shake, changes to exposure, etc. Perhaps we might make small adjustments to our camera preferences so as better to capture the scene faithfully the next time. Who knows.
Secondly, how this might impact choice of subject? In looking back through pictures, you might feel that you’ve spent a bit too much time on rocks or perhaps trees, then, having that feedback, you might decide to do a few more flowers, some portraits, or perhaps photograph some architecture, if it suits your fancy.
I was thinking about how this browsing affects my photography. I would say that it affects me more in the former than the latter. I will tend to tweak my camera settings, if necessary, to make better exposures, for example. Also, after looking at the images in chronological order, which is how I arrange them, it might spur me on to revisit a place that I’ve not been to in a long time. This, however, falls into the second case.
Overall, I don’t really think about it. I just really see what else I can see today that I didn’t see yesterday.
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This was good: “I just really see what else I can see today that I didn’t see yesterday.”
Even though the subject may be the same, what is seen may be different.
And sometimes even though the photo is the same, what is seen may be different.
nice to see i’ve provoked some thought
I’m formulating a part II right now… but i think the main gist of what I’m getting at is do I miss something strong in my work because i’m not paying enough attention to what I’ve done? Is there a thread running through that i could really work on and come up with something good, and I may miss it because the shots that start to tell that story speak softly and get lost in the babble of the crowds of images?
The short feedback loop and ability to shoot profusely has helped me eliminate a lot of nagging problems I’ve had with my pictures, sometimes technical (I won’t admit how long it took to nail the actual longest shutter speed i can handhold my 100mm macro at – after all, you’d think 1/250th is ridiculously fast but no, i’ve seen shake!!!) and sometimes realising just how often i make the same compositional mistake over and over again has allowed me to move past them. I don’t think i’ll ever stop learning that stuff, but at the moment what i’m interested in is going a bit deeper and finding out how it all hangs together, and maybe teasing out a thread to follow here and there. That’s where i think the value lies in looking at you old stuff. It’s just a shame when you’ve so much to go through, these things get lost.
But, I’ll go and continue this on my own bandwidth!
Hope you enjoyed your double trouble sunrise/sunset day today…
Gorgeous photo. Lovely details, subject, atmosphere, and colors.
Interesting thoughts.
I’ve never really thought about it. I just like to shoot and I don’t often think about what I’ve done in the past although I am certain that whatever I’ve learned from past shoots influences my approach as I go. I am also sure that I am pushed to try new things as a result of what I’ve done before, but like I said I don’t often give it a conscious thought. I am more of an in the moment photographer.
The only time I have to think about how I approached things in previous photo shoots is when I am working with a returning client, then of course I go through my archives and see what I could do differently.
I like to think I am versatile although I don’t show a lot of my more edgy stuff on my blog. I tend to stick to a fairly subdued format. I also don’t post too much of my professional body of work online for the public. Not sure why, but I just don’t.
What?! Spend too much time on rocks? Blasphemous.
Anyway, thinking about it – I don’t know if I can actually define how I decide to move on to the next thing vs. sticking around and working something more. I know there are always time and light pressures. Do I spend more time here in the good light, or is there something better around the corner?