My thoughts on the craft, the process and the subjects
Although it sounds like an oxymoron, good creative direction can be very effective and make the creative process a positive experience. A good example of this are the instructions that come with LEGO
I took the photo above with my iPhone. Its wide-angle lens is perfect for this kind of close-up shots. In fact, a combination of the focal length and sensor size in a smartphone camera would often outperform a DSLR in close-up photography, provided that the lighting is adequate.
Throughout a learning process, it is important to be conscious about which advice to follow and which to ignore. Here, “ignoring” does not mean not noticing it, but rather choosing not follow it, upon processing the information that comes with it.
Just as important is to know when to voice an opinion or criticism and when to withhold it. This notion is particularly important in teaching. Sometimes, too much feedback can either discourage or mislead the student about his/her learning process. More importantly, certain things cannot be transmitted by words or even visual example – they have to be discovered and mastered through personal practice.
I find that effort spent on self-editing my comments on other photographer’s images, reviews of other colleagues’ research papers, my lecture notes, etc. translates between these and other areas (e.g. practicing with novice kendoka). Ultimately, this capacity for restraint is based on being sufficiently present at the moment when my opinion is formed in order to realize that this opinion by itself is only a part of the overall communication and teaching/learning process, and as such does not automatically has to be made available to others. There might (or might not) come time when the opinion will be needed. Then, it would have benefited from being effectively formulated and delivered.
…These thoughts came to mind after I heard an interview with Amanda Palmer, and, being fully aware of the irony, I decided to put them into the blood post right away. In my defence, this is not an advice, just some notes to self…
I think that ability to clearly formulate what makes something or someone good, i.e. significantly better than average in the specific field, is crucial for making progress in one’s own development and for creating meaningful contributions.
In particular, I find that Japanese martial arts, such as kendo, offer a nearly perfect model for many other areas of human activity. Te reason for this is that nearly everything that we do involves interactions with other people, which can be modelled, at some level of fidelity, as conflicts of varying intensity. Kendo exemplifies an ultimate level of conflict, with all its characteristic elements. After all, it represents a fight to the death.
One lesson from kendo that applies to most areas where continuous improvement of some skill or ability is needed is that a combination of two factors can serve as a fairly reliable indicator of whether someone has a potential to become good at what he/she does: quantity and quality of practice. Quantity is self-explanatory. By quality, I mean presence, conscious engagement with the subject of the activity.
I think that a similar approach can be adopted to photo projects. I wrote earlier about the importance of declaring a post-processing stage completed at some point instead of tweaking the image ad infinitum. Perhaps, additional insight can be obtained by analyzing when most photographers quit their processing projects. Once the typical quitting points in the workflow have been established, it would be best to either quit earlier or push beyond them.
Many traditional Japanese arts, such as calligraphy, poetry, tea ceremony, flower arrangement include seasonal references. Those can be specific words (kigo) or particular plants and flowers used for ikebana. In calligraphy practice, poems that represent the current season are typically used. This month’s calligraphy that my wife use for practice is an unusual example of seasonal reference (see image above). What refers to the season is not the meaning of the writing, but its pronunciation. It is pronounced “fu jyo ki kyo”, which is supposed to resemble a song of a spring bird.
Another insight from this month’s calligraphy is how effective a reference to nature can be. This notion is directly related to the importance of including an element of weather in landscapes, which was first explored in photography by Ansel Adams
The last remaining authority, the one the sits inside our head, is a tough one, though. I think the reason is that we associate ourselves with what we do so closely, that somehow our jobs (not necessarily the paid ones that we do to make a living, but practically any activity) subjectively become our identities. Although this may have nothing to do with reality, there is a real resistance to trying new things that we create for ourselves. In my experience, I sometimes have to consciously convince myself that trying a new kind of shoot, instead of “perfecting” the one(s) that I am already familiar with, would be fun (and almost always is, following the theory that new and challenging activities are most fulfilling).
The benefits of exploring new activities are definitely worth overcoming the internal resistance. For example, although sports photography was distinctly new, challenging and uncomfortable for me after starting initially in the landscape genre, shooting sports opened up an incredibly fun and rewarding area and generally prompted my interest in photographing people.
Most of the content that is being generated in research, art, literature, etc. is not new, but a re-statement of old concepts. This does not mean that re-visiting old ideas is a useless exercise. In fact, calling something an “exercise” implies that the activity has some intrinsic value.
My three-year-old daughter and her friends like listening to the same stories, watch the same cartoons and play the same games day after day. Of course, their preferences change periodically, but it is still fascinating to see how much children like repetition. Naturally, this is part of their learning process. Similarly, perhaps, re-visiting old ideas helps us learn the underlying concepts and even shape the ideas themselves.
Similarly, photographing or painting a familiar subject, such as a still life or a landscape, not only refines the technique, but opens up new dimensions of the subject. Perhaps, this is why the old works of art are sometimes entitled “studies.”
Last calligraphy lesson was dedicated to practice signing our work before sending to to japan for grading. The signature contains the name of the group, my current rank (using a ranking system of dan, similar to that of martial arts) and my name in katakana.
Writing with a small brush feels different from the usual shodo practice. Although not a part of the test, the appearance and the style of the signature has an influence on the judges decision in a similar way that a way of wearing one’s bogu, holding the shinai, bowing, entering and leaving the dojo are all factors in the outcome of kendo grading. Similar to kendo, the feedback from the judges of a shodo grading is very limited, with some rare exceptions, when brief comments on the specific entries would be printed in a monthly booklet. It would be interesting to have a glimpse of what goes on in the judges’ mind as they examine my work…
In the mean time, covering pages with my name for couple of hours had a mixed feeling of being back in the first grade and that of doing suburi before kendo practice.
An interesting similarity between calligraphy and kendo is that it is not the rhythm itself, but its variation that elevates the quality of technique. In kendo, varying the timing, breaking up the pattern of attacks and counter-attacks, adds the element of surprise for the opponent and makes the techniques less predictable. In calligraphy, varying the speed of the brushwork adds character to the writing, emphasizes individual characters (kanji) or certain elements of the characters and ultimately gives “interestingness” to the resulting image.
Taking advance of the fact that there is neither a set deliverable (minimum set of images) nor a firm deadline for the recently completed photo shoot of a dance performance, I have been experimenting with new post-processing techniques. Narrowing down the initial set of more than 2000 raw images to just a handful, I was able to spend some time playing with some brush stroke effects in Photoshop. I find that allowing sufficient time to experiment with (i.e. try and discard) new techniques is the key to being able to break from my usual workflow and ultimately, to find a new look of the final images.
Dance performance is a perfect subject for this kind of exercise, because photographing it is literally taking pictures of art, which is, literally, creating art out of art.
