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Photography Tales

Photography for Pleasure, Not Popularity

July 21st 2006 01:15

Reminiscing over treasured photographs

Online photography communities are heartbreakers. Like the addictive ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends whose heady experience you find yourself wasting four years of your life with, online communities can be very much the same blur of pointless highs and gut-wrenching lows where your world becomes dictated by page views, comment counts and “favourites”.

An interesting thought occurred to me the other day—how about taking some photographs and not exhibiting them online? Sure, you may find that you have neglected to upload an outtake here and there, but the practice might still stand of having always shared your photography with the public.

For me, it has always been difficult distinguishing between the comments on my photographs like where “randomphotodude” would say, "awesom foto, ur model is hot, chek out my stuf thnx" and the people who sincerely liked my work and was keen to watch me grow. They have been a source of both intense frustration and great, great pleasure.

I am not pledging a vow of silence, or anything else revolutionary, but simply proposing the idea to all interested readers that we allow ourselves the room to grow a little through the old-fashioned celebrations of amateur self-satisfying art—paper photo albums.

Still shoot anything and everything to your heart’s content, but only when it pleases you and not when you’re garnering for page views. Shoot your models and sitters, but as a memento of your growth and not as any contrived or grandiose attempt at art. Page by page, I challenge you to fill an album that you will be able to carry around with you for the rest of your life, and measure its worth by the fond memories it inspires, and not by comments.

Charles Dodgson aka Lewis Carroll filled volumes of albums with his portraits

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Introduction to Photography Tales

July 19th 2006 04:23

Welcome to Photography Tales, the latest blog on the Orble Network. The market out there for prosumer (professional-consumer) digital cameras is ever-booming with new technological developments every year seeing the existing prices drop. Photography, especially digital photography, is becoming an increasingly accessible and affordable hobby, and we see new galleries and portfolios emerge on the Internet with self-professed photographers sharing their creations with the rest of the world. Film however, is far from being forgotten, with professional photographers and artists alike celebrating the ‘old’ medium.

Criticisms have arisen surrounding the rapid introduction of consumer digital cameras. For as little as a few hundred dollars, you can pick yourself up an easy to use point-and-shoot camera, and with the automatic settings, snap up a few pictures of flowers, or your cat, and call yourself a photographer. While I do not want to reintroduce the snooty juries of the Paris Salon, I believe that there is some value in earning myself the title of ‘photographer’ before I abuse it.

We are at a very exciting age where we photography enthusiasts are straddled between the old world and the new, the traditional mediums and techniques of film and the transformational technological advancements of digital and image editing software. We get to see the best of both worlds and we have the opportunity to learn both as long as we choose to take it.

I started digital photography in high school as my selected medium for Visual Arts. With my teachers trained only in drawing and painting, I was left to flounder my way around it on my own. From the onset, I knew my passion would lie in portrait photography, but as many of my friends were camera-shy, I began to pose for myself with the aid of the self-timer and a tripod. I gathered a small fan-base online and supported myself with print sales of my works.

In 2004, I took a break from photography and through my contacts in the industry, began to model for artists and photographers in Sydney and Canberra. I was exposed to a world so far removed from what I had grown accustomed to in working alone. I worked closely with my photographers and gained considerable insight into their idiosyncratic working styles and methods.

Through this blog, I will share with you my personal accounts and experiences working on both sides of the camera—photographer and model, online art communities, and the photography out there that inspires me to create. On occasion, I will also reveal a few of the projects I am working on in my own pursuit of capturing beauty through a lens.