When you open your eyes first thing after waking, do you see in black & white? My first experiences with photography was using black & white film. As a tween, I wasn’t concerned with any difference between black & white and color photography. I was happy enough to be learning something new and exciting in a young life. Like a moth to a flame, I was burned by desire. Finally able to express internal thoughts and ideas previously tethered tightly inside a creative young mind.
It’s interestingly curious that which I’ve not heard written about much—what most amateurs photograph using their cameras? People. Mostly family and friends. “Snapshots.” After some time taking these photographs, it could become stale—losing its luster. Would it be strange to look through a picture book (or cell phone storage) and notice everyone in every photograph was visibly saying “cheeeeeese,” and showing lots of teeth?
With that same thought, what is the longest amount of time you’ve had a roll of film in your camera, finally getting it processed after the last frame? Days? Months? Years (Boomers)?
In the camera phone age, one could assume it’d be food that’s photographed the most. Would you’ve photographed food on your table if you were using black & white film?
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Again, the typical photographic subjects of most people with a camera is—another person. Though the idea of photographing someone you don’t know for the sake of artistic expression may be lost on many people. In many ways, there’s an appeal for street photography’s creative expression which has visibly reached epic proportions on Instagram & Threads over the past ten years or so.
Photographing family and friends was so engrained in the psyche of many people that to take pictures of anything else but other people is “dumbfounding.” I’ve been asked what is the benefit of taking a photograph of a large-sized plant leaf? building facades? Wood warehouse pallets? From the mindset of a creative person, it’s absolutely normal. We photograph it because it exists. It has creative value and merits attention. Abstract photography can be very challenging to the photographer as well as the viewer in that manner, more so than a food shot on a camera phone. Being literal with a photograph is rather easy. Instigating a requirement for interpretation of a photograph brings challenges to bare—like a puzzle that needs to be solved.
Conceived in scientific investigation, it’s branched into differing genres of creative exploration. Look Magazine, Life Magazine, etc., showed that documenting the unlimited aspects of society in photographs was relevant to understanding human history better. Supplying concrete visual evidence of the societies and world’s discoveries to people who hadn’t observed or known about them before.
Fine art photography. The term seems to be disappearing in the social media/internet sphere. Although concepts and ideas have to begin somewhere. They didn’t begin with the creation of the internet or social media. Fine art photography’s germination started with the Pictorialist Movement, working to elevate it from its science-based beginnings into a creative and expressive medium on the same level as painting and sculpture.
I didn’t want to go too deep into the genres mentioned. Just figured to jot down ideas that may spark anyone’s interests in pursuing them at some point.
Do you have any overall thoughts? Share them in a comment. Read more in my previous “Black & White” newsletter.
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Til next time…
Cheers!
When I first picked up a camera with serious intention, it was an Olympus Pen-F digital. I upgraded the model but stayed with Olympus for several years in my street and documentary work. I shot mostly in muted colors and lots of B/W. The camera, with a sensor not known for its color processing, helped me to see in b/w and colorized grays. The Seattle weather helped also. But something happened when I took on a Fuji in my hands. The processing of color is famous in Fuji, and I find myself rarely, if ever, "converting" to b/w with a Fuji. I simply don't "see" in b/w when I use it. But I miss thinking/seeing in b/w, so I've gotten more serious with an old Olympus film camera, developing and printing my own. It's hard work, really hard work, but I'm glad to be able to see in that way again. Of course, I can load it with color film, and I will from time to time, but I relish the idea of returning to b/w for long stretches of time, as I did with my first digital Olympus.
It's the folks who find value in photographing a large leaf, and the side of a barn, that become the "art" photographers. Not everyone paints, not everyone sculpts, not everyone shoots.