by Wouter Willemse
Earlier this week, I received an email from a mailing list of a website for music production. It was about a blog posting on their site with the simple but inviting title: ‘Why do you make music?‘.
The article comes up with some very good points, but truth be told: I don’t make music at all yet. Trying to learn, but that’s another story. Obviously though, it made me wonder: why do I make photos?
As it is not the first post of this kind, a short recap only on the idea behind this post. Again, this post is just one man’s opinion on a single image. Nothing I’m about to write is anything but an opinion; it’s not true, false, correct or wrong.
The image today hasn’t been without controverse, so it’s not unlikely you won’t agree or simply dislike the image to follow. If you take offense to it, then please do remember what was written above: this is just some opinion of some random guy on the internet. It’s not personal at all.
As mentioned in previous posts, I think choice of camera gear is a personal affair, and for lenses this is even more true. We’re not all looking for the same thing, so choice is a good thing.
There is plenty places discussing such choices, but the advices aren’t always equally sound. Or it is sound, but just doesn’t apply to you. Choice is great, but it also means staying focussed on understanding your own needs.
The recent attention for non-fungible tokens (NFTs) got me thinking about the last post I made (a master craftsman in printing making physical objects). In turn, that made me wonder about a lot more complexities around ownership, rights and what the actual product is in photography. The hype surrounding NFTs might make one believe it’s a solution to all kind of issues. But does it?
Like the previous one, this post is just one man’s opinion on a single image. Nothing I’m about to write is anything but an opinion; it’s not true, false, correct or wrong.
Just want to make that clear in case anyone severely disagrees, which isn’t unlikely.
This will just be a short post, without photos, to update on some of the earlier posts on ‘recipes‘. So far, there have been four of those and for all intents and purposes, that should be enough. But at some point, you run out of stock, to find prices that aren’t quite what they were last time….
For various reasons, I haven’t found time to post something fresh lately. It’s not that I ran out of ideas, or topics I care about. But some of those ideas need a bit more time to mature. Some need me to spend some time actually making photos. Others need me to straighten my thoughts a bit more.
In the parts of the Netherlands where I live, this weekend is all about celebrating carnival. I used to celebrate this as well (not this year though). While I could write a lot on this feast, I’m not going to do that.
What I am going to bring up, is the small and sweet companion I brought with me the last times I went to celebrate it: the Werra.
It’s time of the winter olympics, and I’m enjoying a lot of that massively. Apart from the action, the Olympics always have their fair share of interesting stories. Getting to the top makes for fascinating stories often enough. Staying there: a display of immense focus and drive. And as many Olympic sports aren’t very commercial, or even paid at all, that relentless drive to excel is plain awesome.
In some way, most have this drive to be the best. But unlike sports, who or what is the best isn’t always clear-cut.
Discussing photos with photographers pretty often becomes a discussion on the technical execution of the image. The composition, how elements work together (or clash), the use of colours, things like that. More a dissection of the image than a taking the image as a whole.
There is a lot of value in that, as such an analysis gives a lot of clues to learn and grow. But to me, it also misses a vital element. The gut reaction, the emotional response you have when you see the image.