In pursuit of contemporary images - creative photography - P-Essay - Column

PSA Journal, July, 1992 by Margaret H. Vaness

Creative contemporary photography is a forward pursuit, parallel to contemporary art, it is timeless, and has a lasting worth. It is the only way left to go for intellectual growth. It is a delightful experience to view photography as one does the other twodimensional art-forms, a few feet back--to experience the artistic visuahzation the photographer had at that moment.

Contemporary photography is a departure from the academic and traditional, which concerns itself with pretty pictures, mostly literal which we all get hung up on, and which complicates and/or competes with our intellectual growth.

Varying the way you view a scene is important, but it is not the most important part of seeing. The most important part of seeing is the most important part of photography, a part much unappreciated, seldom mentioned, and greatly underrated, is the part of searching. To make a photograph happen, the photographer must first find them. Take your camea in hand and start looking, then be there when the picture is. Once you are there, be ready for the different and unusual. It will grab you. Then you will have it. "There" is usually not far away.

The different and the unusual are vague you say? Common and usual subjects can make different and unusual photographs. Look for form, lines, shapes of things, textures and colors. Look for juxtaposition of edges, of forms, of colors. Chances are what goes along with them will be your contemporary images, and your picture. Keep an open minds-eye, and search out that shot. It's out there just waiting for you.

Look for reflections, for an abstract-special-effect. Colored lights on water, pavement, mirrorwindows, anything that reflects is a good subject. Just remember to focus on the reflected image, not the reflecting surface.

Forget formulas, techniques, and other factors which you should already have firmed within your subconscious, and enjoy the esthetics of the image, view them for their joyous celebration of what they are, of the subject at that moment in time. As a photographer, learn to feel, capture the excitement of that spark of energy that drew you to look a second time at the image before you. Look close and experience it. Extract a portion only--just enough--not more than you need to record, for your show-and-tell, or for your own satisfaction. It is what you do with what you see that makes the difference.

Use simple equipment, or sophisticated, it is of no consequence. Study lines, forms, light and shadow, and color, just as in other forms of photography, in your pursuit. All the techniques you have learned, now become applicable to capture that unique shot. Depth of field, selective focus, multiple exposure (for the most unusual abstracts), in focus, or blur, still, motion, special lenses, filters, each, any, or in combination, or just your creative, imaginative-minds-eye may be all that is required. You need only to take the time, think photographically and search it out.

Margaret H. Vaness has been a member of PSA and the Puget Sound Chapter since 1985. She has served the Society as an Area Representative and as a District Representative. Margaret has been interested in industrial, commercial and academic photography for more than 30 years.