Sailor On Watch, Barcelona, 2014
Or whatever.
Point being, his recent article (“What’s your biggest problem?”) really nails it when it comes to what is necessary to make excellent, inspiring, unique images.
He starts out by noting that most folks, when they complain about not getting what they want out of their camera, talk a lot about dynamic range, focus performance, lens quality, etc. His point is that there is an even BIGGER problem out there preventing many photogs from getting good images and that problem is: THEMSELVES (as much as this might be hard to admit).
That would be you and me, dontcha know!
This all goes back to the same recurring theme…it’s all about “seeing” and developing your vision. The tools we have today to do the job are the least of our worries–they are not our “biggest problem” by a long snapshot. We ought to be spending at least ten times as many hours working on our vision as we do peering intently at lens tests of brick walls and reading the latest hot, hot, hot camera review.
I highly recommend you use the link above to go to Thom’s article and read it in its entirety. If you are honest with yourself, you’ll see how penetrating his analysis really is.
As to the ten questions he poses at the beginning of his column, here is a cheat sheet:
1) To check for chromatic aberration…look for weird color bands at high contrast borders in your images. For a full explanation of what it is and how to fix it (in Lightroom…much the same in Adobe Camera RAW), try this Gizmag article.
2) Saggital coma is…when points of light on the edges of the frame look like birdies with their wings spread.
3) To calculate dynamic range…see this article by Don Smith.
4) Printer dynamic range… and
5) To get the camera’s dynamic range to match printer dynamic range…See this article on the excellent Cambridge in Colour website for an in-depth discussion of dynamic range–how our eyes, the camera, the printer, scanners are all different and how we align our photography tools to make the best of the situation (follow all of their links in the article for a more complete picture).
Now, the next series of questions are WAY MORE IMPORTANT than the previous five:
6) Do you always take photos of compelling subjects?
My answer: “Uh…gee…well…uh…maybe…sometimes…sorta…”
7) Do your photos stand out so much that people gravitate to them even when they are displayed with the work of other photographers?
My answer: “Uh…gee…well…uh…maybe…sometimes…sorta…”
8) What’s the subject of your latest photo…shouldn’t be a noun.
I think he is saying that you shouldn’t be able to simply say, “That’s a picture of the Flatirons.” The picture should be about more than that…emotion, mood, story, etc. I try…I try…
9) Did you frame your image correctly at capture, or did you have to mess with it (“Fix it”) at home on the computer?
My answer: I do pretty well here. Thank goodness I feel OK about at least one of Thom’s questions!
10) How often do you miss focus, exposure, timing, etc. with your photographs?
The first two items could simply be technical issues between you and your camera–things that can be fixed by reading the camera’s manual and using good technique. The third (timing) requires practice, practice, practice to improve your instincts–that is one of my weaknesses, especially with street photography. (I often “see” the image after the fact and it’s too late.)
Again, take some time to go to Thom’s site and read the whole enchilada! (NOTE: Again, as of June, 2021, this link was no longer working, although you might try to Google it.)
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