Practicing Photography - PhotoTrice

Producing A Body of Work

A few weeks ago I wrote that projects bring structure to my photography. It is impossible for me to consistently produce work without a project. I have to organize myself to get good results. Apparently some people have an intuitive sense of what to shoot but I need more control.

Typically I shoot and post images online after each outing. That leaves me with a few published images and lots of unpublished stuff. Most of my work remains unseen. Assuming I make a reasonable effort to self-edit, many decent shots never see the light of day. That is where the idea of a body of work comes in.

A body of work is often defined as the total output of an artist or artisan over time. That could be a lifetime or a project. It may seem strange for a non-professional to consider a collection of photographs as a body of work. I do see my images in that way.

One hot concept these days is to ‘curate’ your social or public presence. That could mean anything from creating lists of things for others to follow to just about anything that carries a personal stamp of approval. Assembling images into a body of work is considered by some to be self-curation. That seems a little pretentious to me so I just pick and sequence images until I’m satisfied with the results. It amounts to the same thing.

Once the images are selected and sequenced it is a matter of processing the lot for output. Here too decisions must be made which will probably eliminate some photos. Not every image will work for every output medium. If all goes well the end result is a coherent body of work. I can’t think of a more satisfying way to conclude any project.

Looking In

Something you often hear is that photographers are voyeurs peeping into places where they don’t belong. That perception is not entirely untrue. We do look into places that other people avoid. Photographers are curious to see and capture what is around them. That is part and parcel to being a photographer.

I am always curious to discover unique scenes. My finished photographs are interpretations that generally differ from the raw source images. It is highly likely that someone will view any photograph I make as a misrepresentation of reality. That is a consequence of the common belief that photographs capture truth rather than light and shadow. Capturing a fraction of a second in time will always be out of step with the human eye in some way.

The images of the musician and ranch house share a common frame of reference. They were both captured from outside a building looking into interior space. Both are biased by my detached point of view and approach to the subject. I have no idea what the musician was playing because I could not hear the music. I also have no knowledge of the lives lived within the abandoned farm house. They are literally moments in time that strike a visual and emotional chord for me. They are interpretations of the subjects that were in front of my camera. Another photographer will interpret these scenes differently.

Tools for the Job

Lone Star Superman – Zuiko 135mm 3.5 @ f8.0

“I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.” – Abraham H. Maslow

An often heard cliché is that the camera is just a tool in the hands of a photographer. That is true as long as the photographer can come to terms with a particular camera to use it as a tool. I may have reached that point with the Sony A7II.

Of course the camera as tool encompasses both body and lenses. That complicates things when using legacy lenses because the two were not designed to work as a system. Finding the right match of body and lens requires some work on the part of the photographer. There is at least a little luck and intuition involved as well. This is particularly true if you have limited experience with legacy glass. I am in that category.

All of this makes me reluctant to say that I’ve found the right tool for my year long photography project. The camera body is indeed excellent but the lenses are a work in progress. With only four lenses, three of which were purchased several years ago, I can’t say that I have the right lenses. How do you know if they are the right lenses?

Being pragmatic at heart and trying not to be a gearhead my approach is to shoot with what I’ve got. Given the results so far this seems to be a reasonable if not optimal approach. As I get deeper into the project a time may come when purchasing additional lenses will make sense. Until then I’ll muddle along using my current glass.

Best to remember that my project is to shoot the A7II for a year using legacy lenses while spending the least amount of money. As long as the images look good I’ll stick with what I have in the bag.