Every Picture Is a Compromise
Lessons from the Also-rans
Most photography websites show the photographer's very best work. Wonderful. But that's not the full story of a creative life. If we want to learn, we'd better pay attention to the images that aren't "greatest hits" and see what lessons they have to offer. Every picture is a compromise — the sum of its parts, optical, technical, visual, emotional, and even cosmic – well, maybe not cosmic, but sometimes spiritual. Success on all fronts is rare. It's ok to learn from those that are not our best.
This is a series about my also-rans, some of which I've been able to improve at bit (i.e., "best effort"), none of which I would consider my best. With each there are lessons worth sharing, so I will.
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Original digital capture
It's What You Make Week
The theme this week revolves around the idea that it's not what you take, but what you make that counts. All the images this week are ones that required radical processing to pull something interesting out of a blah RAW capture.
What I saw that I liked:
I'm a sucker for dripping paint.
What I don't like in the RAW capture:
These are some of my least favorite colors — especially in combination like this. I knew it had to be b/w because I can hardly look at the RAW capture without feeling just a bit queasy.
What I made:
It's amazing how a conversion to b/w not only changes the mood of a photograph but almost always seems to require an increase in contrast. I have no idea why, but I find it pretty universal. I've developed a habit over the years of pushing contrast very aggressively in a b/w image just to see what happens. Rarely do I go as far as the image at left, but sometimes it is the right thing to do. This converts and ugly and unusable RAW capture into an abstraction that I like. Talk about making something out of nothing! |
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