Brooks Jensen Arts - Every Picture Is a Compromise

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Every Picture is a Compromise
A Series About Keepers, Also-rans, and Learning from Mistakes

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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

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Film Contact Sheet to Digital Image

I think my generation has been the luckiest in the entire history of photography. We have roots in both the analog and digital workflows. From the odor of Hypo to the click of a Lightroom preset. This week is a nostalgic look back at contact sheets and the images that came from them via the hybrid processing of a negative scan.

What I saw that I liked:

Lovely clouds, but it is that road snaking through the valley that is the picture.

What I don't like in the picture:

In the contact sheet, the road is middle gray and dull.

What I learned:

Masking is such a great tool in the digital workflow. It allowed me to lighten the road almost to the same brightness as the white clouds. That is what I saw in my mind's eye that I was unable to achieve with analog dodging during the exposure under the enlarger.