The Photographer and His Camera
Since the invention of the camera in 1839, photography has transformed
the entire nature of art in that it brought about a great revolution
of the traditional arts, pushing it from depictions of a world we
already knew to expressions of inward gestures and creativity.
Photography conveniently replaced with images the words that were once
essential to describing a visual. These images are in fact very
different in nature from the continuous action of television, as well
as the timeless sculpture. Abolishing the concept of time and space,
the technology of the photo is thus fabricated by the desire to give
permanence to daily feelings and experience. The photograph is a
medium with the ability to isolate a single moment in time which in
turn can be duplicated and endlessly re-created. However, the context
in which it is taken remains obscure, giving the photo and the
photographer the power to transform the particular moment in reality
that is supposedly portrayed. Regardless of the content and
technology of the photo or the message, mankind’s “avid desire to
prostitute itself,” in McLuhan’s words, is undeniable.
The intricate relationship between the photographer and his camera
brings new light to assessing the content of a photograph or the
message it carries. More specifically, if the message is the
photograph, then the camera is the tool that allows for the photograph
to be taken. Thus, the camera is an extension of the photographer and
the message. Furthermore, the photographer fulfills the potential of
the camera just as much as the camera fulfills the potential of
photography. It is...
... middle of paper ...
...s of
content. Above all, to the viewer, the photographer’s name gets
remembered from his work.
Perhaps photography is even a rival of the word because it offers an
alternative to the description of images. Consequently, photography
works against the only form of communication for the preservation of a
culture. Furthermore, what we see should not distract us from what
pictures we are not shown. Not only should the veracity of
photographs be questioned, the relationship between man and machine
should also be scrutinized. We aspire to fully realize the potential
of a technology, like the performer and his piano. However, the
artist fulfills the potential of the machine just as much as the
machine fulfills the potential of the art. In the end, their aims
toward mankind’s desire to ‘prostitute’ are indivisible.
Having such an image before our eyes, often we fail to recognize the message it is trying to display from a certain point of view. Through Clark’s statement, it is evident that a photograph holds a graphic message, which mirrors the representation of our way of thinking with the world sights, which therefore engages other
Camera Lucida was Roland Barthes’ last written piece, published posthumously in 1980. This book deals with the topic of photography and the death of Barthes’ mother in 1977. The role of photography is questioned; he asks what about photography makes it a valid media? We read about the operator (the photographer), spectrum (the subject) and spectator (the viewer), also about the studium (what we see in the photograph) and the punctum (the unclassifiable, the thing that makes the photograph important to the viewer). According to Barthes the photograph is an adventure for the viewer, but it is ultimately death, the recording of something that will be dead after the picture is taken. This idea is the main focus of Barthes’ writing, the photograph “that-has-been”, in Latin “interfuit: what I see has been here, in this place which extends between infinity and the subject; it has been here, and yet immediately separated; it has been absolutely, irref...
John Mahtesian's photography offers a visual poetry of the human condition. It is a direct expression of his warmth, depth of spirit, and humanity. A true gentleman, extremely humble and unfailingly polite, he achieves an invisibility that is the success of his art. His patience and commitment to his vision allow him to capture moments others could not. If his subjects are aware of his presence, his gentle nature so enchants them that they are unguarded and their essence is revealed. So compelling are his images that we are truly convinced his insights are our own. They make us rejoice in the world around us, and in the nature of human existence.
In The Photographer’s Eyes, John Szarkowski focused on issues that encompass the art of photography. The five issues are: The Thing Itself, The Detail, The Frame, Time, and the Vantage Point. “These issues do not define discrete categories of work; on the contrary they should be regarded as interdependent aspects of a single problem…”
The purpose of this essay is to integrate the photographic process with creative writing. At first glance, one might think that the two mediums do not have much common ground. However, upon further scrutiny, one quickly discovers that is not entirely the case. Photography plays a wide and diverse role in creative writing.
There are people in the United States who are paid to follow and ambush famous people at all times. These people are known as the paparazzi. The paparazzi stop at nothing in order to photograph celebrities. In some cases, there are deadly consequences to their actions. Diana, Princess of Wales, died in a Paris car crash in 1997. She was trying to escape from the paparazzi. If the paparazzi were not chasing her, she may still be alive today.
This book is a note written by Roland Barthes to record the dialectical way he thought about the eidos(form, essence, type, species) of Photographs. Roland Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, linguist in his lifetime, but surprisingly he was not a photographer. As Barthes had a belief that art works consists with signs and structures, he had investigated semiotics and structuralism. However, through Camera Lucida, he realized the limitation of structuralism and the impression to analyze Photography with only semiotics and structuralism. Barthes concludes with talking about unclassifiable aspects of Photography. I could sense the direction Barthes wanted to go through the first chapter ‘Specialty of the Photograph’. He tried to define something by phenomenology
However, in stark contrast to The General, other films were being made around the world that did not follow a simple Hollywood structure, but rather were more experimental with what a movie could be. Man With a Movie Camera (1929), a very ahead of its time, utilized a completely different style of filmmaking that resonated strongly with the ideals of the Soviet Union. Thus, Man With a Movie Camera sought out to make the everyday people of the Soviet Union the stars of the film. This idea was completely revolutionary as well, and almost by necessity, introduced a new style of editing to fit the story—or rather the documentation—that director Dziga Vertov was trying to tell.
The theory of photography originated from the discovery of the camera obscura phenomenon – light that enters a darkened chamber through a small hole is projects an identical inverted image on the interior wall of the outside scene. The first recordings of scientists recognizing this concept was in the writings of Greek philosopher, Aristotle (384 – 322 BC).
The rise of photography began in the early 1830’s in France, and wasn’t very popular as most artists preferred a paintbrush and canvas to a new contraption that wasn’t popular and wasn’t manufactured locally or globally yet and that was fairly expensive to try to produce, and since this time it has been debated if photography deserves its place in the art world. Through the late 1800’s and the early 1900’s it grew in popularity and throughout time photography went from being badly received to a new form of art though people around the world still debate if it is indeed “art”. Photography has a long history from the first camera obscura in the 18th century to the latest Nikon or Canon camera in the 21st century.
Mougeot, Luc. Growing Better Cities: Urban Agriculture for Sustainable Development. International Development Research Centre, 2006.
Photojournalism is a specific form of journalism that employs the use of images to form a news story that meaningfully contributes to the media. This allows a photographer to capture stills that tell the story of a moment in time. Photojournalism creates a transparency between the media and the people as it depicts an accurate representation where meaning can be misinterpreted through text. Photojournalism largely contributes to the way we understand the reality of a moment. Becker (1982) supports this concept as he compares photography to paintings. He says that paintings get their meaning from the painters, collectors, critics, and curators; therefore photographs get their meaning from the way people understand them and use them. Photojournalist’s
In Sontag’s On Photography, she claims photography limits our understanding of the world. Though Sontag acknowledges “photographs fill in blanks in our mental pictures”, she believes “the camera’s rendering of reality must always hide more than it discloses.” She argues photographs offer merely “a semblance of knowledge” on the real world.
Photography has created an outlet for the masses to story tell. It has a way of speaking without words like most art forms and is a manner of expression in itself. To eradicate photography from humans would be equivalent to taking away a limb from humankind. Our society has grown an immense amount of dependency on it. Photography has become almost a daily menial task such as brushing your teeth; where we must take pictures of the things we deem important or equally unimportant, even more so with the invention of social media outlets such as Instagram and Snapchat, where photography is the main source of communication between people who use them. Susan Sontag offers the basis of what taking pictures can undertake in both our daily lives and moments that are not part of our daily lives, such as travel. Traveling to places where one is not accustomed can flare pent up anxiety. A way to subdue that anxiety could be through taking pictures, since it’s the only factor that we have total control over in a space where we don’t have much, or, any control of our surrounding environment. On the other hand, taking photos can also be a tool of power in the same sense as it allows for it to be a defense against anxiety. With the camera in our hands, we have the power to decide who, what, where, when, and why we take a picture. This in turn also gives the person who took the picture power over those who later analyze the photos, letting them decide the meaning of the photo individually, despite the intended or true meaning.
Digital camera is a very important tool nowadays. People would always want to save their memories in the shape of pictures that will last forever. People were amazed when the first ever camera introduced back in hundreds of years ago. At that time camera consisted of large and impractical components and it was very hard to use. In fact, it even took quite some time to develop the pictures on the paper. But now there are some products of digital camera that are very easy to use and with its pocket-sized feature, one can carry it everywhere. There are several advantages of using digital camera: very easy to use, easy to carry on, instant feedback; which means one can immediately review the captured pictures and erase any pictures that they don’t like. One real advantage of digital camera is that one can share the pictures with other people easily thanks to the high speed internet connection. Before digital camera one has to print pictures, paying for postage, and waiting for the pictures to be delivered. Gone were that days since it is possible now to share the pictures online within minutes.