Photography

1. Photography What is Photography: At its most basic level, photography offers a means for making a facsimile of whatever the camera is pointed at. It is the medium for producing an accurate record for posterity. This is technically accurate record, nothing more, although it has been photographed under appropriate lighting to create a sense of form, shape and texture of the flower itself.

2. Photography What is Photography: Record photography at a more personal level is to be found in albums of the holiday snap type of photograph. And there is nothing wrong with these type of photographs as they can be well composed and well executed. The holiday snaps fulfils its purpose if it shows us, or reminds us, of a moment in time at a specific and identifiable point on the planet. The holiday snap offers us a visual reminder------yes this was me five years ago, this was our class group snap, etc etc. A visual memoir.

3. Photography

4. Photography What is Photography: At Taj Mahal Agra, hundreds of thousands of frames of films are exposed to this identical shot. You stand at the very end of its lawn and point the camera towards the Taj and press the button.

5. Photography What is Photography: Almost as many as thousands of photographers have captured their loved ones in front of Taj. This is simple recording of a moment in front of this beautiful piece of architecture. Record is the operative word, by no stretch of the imagination are these creative images or expressive images. They are records, as impersonal as the cameras used to take them. They have no relationship to the photographer, any photographer could have taken them, and millions probably have. As records of a moment in the photographer’s life, they perform their limited function well.

6. Photography What is Photography: Of course photography offers us much more than that. It offers us a vehicle for introducing personal interpretation, and personal expression into those visual memories, extending well beyond the limits of mere memory triggers. To achieve any of these more ambitious aspirations for the photograph, the active participation of the photographer is essential. Good photography is considered photography, with the photographer taking time to think through the purpose of the intended photograph, and then devising a visual strategy for achieving that purpose.

8. Photography

9. Photography What is Photography: Photography allows us to isolate objects from their surroundings, or to isolate a small area of nature from the whole, and explore its visual potential. We can enjoy the simple forms, texture and patterns of selected elements from a wider object or landscape. Good photography does not necessarily depend on good or expensive equipment. Although a relatively high quality lens on the camera is an advantage in ensuring that the well observed photograph is at least reproduced sharp.

10. Photography

11. Photography

12. Photography What is Photography: Good photography depends exclusively upon the photographer, and the photographer’s ability to do two simple things: Firstly, the ability to see what you are looking at is essential. To recognize the potential of a subject or location in visual terms, to recognize the visual appeal of isolating particular elements, and viewing them from a specific viewpoint or camera angle. Child with a hand granade in central park N.Y.C 1962 Diane Arbus

13. A young Brooklyn family going for a Sunday outing, N.Y.C.Diane Arbus 1966 Photography

14. Photography Triplets in their bedroom, N.J.1963

15. Photography What is Photography: Secondly , and by far the most important, good photography depends upon the photographer’s ability to understand light, its subtleties, its colors and contrasts, and to bring that understanding to inform the picture-making process. Ansal Adams .

16. Photography What is Photography: Look at this picture. See how the use of oblique bright sunlight accentuates the shadows, creating an exaggeration of the third dimension. Ansal Adams .

17. Photography Ansal Adams .

18. Photography What is Photography: Light is predictable if nothing else. By understanding how it works, and limiting our photography to only those times when ‘appropriate’ lighting conditions prevail, we can control the visual impact of our pictures. Appropriate for one picture however maybe wholly inappropriate for another. It is the ability to recognize the appropriate and the inappropriate which defines the line between the good photographer and the snapshooter. Ansal Adams .

19. Photography What is Photography: The warmth of sunshine giving the picture a warmth which will totally lack in a photograph taken on a overcast day. Filtered through several hundred feet of cloud, light becomes very cold and unwelcoming. This can be useful device in provoking particular viewer reaction. Warm light draws a different reaction to that elicited by a cold light. Ansal Adams .

20. Photography Ansal Adams .

21. Photography What is Photography: Photography is accessible at so many levels that it offers anyone, almost regardless of skill levels, the opportunity to use this medium for the visual communication of ideas, emotions and opinions. Diane ArbusA Jewish giant at home with his parents in the Bronx, N.Y. 1970 .

22. Photography What is Photography: To exploit the potential of photography we have to be careful in our selection of subject matter, the selection of the camera position, choice of lens, choice of exposure and above all selection of lighting. Exercising these few controls offers limitless opportunities for the investigation of color, form, texture, movement, and a host of other themes. Ansal Adams .

23. Photography What is Photography: Despite the fact that outdoors our subjects are lit by that single large light source, the sun, either direct or diffused as weather conditions dictate, we have immense control over lighting. If the lighting is appropriate we can effectively control and direct that lighting by changing our camera positions. Move around the subject and the lighting effectively changes. Ansal Adams .

24. Photography Ansal Adams .

25. Photography Ansal Adams .

26. Photography Ansal Adams .

27. Photography What is Photography: By developing the skills of composition and appropriate selection of lighting, the skilled photographer can provoke the viewer into accepting a very subjective interpretation of reality as an object record of reality Diane ArbusMasked woman in a wheelchair, Pa.1970

28. Photography Diane ArbusUntitled (7)1970-71

29. Photography Diane ArbusIdentical twins, Roselle, N.J.1967

30. Photography Diane ArbusUntitled (1)1970-71

31. Photography • What is Photography: • A good photograph has three distinct jobs to do: • It must attract attention • It must hold the attention while the viewer “reads” it. • It must transmit information, ideas, emotions or whatever other purpose has been ‘designed’ into it. Diane ArbusTeenage couple on Hudson Street, N.Y.C.1963

32. Photography What is Photography: Only if it does those three things effectively, is the photograph going to success as a piece of visual communication.. Diane ArbusKing and Queen of a Senior Citizens Dance, N.Y.C.1970

33. Photography The influential photographer and photo-journalist Arthur Rothstein defined the photograph when he wrote that: “Under the direction of a skilled photographer, the visual language may be used to draw comparisons, to distort, to emphasise, and to document social conditions. The photograph not only presents facts, it registers ideas and emotions as well. Because powerful photographic images are fixed in the mind more readily than words, the photograph needs no interpreter’’. Walker Evans Citizen in downtown Havana 1933

34. Photography While that may be a rather broad generalization of the power of photography, it does highlight the potential of the medium as a means of introducing other to the ideas, opinions, likes, dislikes and other emotions and reactions which make each one of us individual. Our photography can be a powerful extension of our brains, giving visual form and substance to everything from abstract thoughts to political and cultural opinions. Walker Evans Main Street, Saratoga Springs, New York.1931

35. Photography Walker Evans Main Street in Pennsylvania Town 1935

36. Photography Walker Evans Negro Church, South Carolina 1936

37. Photography Walker Evans . Penny Picture Display, Birmingham 1936

38. Photography Walker Evans Garage in Southern City Outskirts 1936

39. Photography Walker Evans [Burroughs Family Cabin, Hale County, Alabama] 1936

40. Photography Walker Evans Hale County, Alabama 1936

41. Photography Walker Evans 42nd St.1929

42. Photography Walker EvansThe Breakfast Room, Belle Grove Plantation,White Chapel, Louisiana1935

43. Photography Walker EvansCity Lunch Counter1929

44. Photography Walker EvansGirl in Fulton StreetNew York, 1929

45. Photography Walker EvansGraveyard, Houses, and Steel Mill, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania 1935

46. Photography Walker EvansHouses and Billboards in Atlanta, Georgia 1936

47. Photography Walker EvansMaine Pump1933

48. Photography Walker EvansParked Car, Small Town, Main Street, 1932Ossining, New York

49. Photography Walker EvansStamped Tin Relic1929

50. Photography Walker EvansTorn Movie Poster1931