Jim Brandenburg - Nat Geo Article (1 shot/day)

Have u seen the November 1997 issue of National Geographic? Photographer Jim Brandenburg was shooting only 1 photograph - one single exposure - per day for 90 days. And he got 90 fantastic images!!! <BR>

I'm totally amazed at the result that he can acheive with this '1 shot 1 kill'! Some of the images that he had taken are elusive. With only a split second dalay in the release of the shutter, the whole image could be ruined (eg the gray wolf chasing common ravens on day 78). <BR>

I can produce good images but not to this standard of having every single frame turning out to be winning shot. How about the rest of you?

I guess it depends on how well I know my subject. With one I've shot extensively, I think I could do it; with an unknown, it would be impossible for me.

 

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With 35mm camera/lens and subject or group of subjects that I've worked with for years and whose members and environment I knew intimately, I don't think it would be so very exceptional.

 

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I recently took a class in architechtural photography and, on an assignment I shot a roll of 35mm B&W film on a church nearby. I showed the proof sheet to the class and the teacher was rather surprised that every frame was (nearly) prefect, he said that, if it was his proof sheet, he'd frame the whole thing. I thought it was routine to get (nearly) perfect exposures on such a subject when I could choose the lighting and the subject didn't run away. With a completely predictable subject and the ability to choose when and where to shoot it shouldn't be all that hard to a long string of perfect images. In most cases I would expect to have done each one before, perhaps many times over the years, so it would become more a matter of remembering how I had done a given shot under the current conditions.

 

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Nevertheless, a string of 90 is pretty damn good!

 

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Frank

I haven't seen yet the November issue of National Geographic but one of my friends told me about Brandenburg's article. I don't like to disbelieve other photographers, and even more Jim Brandenburg...Every one knows how good he is!!!. But I can't imagine Jim Brandenburg with his eye attached to the viewfinder watching a gray wolf chasing some ravens and saying..."not now, not now,...I think I've got it now,...a bit forward...Now!!! click!!!. If its really the way he works I wonder what the film manufacturers may think about him!!!... "No bussines with Mr. Brandenburg!". Everyone of us knows that if you have such an encounter like this we stick our finger like glue to the button and we may only stop when the roll is finished, and this is because we have the fear of not taking that perfect picture and we rather waste a roll or few rolls if we are sure that we can take just a single picture of that moment.

 

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So I think that it could be a misunderstanding or... I don't know!!!!

It wouldn't be nearly as fun if we could only snap off one shot per day. Nevertheless, I think that many of us, with proper discipline, could make one shot per day count. It almost sounds like a course for improvement. If you're limited to one shot each day, it is easy to find the time to assess all of the details before firing. Just don't squeeze the button unless you're sure its a keeper. I find myself doing this more and more anyway, but not to the extent of limiting myself to one per day.

 

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This game seems pretty contrived. Did he limit himself to one photo per day, or did he limit himself to one photo per day from a particular camera body? Personally, I am addicted to the noise of the mirror, shutter, (and now, in the 90's, motor drive). Once per day wouldn't be enough of a fix.

From my reading of the article, this was essentially an artistic exercise that Jim Brandenburg undertook because he felt that his photography was becoming too predictable. It is most definitely not the way he works most of the time!

 

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He was kind of burning out and felt that he was falling into a rut of shooting lots of photos and picking out a few good ones. So, he comitted to only shoot a single image every day from Sept 21 thru Dec 21. He was working in northern Minnesota, so there were plenty of things to take pictures of . In fact, several days he bypassed lots of subjects looking for just the right one...other days he finally settled for shots out of desperation. Interestingly enough, a few of his desperation shots were among the best he took.

 

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He's also got a book coming out about this. Some very stunning pictures came out of this exercise. I could shoot a thousand rolls of film and never come close to some of these images.

BTW, the name of the book will be "Chased by the Light," and it will be coming out in Fall 1998. For those interested. They show all of the pictures Brandenburg shot in the article, but most of them are thumbnail size.

Steve is right, this was just an exercise for Brandenburg to push himself. I can imagine that if you were as accomplished as he is you might approach a point of "stagnation" in your work. I really admire this project that he did.

 

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I wouldn't call every one of his 90 images phenomenal. In fact, he states in the article that he was a bit nervous about having them all published. He did publish the first picture of a dead deer's eye I have ever seen. A very haunting image. The eagle and wolf shots he got with just one image are amazing.

 

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Congratulations Jim, I think your project was a success.

 

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Mark

I once had a photography teacher who said that film should be used without sparing quantity. He said to use it like toitet paper. I was never comfortable with this appraoch, although I certainly have never approached the one shot theory either.

 

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It seems like this was a good exercise for him, but would not be my cup of tea. However, the point is a good reminder to take care when shooting. This sounds obvious, but sometimes one forgets to really concentrate and to make up with quantity.

 

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By the way, I read an article by another National Geogrpahic photographer and he said that in general they shoot "hundreds" of rolls for each story.

I had the good fortune to attend Jim brandenburg's slide show about his "Chased by Light" project last night. I thought I would share a few notes while it is fresh in my memory.

 

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He started by expressing his amazement that so many people were interested in what was intended to be such a personal project. He started his career in photography when relatively few photographers were doing nature photography. He shot many projects for National Geographic but they were almost always people stories and he had to "work in" nature photography on the side. Eventually, thanks to the success of his wolf photography, he had been able to do more nature photography. Of late it began to seem to him that there were thousands of nature photographers and a proliferation of images that was becoming overwhelming. It caused him to question his own motivation for contributing images.

 

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During a trip to Japan for NG he was introduced to Zen disciplines and aesthetics. He decided that he needed to apply something of a similar discipline to his photography, purely to challenge himself. It was intended to be a personal assignment with no thought of marketability. He wanted "high-risk" photography for personal improvement.

 

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He started on the first day of autumn and had only the first image pre-planned. As each image was projected he spoke briefly about the time and conditions. Most comments were something like: "2:20pm, now I have the afternoon off", "6:15pm, I wimped out and shot a sunset", "4:40am, having the rest of the day off seemed like a vacation".

 

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He varied many techniques during the 90 days. Some days he picked a location and waited for the light to make the photo. Some days he had other commitments and had to squeeze a shot out of the last available light. He shot the entire project on various, high speed print films (in the 800-3200 asa range) to give himself a bit more safety margin for each exposure. (In response to an audience question he said that his favorite film was Velvia, for what that is worth.)

 

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A few of the images had stories to go with them: like the loon he rescued from fish line that gave him a great pose as it swam away in the dawn light; but most of the images he regarded as just simple images that had no special story or impact. His eventual satisfaction with images seemed to have no correlation to the amount of stress he felt when he took the picture or the feelings he had at the time he took the picture. Some he thought would be good and weren't, and vice versa.

 

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He was quite critical about many of the images: he mentioned timing problems (birds moving and not being where he wanted them in the photo), lighting problems (getting an interesting photo after sunset), idea problems ("what was I thinking when I took this one?"), decision problems ("should I shoot the gorgeous double rainbow over lake, or the wet raven feather?"). There was no illusion that he thought that every shot was a "winning shot", although a substantial portion were. One shot did literally win an award from Life magazine.

 

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He felt that this project had changed him as a photographer. It made him want to continue with more careful photo selection and less film exposure. It has made him want to spend more time "looking" instead of "taking". At the moment he is reviewing his entire back catalog of images and looking at old photos again. One initial result was that several images in the slide show had been taken over 20 years ago and never shown in public before. Long term results will be several books.

 

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He ended with a preview of his upcoming projects: a book about images he produced without the stress of the single daily image, tentatively titled "Captured by the Light"; and a book about prairie, tentatively titled "Bones of Our Mother". Based on the previews, they should contain some marvelous images.

 

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Mr. Brandenburg may give more shows this fall after the release of the "Chased by Light" book. I would happily go to see one of his slide shows again and would recommend to anyone else who might have the chance.

 

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My personal interest was the rare opportunity to see the essentially unedited output of a very good professional photographer, and to hear his thoughts about his images. The 90 slides of the project were bracketed by some of his best images so it was easy to see that he maintained his high quality standard. As nice as it was to see his best images, I found it more informative to hear about what he considered failures. I think that it gave me a clearer idea of what it is I find unsatisfactory in my own pictures but have hard time elucidating. In the future I will try to pay more attention to "why" I want to make a photograph compared to the "what" or "how".

 

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In summary: an excellent, thought-provoking slide show.