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matt_borengasser

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I'd like to hear some stories of how your photography is affected by

your admiration for the equipment you use. Sounds a bit strange of

an idea, so I'll elaborate. Your photography is the result of a

process that involves a device called a camera. How much you admire

(or are in love with in some cases) your camera might play a roll in

the photographic process and even the way you photograph, where you

photograph, how and what you photograph. Maybe your camera is why

you photograph.

 

I'd like to hear some feedback. I have my own feelings, but I don't

want this to be about me. So...think about the question and if you

have an answer, let's hear it.

Thanks.

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Well, it's the simple answer, but it's whatever equipment I know well enough that I don't think about it: so the camera works for me and I don't work for it. So I admire the equipment that simply works and that can be transcended.

 

I use primarily 4x5 and 2 1/4. Some 35mm. They all have there place and their personalities. I will say that one of my goals is to have enough maturity in my work that I can just have on format, a handful of lenses, and a few films. This I think would be admiral.

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Seems to me like a fair question: though cameras and related equipment are inanimate objects that we use as tools to capture images, their selection and useage can become very personal. In a way, they become part of what we are as photographers and reflect our tastes, skill level, orientation to our craft and mode of operation. We come to depend on our camera to faithfully obey our commands and, though it's still only a handful of metal and glass, I feel it's possible to develop a fondness for it in the way you might any faithful retainer.

 

Does that qualify as love? Maybe not by some definitions, but it can come pretty close. Does the relationship shape the way I work with my equipment? Tougher question, but I'd say I take better care of my favorite gear, expose it to less environmental hazards and store it more carefully. Because I'm also more comfortable using my favorite camera, its operation has become very intuitive and, as such, has taken on the role of being an extension of my physical being. Sure, it's still only a tool, but just like a favorite brush or chisel, the relationship with it has become quite personal and using it brings a sense of intimacy that transcends its utilitarian nature.

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<i> a sense of intimacy </i><p>

 

I look for intimacy with my subjects. Intimacy with my camera may be nice if I'm lonely and have nothing else to hold, but it has nothing to do with getting intimate with my subjects.

<p>

If you watch people who are <i>photographers</i>, they see the subject and relate to it. The camera is something that should be comfortable and habitual, so it gets out of the way between the subject and the photographer, doesn't interfere with the intimacy between the subject and the photographer. Only then will great photographs be made.

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Matt like others have implied, the camera is just the tool.

I love photography! Capturing beauty in the moment! and then being able to share with others (profit or gift).

Yet I need the tool to do what I love (not to mention alot of other tools).

It's like a screwdriver, a tool I need but it isn't special or loved & yet can build beauty with it.

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It is a pity your genuine question is receiving the inevitable "it's not the camera stupid!" replies. Bit of a knee jerk reaction from some photographers I imagine.

 

Other artists, painters and writers, will easily and eagerly name their favourite brand of brush or pen, oil or ink. They feel an affinity with the tools they use and because they experience so much of their creative life through these tools may even fall in love with them.

 

I know I love my camera. Would I love another camera as much? Quite likely.

 

As for your specific question; Confidence. That is what I think *quality* gear brings to the process. Confidence that what you put in will be efficiently and accuratley converted. Recently I bought a new tripod system. It replaced my first tripod which cost all of $10. Here I have just spent close to $800 on a few new pieces of gear which I cannot actually tell people allows me to do that much more than what I had with my old gear.

 

But when I use this new gear I am struck by how much more accuratley and safely it allows me to work. Where before I would think twice about a dangerous, to my camera, shot I feel confident in doing it now. I feel more confident which translates into better photos and I admire my gear for that.

 

Yes talent can take a great picture with virtually anything but good gear breeds confidence and that is not to be sneezed at.

 

And even more specific to your question; Lomo, Leica, Holga and Diana. People go out of their way to get these tools because they admire them for the how of what they do. Leica for very different reasons to the others but essentially the same admiration. If that is not the truth then at the very least nobody who likes the look of a Holga photograph would bother with getting a Holga, they'd just buy the nearest bit of junk to hand and make sure it leaks light.

 

And Matt, I'd like to hear your gear-admiration story.

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<i>Other artists, painters and writers, will easily and eagerly name their favourite brand of brush or pen, oil or ink</i><p>

 

I know lots of painters. If you ask them what brand they are using, they will tell you. However, that's not what any of them want to talk about. It's always what projects they have, what series they are workin on, where they are trying to get a show.<p>

 

When the gear becomes an obsession (admiration, whatever), it's almost always an indicator that the only project going on is using the camera. There's no bigger picture of photography, no personal vision, no style. It's about the camera because there is nothing else.<p>

 

I know a lot of photographers. What they get excited about is what they're going to work on producing, what they've just printed, where they got a show. They talk about equipment, but it's usually an offhand discussion, unless it's a professional issue.

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i suspect it has a lot to do with personality type. there are people who anthropomorphize everything. they give them names etc. sort of like the "golden boy" T shirt on Seinfeld. these types probably do "love" their cameras and may or may not take great photos with them.
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My wife paints and has a network of friends who do the same. I've never heard any

discussions about tools or paints, unless it's something very unique for a specific purpose.

Lots of discussions on projects, techniques, books, workshops, other artists and their

projects. I also go to a lot of open studio events in the SF Bay Area and engage artists in

conversation. Tools don't come up - just about everything else. It's interesting that many

use off-brand or "student" lines of oil paints.

www.citysnaps.net
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all of what Brad said is true (i am also a painter.) but there is not a mutually exclusive relationship here. it is possible to both "love" (if you are that personality type as i pointed out in one of my responses) your tools and use them as if they were "neutral." if you get really on an intimate level with most artists/craftspeople they will admit to having certain fetishes. kind of like Newton's apple in a drawer. most of my artist friends when they trust you will admist that in order to get started on something they have to have xyz tools or conditions in place. but you won't hear this at openings or "career oriented" artist get togethers. i guess what i am saying is that there are "psychic trade secrets" or things that gets one stoked about making art. often this is a sheer "love" of the tools. beautiful tools can make "demands" on you. but, i really have no problem with the bottom line approach which is indifferent to the tool used. it is, as i stated above all about personality. i recommend people see the Andy Goldsworthy documentary "Rivers and Tides" as it does touch on this whole issue. his love for his materials (natural things) is palpable. watch his hands.
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"Cameras are simply tools"

 

...and I could say the same about some of you.

 

It's a perfectly valid question, like it or not.

There is nothing wrong with having sentimental feelings for a camera. Is your grandfather's watch just a "tool" that keeps time? Is that antique siverware that belonged to your mother just a set of "tools" to eat food? No, these things have meaning beyond pure utility. This is not a difficult concept.

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Claudia, most of the people who claim that their inspiration comes frome their tools produce work that is indicative of their love of the tools, not of any photographic inclination. There may be a few who cross over, but it's not the starting point. The starting point has to be some sort of artistic vision, or the results just aren't there.

 

It's like the thread on the Leica Forum right now, the guy who decided that his decision to buy a Leica was vindicated by David Allen Harvey using it to produce great photographs. What the guy apparently doesn't know is that DAH has said "I'm anti-equipment." Kind of sums it up.

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The question re-phrased:

 

Do certain tools because of specific feelings ascribed to them prevent you from creating the best possible interpertation of you vision?

 

My feelings:

 

Gearheads love their gear and sometimes take pictures.

 

Craftsmen use tools they are comfortable with to create.

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<i>I use mine like a sailor uses a cheap whore.</i>

<p>

Oooh, Edmo, you can be so shocking at times.

<p>

My current partner is a painter who loves working with acrylics but is fairly ambivalent about her brushes. A previous partner, a sculptress, worked mainly with wood. She loved wood and loved her tools - chisels, saws etc. Furthermore she was really appreciative of the people who made her tools. Both of them realised that any artistic output of theirs was dependent upon the input of many things - not just their artistic ability.

<p>

People who dismiss their tools are just plain selfish.

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