Why are you a photographer?

[larose]

It gives me the opportunity to look at different things (people, structures, ducks -- but people, mostly) with a purpose. I'm a covert people-watcher, only gaining confidence enough to do so when wearing sunglasses or otherwise unobtrusive about it -- trying not to be rude by gawking. A camera sitting in my hands is a little more obvious, but I can have the excuse of "I'm photographing that thing behind you, you can act natural."

 

It also gives me the opportunity to get out into the world. As I am, and always have been, shy in general, my momentum each day is to find things to do in my home: cleaning, reading, sitting outside watching the squirrels busy themselves with scampering along the fence, through the trees, whatever. My camera gives me a push to take it for a drive and to do and see things that I would normally try to escape from.

 

Also, seeing things differently and catching it in one moment of time is rewarding. Most people I do know only take pictures for record-keeping purposes: kid's first steps or the family reunion shots. When I get a few shots out of hundreds that I feel are worthy of printing or, even more rarely, framing and hanging in my photo room, the response I get from others is mostly encouraging and pleasurable.

 

Most of all, it's because I can capture the truth that I see, or I can bend the truth as I see fit.

[kelly_flanigan1]

Its due to the secret addictive additives in soup bowls; tri-chem packs, Verichrome ortho; free 120 box cameras we got as kids.

[wood]

I simply can't stop myself.

[mcpoljak2003]

David Dorich is correct when he say's debt and obscurity, but I refuse to admit that to myself. In my own little world, wandering through forests and deserted city streets, I'm the Indiana Jones of photography; I've even got a brown felt Fedora to prove it!

[DB_Gallery]

I loved Astronomy as a kid. So I spent untold amounts of money trying to get photos of

the moon with my Dad's old 120 folder taped to the eyepiece end of my 60mm refractor

with a brick for ballast on the other. That is how I got into photography. I was 9 at the

time.

 

But I decided to do it for a living when a then young Frank Niemeir came into the Boys and

Girls Club to shoot his very first assignment as a photojournalist at the paper he had just

joined in California:

 

http://www.mindspring.com/~frankn/

 

I was 11 at the time and was trying to attain perfection in a model building contest. I saw

him walk in sporting a pair of Nikon F2's with motors and looking for the money shot. As I

watched him working it, I started to fumble and run out of hands. He caught me in a mid-

paint crisis and I ended up the front page the next day. From that day forward, I was a

photographer, albeit unpaid as a youngster, but a photographer still. Frank is a friend and

we are both still photographers using a journalist's eye to bring flair and personal

connection to the visual world around us.

 

Here is the photo that was truly the moment I decided to be a photographer as not a

hobby or a job, but a way of life:<div></div>

[Allen Herbert]

I like to look around corners.

 

Photography focuses the mind on the reality of the world, and the little unseen special moments.

 

And it is interesting to explore which we pass by in our rush to get to the next moment in time.<div></div>

[Allen Herbert]

Tut,tut.

 

Lust

Lust is the natural, animalistic desire of the soul to sin and cater to basal urges.

 

;)

[p.h.otography]

I got into photography after owning a video camera. My college opportunities were looking a bit dull and I didn't know what to do. I decided that I wanted to do something with cameras. There was a photography course and I wanted in.

I joined the photography diploma program and began to learn about photography and slr cameras. It all amazed me and I found interest in something finally.

I spent the nest two years trying to prove myself a budding photographer. With extra curricular activities out of the norm my attendance and punctuality lead me to be redundant and no longer a part of the diploma. I had failed.

I spent my spare time enjoying myself and not taking photographs. I lead a life of wreckless shame and guilt. I was incarcerated and missed my camera. I read about photography.

I was released in 2004 and went back to the same college to enrol in a a higher diploma. They allowed it. I had motivation to shoot photographs and had my own ideas. Two years later I graduated.

Now I'm working as a photographer in a different country making books.

What drives me is the passion to be behind the controls of a camera.

It's the only thing I've done well in, and been accepted in. I wish to achieve much from photography.

Photography is therapeutic to me. It allows me to escape the reality I live in to be able to frame something else and its environment.

To capture is to hold a sense of imagination. And every photographer needs to be imaginative.

[antoniobassiphotography]

Kristina, Chris, Lisa, Kelly, Robert, Mark, thank you for your contribution. Daniel and Allen,

very beautiful photography and thank you for the uploads. Jeff, I know what you mean...

Peter, I feel very close to your vision. Thank you all for your stories.

[darrenbeattyphotography]

I, too, was introduced to photography at a strange point in my life. I was "forced" to take a visual communications class in college, and I have been in love ever since. Nothing makes me happier than when I can make a photograph for someone and see the smile on their face, or hear their gratitude over the phone. Photography for me is very therapeutic and calming. I see it as a form of expression but more so, as an extension of opening channels visually. Helping someone see something at a different angle even though they have seen that object a thousand times. Photography has also introduced me to fascinating people around this world. And for all these things I am very grateful; and I hope to be doing this for at least 50 more years.

[manut]

I am a photographer because photography has all the creative elements that a interests a curious, observant person. Photographers have (or try to achieve) a talent which is a combination of science and art and freezes the moment for the world to see again.

Once you learn that you have this talent you try to attempt and achieve perfection, which starts it all.

[KenPapai]

To document lives and because it is really SO FUN! It's like a drug to shoot a camera---every shutter click is like a small rush.

[felixg]

Steve Gubin:</p><p>"So...if anyone has borne with me this long ... there you have a longer, more serious, and more personal response to the original question."</p><p>

Belatedly, four days after you left it: many thanks. No question of "bearing with you" - it was fascinating and valuable.

</p><p>

This whole thread has been a good one.

[pandorasbox]

I'm not sure you want to read my reply. But maybe someday I'll write it.

[magdalenacampomenosi]

My photograph's style tries to be an exercise of look that expresses over the image a subjective impression of the reality. The so called "real" that in its pure physical appearance seems to be prisoner of the immovable laws of the matter. Through the look's soul, it can be transformed, sublimated into alchemy where the man's ego becomes an actor and vehicle of its metaphysic transfiguration. A natural landscape, a monument, a flower, become in its photographical epiphany, symbols of another dimension.

A dimension that every man has a feeling, foretells, looks for unconsciously and it is: spiritual

dimension.

Photography could be a means, although clumsy and subdued to mechanical manipulations- By the fact to brush in an instant to this other dimension of light that is the foundation of the world. In this sense, the word photography assumes all its meaning:

"Light's writing".

 

Antonio, sono molto limitata nella scrittura dell'inglese, percio' ti ho solo scritto quello che é per me, personalmente, la fotografia. Spero che il mio contributo sia utile.

Ciao.

[don_e]

It's the only way I know of how to make photographs.

[j.kivekas]

Why am I a photographer? It gives me something to do, fills my empty days, helps me not to get too much bored with my life.

[douglas_vitello]

A buddy at work turned me on to photography 30 years ago and his rational was our memories all fade with time so it is critical to capture the moment because it will be gone forever in a instant.At the time I was a young stupid punk who was more interested in the mechanics of the "machine" and thought it would be something fun to do (like working on cars)then move on to other things.I did not have a clue to what he was really trying to impress upon me.Thirty years down the road he is gone but I have thousands of "moments" stored away safely thanks to his mentoring.If the house caught on fire it would be the first thing I grab because everything else can be replaced.I would give anything if I had a mentor at age 10 instead of age 25."Youth is wasted on the young".I'd give anything to fill in those blank years now.

[antoniobassiphotography]

Douglas, very good story. I understand what you are saying because in music (I'm a violinist)

the waste of talent is very common. So many young talented kids are mentored by the wrong

people and they grow up with defects, technical problems and no musical vision. I was also a

young punk and wasted a lot of time because I didn't have a mentor always there to keep me

on track. Interesting that you mentioned the capture of the moment, you should visit my

other forum about "The infinite moment" as I call it.

[photobycate]

Being a photographer allows me to see beauty in everything, the good, the bad, the ugly the pretty, the sad and the happy. My eyes are wide open to it all and it is all beautiful.<div></div>

[antoniobassiphotography]

Cate

 

Very nice photo, the fact that you saw beauty in that scene made you take the shot in a

way that we can also see the same beauty your eyes saw. Good work

 

Felix

 

I am glad you found my post valuable. I do think it was very valuable for me too, sharing

so many stories (and I hope many more to come) and learning a lot.

[m_akin]

IN MY LIFE, I've met with so many people, witnessed so many events and been to countless places. Some of these were good, some of them were bad, some beautiful and some ugly. The effects of all these, joined together with my dreams and desires, made me who I am. As a result, thousands of pictures were born on my mind and spirit which are unerasable...and hopefully as long as I live they will continue to be born. Now I am searching for these pictures. When I meet them by chance, I take their photos and share with you. In my opinion this is the art of photography and being a photographer

[mg]

I take pictures - well, I should say when I take pictures for myself, I take pictures because I'm hoping to capture an ESSENCE of the subject matter. Not THE essence, just AN essence. Basically I take pictures to say something about something or someone.

[photobycate]

Thanks Antonio, much appreciated!!!

[malcolm_thomas1]

Photography, for me, is all about representing the external world. The aesthetic. Finding beauty in each moment of life, because really, this entire existence is absolutely absurd and marvelous and I think freezing a moment in time is a good way to celebrate that.

 

In an infinitely huge universe it's easy to get lost, and photography brings me back in.