A means to an end...

[nicolerenee]

<p>Is a camera just a means to an end?<br>

Does the method draw you in, or is it simply a means of creating the desired result?<br>

Can one be dispassionate toward the medium used and still create worthwhile (however you measure that) photos, or are the two inextricably bound up?</p>

<p> </p>

[saskphotog]

<p>I think being dispassionate thwarts the creation of anything worthwhile.</p>

<p> </p>

[bobcossar]

<p>The process of creating is a <em>process. </em> It is not an end in itself, yet processes DO engage the artist even though they are not the intended end result....<br>

Think of the creation of a child. Most find the process and the tools to be <strong>quite </strong> engaging....regards, Bob....</p>

[luis_g]

<p>I think one needs to be proficient with their tools and processes, intimately familiar with their cameras, but as we see here every day, it's easy to get more involved with the tools than the pictures one makes with them.</p>

<p> Cameras should be in the service of your vision, not the other way around.</p>

<p> </p>

[paullink]

<p>Since we spontaneously choose the method of expression and the means of it , i believe it doesn't draw us in, but we keep stepping side by side with this forever.We love it.<br>

Our creations then surely are worthwhile at least for us.I don't say that after many years of passion some hints of habit are not obvious.The peril of this habit growing up constantly will bring boredom, repetition and lack of feeling.And then it's time to put down the means and admit...this is the end.But we can't blame the means for this.A hard decision, much more for the professionals.<br>

In our case, talking about photography, i consider the cameras an extension of our eyes which has an immediacy-due to the means- that poetry, painting or sculpturing haven't.I believe we MUST keep on taking photos since our physical end.Best wishes</p>

 

[nicolerenee]

<p>Yes, the camera should be in the service of the vision. But then every tool is ultimately in the service of the end product isn't it? Or is it?<br>

But does someone who is not really passionate about the act of photography, the pursuit of light, of holding a camera in their hand, those intricacies that make photograpy what it is (rather than painting or drawing or sculping) create a worthwhile image? Can a woodworker carve a masterpiece out of pure desire to create without having a love for the act of handling a chisel and hammer and lathe?<br>

Lot's of people paint because they like to even though their paintins will never ammount to anything more than time spent in an enjoyable passtime.</p>

<p>So it seems</p>

[michaellinder]

<p>Perhaps producing a photograph can be viewed as a journey. From this perspective, sometimes just taking the journey is as meaningful as reaching the destination.</p>

[vince_smith2]

<p>When new technology is released, I can't wait to read about it. When I have a new camera in my hands, I can't wait to take it for a test drive. I enjoy the science behind lenses, sensors, and even storage cards. It's also useful and fun to think about what the latest technology is capable of creating artistically. When it comes to pressing the shutter, it's about the subject, not the camera. The camera can affect my mood slightly and thus inadvertantly affect the image, but at that point in time, it's primarily a means to an end.<br>

It's an interesting question and I look forward to reading what the more experienced photographers have to say.</p>

[luis_g]

<p>[Nicole York] "Yes, the camera should be in the service of the vision. But then every tool is ultimately in the service of the end product isn't it? Or is it?"</p>

<p> The tool is inert. It cannot know what it will be involved with when you pick it up. It serves you. Will it be used to create a journal of your travels? Someone's wedding? A day in the life of a President? Family photographs? Pictures about what you are feeling? Staying the moment? Who you are? Where you come from? Where you are going? War pictures? A story for a magazine? Commercial shot for a client reaching for a share of the (rapidly dwindling) market?</p>

<p>[NY] "But does someone who is not really passionate about the act of photography, the pursuit of light, of holding a camera in their hand, those intricacies that make photograpy what it is (rather than painting or drawing or sculping) create a worthwhile image?"</p>

<p> Of course they can. Not everyone has to think like you or me to make a worthwhile image. To a degree, you have to at least be able to tolerate the process. Passionate about holding a camera in their hand? Believe it or not, there are lots of people outside of photo.net who don't fondle cameras more often than their significant others!</p>

<p> There actually are people who are more concerned about what they are working on than every dribbled manufacturer's rumor leaking onto the internet.</p>

<p>[NY] "Lot's (sic) of people paint because they like to even though their paintins (sic) will never ammount (sic) to anything more than time spent in an enjoyable passtime (sic).</p>

<p> Ah...the urge to create art, of storing encoded psychic energies in media, regardless of how good it is, is one of the qualities that make us human. It's just murdered/extinguished in most of us as children, and resurfaces in a myriad ways, photography being one. That urge is a passion unto itself, and existed before tools, when the first artist traced something with his finger in the sand, just as it does now.</p>

<p> </p>

[tomwatt]

<p>Regarding the insertion of passion/dispassion in the image-making process... I have to say that some image-making, to include photographing bodies, tends to push the photographer towards a dispassionate mode. Because to be otherwise adds to the trauma.... "hiding behind the camera" becomes a place of safety when confronted with sights that cannot otherwise be bearable.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Reading Luis's interesting post, I'm cautious that we should distinguish between tools and equipment, or at least recognize equipment as a subset of tools.</p>

<p>The passion I consider is for the process of shooting more than for fondling the camera, though I can feel passion for that as well. In my case it is getting to know, if for only an hour or so, the people I shoot . . . intimacy. Getting to walk around the city discovering locations, creating an image framed by the lens out of raw materials the scenes of the city provide me, noticing light, moving for perspective, positioning myself physically. It's time spent waiting for a moment. Tools well beyond the Canon vs. Nikon debate. Not that the equipment should be discounted, since being in touch with equipment will, of course, affect vision and approach.</p>

<p>For me, often, the process and the end product (the photograph) are inseparable. It is often the process that I want reflected in the product, yet sometimes not at all. Sometimes I want the process to be seemless. All depends on what I'm doing. In any case, I'm mindful of the irony that the eventual photo will likely transcend (to whatever extent) the process while owing its existence to it.</p>

<p>I love what Thomas has added and hadn't considered the need for dispassion or removal at times. It can, indeed, be a place of safety and that can have its positive and negative effects. It can make some things bearable to photograph but it can also distance the photographer and I think that shows up a lot. A large majority of homeless street shots we see are from people hiding behind their cameras and it shows in many of those photos feeling distant at best and exploitive at worst. </p>

<p>Snapshots, on the other hand, may be a good example where the product is really the goal and the process is relatively unimportant. Snapshots are significant, in that they are some of the most genuine and telling photos. At least some of that may come from their relative lack of self-consciousness.</p>

[jtk]

<p>All I want is the fear and pleasure of facing and learning a little about the subject (person, place, object) AND delivering a print I've made (to myself if my subject's not a person).</p>

<p>When I used photography to pay bills, I was happy to deliver transparencies. For quite a while I thought soundslides online (<a href="http://www.soundslides.com">www.soundslides.com</a>) would do the trick, and it probably will eventually, but for now it's prints.</p>

<p>This is neither theoretic nor philosophic for me, and it's not complicated. I have never had much interest in cameras (35mm-8X10-DSLR), but they're part of my life...like the cat that won't go away.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Perhaps this is simplistic, but travelling from one place to another requires some mastery of the tool to get there, such as with your car or a bicycle. Cars, like cameras, become objects of fascination in themselves. And you certainly must know them to use them. How does it handle? Will it allow you to project your vision of something onto a two dimensional print or other image?</p>

<p>The process of getting there is part of the pleasure. I like shifting gears or changing f-stops. Ultimately, though, these are questions of simply applying the tool, and much subordinate to what happens in one's head in regard to the image desired.</p>

<p>John, how true the cat analogy. Our cat is a friend, but difficult to keep, or have baby-sit by others, in his failing old age. Our former guy simply trundled himself off to a secluded bush to enact his final testimony (like birds hide themselves to die), discovered a few years later via his badge.</p>

[jtk]

<p>"Our former guy simply trundled himself off to a secluded bush to enact his final testimony (like birds hide themselves to die), discovered a few years later via his badge."</p>

<p>I have a wooden 4X5 field camera and a 6X9 Century with a bunch of lenses...I fear they'll be discovered in a few years at the back of a closet.</p>

[michaellinder]

<p>Indeed, handling the camera and other photographic paraphernalia is part of the process. To me, the most worthwhile part is getting to the location and scouting it out. Before I begin to think about the angle, exposure, shutter speed, etc., I am taking in whatever or whomever I am going to photograph. I am thinking about the subject. I have created a relationship with the subject.</p>

<p>John, have I just restated your point - " ... facing and learning a little about the subject (person, place, object)..."?</p>

[steve_swinehart]

<blockquote>

<p>Is a camera just a means to an end?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>For me, yes.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Does the method draw you in, or is it simply a means of creating the desired result?</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Depends upon the definition of "desired result." Sometimes the image made by using a camera is just the starting point to get to the desired result.</p>

<blockquote>

<p><br />Can one be dispassionate toward the medium used and still create worthwhile (however you measure that) photos, or are the two inextricably bound up?</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>How could a person be dispassionate about the medium? If you are working in a specific medium you have to like or be excited about the results - otherwise you need to change mediums.</p>

<p>One can, however, be dispassionate about the equipment. The best case (for me) - is when I forget I'm even using a camera; and am connected directly to the subject. That seems to be when I make the best photographs. I have had complete memory blanks about using the equipment when taking photographs. </p>

[fate_faith_change_chains]

I suppose one can become indifferent towards the actual outcome ( a viewable image, a photograph ). And if a photograph or an image on a

screen is to be considered that what mostly defines ' the medium ' of photography, then yes, one can also become indifferent towards the

medium ( as in, the endresult : a photograph ) BUT still be passionately involved in the very act of photographing. I've read that Gary

Winogrand, at one point in his life, had to photograph almost everything he encountered, but without necessarily caring all that much about

the actual outcome anymore. That's not to say that he didn't care about the medium anymore because maybe for him, the very act of

photographing was / became the medium. A medium used to release a certain tension every time he pressed the shutter, again and again...until it was the only thing that mattered.

[jtk]

<p>Michael...yes...that's at the heart of my own understanding of photography.</p>

<p>For me, premeditation (eg scouting) is important.. those happy accidents that thrill all of us will occur for me in the middle of something intentional, or not at all. I sometimes lose sleep exploring a simple photo idea: subject, location, why?, worthwhile? color/B&W? I'm beginning to think about a small self-assigned B&W film project because (maybe this is true) I enjoyed developing/scanning more than I enjoy conversion of color files to B&W... will probably do it soon, but wonder where I want to do it (I do envision the prints, am thinking about the paper...will they be Moab Colorado Satine or Ilford Gold Fibre?..or "traditional" Entrada Natural?).</p>

[jtk]

<p>"that's at the heart" = relationship, per Michael Linder, above. And I should have said "premeditation is ALSO important, just as for Michael.</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>"I sometimes lose sleep exploring a simple photo idea: subject, location, why?, worthwhile? color/B&W?"</p>

<p>Perfect. I agree, but I try not to incite that result always (too tiring!).</p>

<p>All of that is many miles away from the simple tool - the camera - which should have little more importance than the painter's brush, the use of which one simply should master - and then move on!</p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Correction: "....many miles above..." I was trying to say, I think like John, Michael and some others, that the camera is only a small part in the overall process of creating an image. </p>

[mwaks]

<p>

I think it best to hold a camera in ones hand as a technical tool. Those who hold it lovingly thinking it has personality and magical power may not have the best results in what they wish to do. It's somewhat the same as the question: Does the guitar player control the distortion pedal, or does the distortion pedal control the guitarist?

</p>

[Art X Photography]

<p>I'm a strong believer in pre-visualisation, that is, I have an idea of what it is I want to create before attempting to create it. In that sense the camera is simply a means to an end. Whether through the inception of the original shoot or in the process of post production treatment (p/p t) the method still remains a means to creating the end result UNTIL by chance, accident or shere luck (but mostly a combination of all these factors) the method begins to draw me in. The passion remains always present (if it didn't I would, and have dismissed a work even after investing many hours of p/p t). The journey I take may not be the path originally chosen, but the destination remains the same. I cannot remain dispassionate towards the medium in a technical sense (admiring its limitless possibilities of p/p t and play with compositions) but have no emotional interest in it (if that is the infrence, by the term "dispassionate" in the original forum thread), I have no pathos in the medium. Not that this forum is a discussion of 'theoretical philosophy' but if I was to make an analogy I guess in photography terms I am a strong believer in consequentialism rather than deontology. A means to an end? Yes for me it is.The end result is where the passion really lies while the process can have moments of passion but ultimately remains a dispassionate experience for me. I derive pleasure more from the end result while appreciate and dwell in constantly improving the process by which that end result is achieved.</p>

[michaellinder]

<p>Michael:</p>

<p>If indeed a camera were a magical instrument, the role of the photographer would be reduced simply to activating it. Using your guitar analogy, watch a good blues player. He/she doesn't simply strum or pick the strings. At the appropriate times (decided by the player), he/she bends the strings to produce a note that is less than a half step from the note below. More importantly, watch the expression on the player's face.</p>

[don_e]

<p>I wonder if there is a difference in opinion on this between those whose photography is mostly tripod work and those who mostly do handheld work. I can use any camera mounted on a tripod as a means to an end, but handheld is different. This is partially due to a slight physical impairment that makes certain designs unwieldy or uncomfortable, so I tend to feel some affection for the ones that work well for me.</p>

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