Creative people Commit

A few weekend's ago, I was in Torridon conducting a weekend workshop. One of the topics that came up was the abundance of choice that we have as photographers. It's a well worn path of discussion for me, and something I've got very firm views on. I believe that when we have more choice, it does not equate to better creative control.

In fact, I think my motto on occasions has been that 'less is more'. One such instance is in lens choice. I don't believe that having zooms makes for a better approach to improving composition, and that by using fixed focal length lenses (primes) we have a lot of advantages over those who believe that having a zoom will allow them to cover all scenarios.

Let me explain. Primes force you to hunt the landscape. You have to move, to find the right composition and fit it to work with your lens. Zooms make us lazy and we tend to stay rooted to the same spot. We don't engage with the landscape so much. Also, if you are a beginner, then zooms make things more complicated because I believe that if you have, say, 3 fixed focal length lenses such as a wide, standard and telephoto, you get to know them well and in particular - start to 'visualise' in those particular focal lengths. It cuts down decisions and allows you to get on with the task at hand - making images.

It's a complete folly that having lots of lenses, lots of camera bodies, and carrying everything with you all the time - means you're ready for anything. In truth, you've lumbered yourself down with a lot of dead weight, and too many options.

There's an adage 'the best camera and lens you have - is the one you have with you'. If you have one lens, you'll work with it. Get the most out of it. If you have five lenses, you've got to make your mind up which one to use, and until you're really experienced in using them - you'll only add confusion to the process of trying to make good images.

So what is my point?

Well, I've not really got to it yet. So far, you've just been listening to a pre-able, and what I'd like to really discuss is that anyone who's wanting to work on their photography and improve on it, needs to be able to commit. Make decisions and stand by them. Those that go out with all the lenses in the world to capture 'everything' are only distancing themselves from making any firm commitments.

We seem to live in an age where we want endless undo features. We wish to be able to capture 'everything'. Well, we can't be omnipresent. That's someone else's job. Not ours. No. We have to compromise, accept we won't capture everything, and nor will we be able to get everything 'right'. Those that think they can by taking every available lens with them is only fooling themselves.

And my point is: the same for post-capture editing.

I'm always fascinated when I show groups on my workshops the endless undo facilities of LightRoom. Compared to Photoshop, you can undo anything at any time, days, months or years after you edited it - in LightRoom. But you can't with Photoshop. Once you crop and save that file, quit the application - you've lost any possibility of going back in the history, because Photoshop is destructive: it only remembers your edits during the current session. Not for the rest of your life.

So you better get it right.

Or maybe that should be - you better get used to living with your decisions.

I make bad choices all the time. But by looking back at what I did, months, years later, I see that I'm developing and learning. I need to make mistakes to improve. I need to commit and believe that what I chose as a suitable edit - was right - at that time.

So my point is - I don't think having endless undo capability in LightRoom is really that important. Yes, it's nice, but it's not really a feature I seek or feel is vital to any editing application I use - because I don't look back. I don't waste time thinking that I might have got that edit wrong. I make a decision in Photoshop, do the crop and move forward.

I'm aware that during the editing stage, images become photographs. I'm aware that their personalities change. They become something else. Each edit closes a door of what they might have been, and opens a door to what they are becoming. I embrace the future and I'm excited to wonder just which direction the editing will take the image in.

Sure, there's a valid reason for having undo features. I use the history in Photoshop all the time. If I'm not sure just where I'm going, I'll revert, go back a step or two, compare, and see if I think the current edit I'm doing is justified. But once I save that file, I'm committed. I don't look back.

I believe in myself, and my fallibleness too.

It reminds me of each time I make an image on my film cameras. Once I shoot a frame, I know I can't go back and change it. I live with it, embrace it for whatever it may be, and whatever it may become, once it's scanned and loaded into my digital darkroom.

No, to think you have endless undo possibilities, and can 'go back' at any stage is for those who lack conviction, or confidence in their own artistic-leanings.

Perhaps the message in this post is to trust yourself.

Accept that you won't always get it right, that anything we do in photography is a learning process, a stepping stone towards better images in the long run.

After all, a good artist is one that is open to growth. And growth only happens when we open ourselves to letting things go with the flow and being free enough to see what might happen, and not worry too much if what we create appears to be a failure (I would argue any failure probably holds a lesson for us).

Maybe you feel this posting doesn't apply to you. Maybe you feel you've achieved a level of 'perfection'. I think one attribute all creative people should possess is that of humbleness. If you feel you're creating perfection, then maybe you're in more trouble than you really know.

I'm certainly aware that I'm on a journey and that what might seem good today, may feel wanting tomorrow. But I don't hold myself in high regard and nor do I give myself a hard time about my decisions. I just try to let things flow. Everything is of its time. I try to be kind to my own creativity. If I'm kind to it, then it will be good to me.

Creativity is a constantly learning journey. Being extremely kind to your mistakes is really important. But also holding true to your convictions at the time of the edit is really important too. The images show who you were at that moment.

So for my money's worth - I'm not too bothered about having that undo safety net that Lightroom offers. It's a distraction on the path of creative learning. I make my decisions, I live with them and only by living with them, I learn. But in order to learn, I have to commit.

Screen Calibrators

You may remember a few weeks ago, I wrote a very brief report on my purchase of a BasICColour Discus screen calibrator/profiler (see photo). The Discus is a 'relatively' expensive screen calibrator, built of extremely high quality components.

I'd read a lot of reviews of the product before buying it, and the calibrations I'd seen were so tight, that I felt that this was the product for me. My old screen calibrator broke last year, and I'm in the process of preparing my images for a 2nd book, so I really wanted to make sure the images were as accurate as possible on my screen.

I've just done some tests comparing the Discus to a Spyder 3, but before I show you the results, I'd like to make some things very clear about calibration and profiling:

1. Not all screen calibrators are created equal.

2. Not all screens are created equal. I've found some screens - particularly laptop screens - a nightmare (or impossible) to profile.

3. Yes, when your calibration software says 'calibrated successfully', what it is really saying is that the device has calibrated/profiled your screen to the best of its ability under the circumstances.

4. The circumstances that can affect a successful calibration are things like - type of monitor you have, how well it can be calibrated, and also, the settings you wish to calibrate to. For instance, I had difficulty getting good calibrations out of my Eizo CG241W monitor and BasICColour support (which was excellent and very responsive) told me that my monitor, or a lot of modern monitors don't like to be calibrated below 120cmd. By moving the brightness up a little on the monitor from 110cmd (my preferred luminance), I got a tighter calibration. They also asked me to adjust the black point calibration too. So I know my monitor is not ideal, but i suspect that this is the case with everything - everything is a compromise right? The other circumstances are the kind of calibrator you have, and how 'tight' it is calibrated itself. As I say, everything is a compromise.

Below are two graphs, showing you how 'tight' the Spyder 3, and also the Discus calibrations are. In essence, the colour graph shows you how far the calibration was (the achieved value) compared to the desired value. Green and amber suggest calibrations that are 'acceptable' while red indicates anything that is not. You can see in the Spyder calibration that it failed to calibrate the blacks well, and the achieved result is quite different from what was intended.

BasICColour-Display (the software used to calibrate and profile my monitor) says it failed to get the screen within an acceptable range under the conditions I wished to have it calibrated to, by using the Spyder 3. This does not mean that the Spyder 3 is a bad device - you get what you pay for to some degree, and I would argue that the profiles it creates on most systems are more than acceptable for most users - if you're an amateur looking to get your screen 'within range', then I'd say it's fine.

Now comparing the results from the Discus above, you can see that the delta-E (the difference between the target and achieved profiling) is much tighter. The calibration / profiling has been successful. You can see there's still a difference in dark tones - particularly the dark blues for some reason - are a little off, but overall, I know the calibration is within an acceptable range.

I think the Discus is a very professional, tightly-calibrated device. Apart from the build quality (like picking up a piece of Tank accessory), it does seem to deliver on giving some of the best profiles around at the moment for under £1,000.

Of course, I guess you'd have to figure out if it's worth it to yourself, and whether it matters that much. As someone who is preparing images for print in books, I think colour management is vital. I need to know that what I'm dealing with on screen is very close to what is inside the file. To me, screen calibration and colour management in particular, are as important as what camera I choose, or what tripod I buy.

As with all reviews on the web - you should really consider doing your own tests - if that's possible. You may find that cheaper colourmeters like the X-Rite Eye One Pro, or the Spyder series are more than acceptable for your needs. But I suspect, if you're the kind of person who must have the best (it's certainly a fault of mine), then you may wish to look higher up in the price bracket (the Discus sells for £850 here in the UK) for something with tighter abilities. But only you can really test to see if you notice a big difference to the profiles they build.... the ultimate test really, is in viewing a profile-test-target on your monitor against a daylight illuminated print in a viewing booth.

I don't offer this posting to say if one calibrator is better than another, and my posting is not intended to slate the Spyder 3. As I say, the Spyder 3 may be more than acceptable to you and give you profiles you're more than happy with, but I think if there's a message in this post - it is that even if your calibrator says it's done it's job and calibrated and profiled your monitor successfully, it's the degree of how well it's done it that is the point. Colourmeters can only get your monitor to within a certain range of the target calibration.

Just how close, and whether you'll notice the difference -  is perhaps the most pressing question. You'll only find out by doing your own tests. I would say though, that in order to confirm how good a profile or calibration is - you need to verify it, and that's only really possible by comparing an evaluation target in Photoshop (colour managed) against one that is displayed under a daylight viewing booth.

More cover mock-ups

I'm heading down to Nottingham on Monday to work on my 2nd book layout. Darren has been sending me some ideas on the cover and slipcase, and these have been feeding back into my own mind and resulting in more changes.

The choice of a font, can really make a huge difference to how a books is received. We conjure up expectations based on how the cover of a product looks, and in these mock-ups, the font is more 'modern' than the one's in the previous mock-ups.

I find this all very exciting, and full of surprises. I've been living with the previous mock-up in my mind for some time, and was imagining the book sitting on my bookshelf, and now, what was becoming 'real' is now becoming fiction for me again... something fluid, changeable. It makes me wonder just how different the book will actually look once we've got the design complete, which I would imaging, should take a few more weeks of fine tuning once Darren and myself have gone through setting up the initial look.

The other good news is that the preface has been written by my very special guest photographer. More news about this at the end of the month in my monthly newsletter.

Variations on a theme (read location)

This image was taken at one of the many times I've been down at the waters edge of Reinefjorden.

I can't seem to stay away from the place, and I've shot it under vastly different lighting. The above shot was taken in February as part of a Safari I was running. We did come back in March too, and we got the light you see in the image below:

Quite a marked difference in light. Partly to do with the sun being more directional, hitting the edges of the Lofoten 'wall', this shot was very much a 'throw-away' effort at the time. But I'm glad I decided to stay put and just shoot. Literally a minutes walk from where we were staying, it was from a slightly different vantage point. But it was the same fjord, and the same mountains, just from a slightly different angle, and with much different light.

But I also shot this image in March too, of the same fjord:

But I think the last image is more a 'standard' landscape image. It shouts 'vista-shot', which is no bad thing, but just perhaps a little too 'expected' for my own liking. I much prefer the first two efforts as in each of them, there is a very strong message that I feel is less evident in this shot.

I think that what I'm striving for in every image I make, is some form of presence, or individuality. Certainly the first two are very unique. The first is mostly a play on lighter tones and calm reflections, with a dominant mountain in the frame, while the second image is mostly about directional, moody light.

Returning to the same location time and again, always yields something new, because each time the location is new. We are reactionary beasts and in photography, I feel that means we react very much to the differences in the quality of light - if we choose to observe, and notice those differences.

When impressions don't match results

When I'm out making images, I have to trust my intuition - it's part of being a film shooter - I can't see what it is I've captured until the films are processed much later. I would say though, that after shooting film for over 20 years now, that I feel I've got a fairly good grasp on how well things are going at the time of capture.

But there have been a number of occasions of late, where I feel that what I created, once home, and reviewing the transparencies, did not equal what I thought I was achieving at the time. In some instances, the final images have surpassed what I felt I captured. This was evident last summer when I visited Iceland. I had a terrible head cold and felt that the entire shoot was a disaster. So much so, that I came home early, feeling very despondent and assured that the whole shoot had been a disaster.

When they returned, and I finished work on them, I discovered I had this collection of imagery:

I was a little overwhelmed at just how well the final images turned out, and in particular, how the images are perhaps some of my personal best work, despite my belief at the time that things weren't working for me whilst on location.

I'm curious as to just what it was, that helped me make such a strong collection of images, despite my belief at the time that the images were no good?

I feel, that we should always be willing to review not just our work, but also ourselves. I little bit of introspection - or self-awareness is no bad thing, and in fact, I think it's perhaps the most important thing in photography. We often overlook the most important ingredient in image making - ourselves. I've written about this on several occasions now, and I've even gone to the trouble of writing an ebook about it too.

So I'm no stranger to being surprised by my own efforts - a creative person should find himself surprised every now and then, and if he isn't - it's maybe because he never re-evaluates himself, or the work he's created.

Above is a contact sheet for my first escapade to the Lofoten Islands last March. I feel this too, is a very strong body of work. The only difference between this and my Iceland shoot, was that I knew I was capturing something of merit at the time.

So this year, I've been to Lofoten twice. I'm in the middle of editing the final images from two shoots - one in February where we had the most spectacular light and plenty of snow, and a second trip in March where the snow was fast disappearing and I didn't feel that enthused about what I was capturing.

Again though, I'm surprised. The latest (and most disappointing shoot) seems to be providing the most thought-provoking images out of the two shoots. Which is not what I anticipated.

I think there are perhaps numerous reasons why we should have such a disconnect between what we anticipated and what we actually get. I'll try to cover some of them (as I see them) here for you. Maybe you'd like to suggest some others that I've missed?

1. Lack of experience is the obvious one. But as I've said, I feel I've become pretty proficient at what I do, but there are still those moments where my vision seems out of sync with my ability.

2. Being overwhelmed by the experience of simply being there. Some places are more pleasant to shoot than others. But this has little impact on the final image. A rainy day can make the whole experience feel worthless, yet we can still come home with some surprising images. Part of this is because we have to learn that the quality of light that we find pleasing and enjoyable to be in, is not the same as the quality of light that a camera prefers to record. Camera's like low contrast light.

3. Energy levels. If you feel like crap, you can't really be that objective about what it is that you're doing. If you're unexperienced, you  will most probably let it influence your shoot as well. More proficient photographers (although not immune to this), can often still come home with good images because of the amount of experience and technique they've built up.

But i'm wondering, if you're not entirely there - if you're feeling sick, or your mind is distracted, and you still come home with good images, then what is going on? Is perhaps the illness taking your mind off things a little? Is it acting as a distraction? A distraction that allows the mind to think more laterally, and come up with things it ordinarily wouldn't?

Your comments are welcome.

3.

What we don't see, we can't learn from

While I was staying at Lilians guest house in Lofoten last week, we had a discussion about music which I felt had a lot to bear on the process of photography. Lilian was explaining to me, that when composers wrote their musical manuscripts, they always wrote down the exceptions, the things that should be played differently. They never ever wrote down what was normal practice. It seems that in the classical world of music, we have very little knowledge of what was assumed as standard practice back then. So when we come to interpret manuscripts from the past, we only know about the exceptions and have no idea how the piece would have been played based on fashions of the time.

Our little conversation got me thinking about just how much we learn from looking at other photographers work. I know I've learned a lot from viewing the work of photographers that I admire. But based on my conversation with Lilian, I'm now thinking that I've only learned a small amount of information by looking at a completed set of photographs.

Put it this way, good photographers only show their best work. They do not show you all the mistakes, or near-misses that they encountered on the way to creating the final image. We have no understanding of what compositions came before the final one, or whether the composition was tuned until they got it 'right'. If Ansel Adams had been a medium format shooter, I would have loved to see a contact sheet of the not-so-perfect versions that came before many of his iconic images. It would teach us a great deal.

In my own case, I'm aware that I often start off with a nice composition, but as the shoot progresses, so too, does the composition become more refined, until I feel I've got as far as I can with it. Distracting elements are slowly removed, and over the course of half an hour, I might find the composition becomes simpler. But you'd never know this, because you never get to see the set of images in the sequence that lead up to the final image.

I think this brings me to a problem that a lot of amateurs have. They feel that everything they do should be good. They give themselves a hard time if they are not. Someone who is proficient at their photography knows there is an evolution stage to most of their best images.

I don't often start off with a good composition. I have to work at it. I am, essentially starting from square one each time I go out to make new images. But the important thing is, that I allow myself the freedom to make mistakes, to experiment. It is by only allowing myself that freedom, that I can hit upon something worth exploring and then moving onto further tuning.

Everything starts as chaos. all artists give themselves up to starting from scratch every time they begin a new work. What is 'work in progress' may look bad, but good artists know that things are fluid, in an incomplete state. Amateurs who set high standards for themselves, aren't prepared to live in this 'no-man's-land' of incompleteness - it's a frightening place to be, because it requires confidence to know that they are on the right track with what they're creating. I think this is overcome with experience, and experience comes from being patient and giving yourself the time to develop.

I think this is why we often hear people say things like 'oh, that's so good - i could never do that'. Because they can't visualise all the blind alleys, wrong choices and evolutionary stages that an artist had to go through to create the final work. All they see is the final work and assume that whoever created it, knew what they were doing from the onset.

It simply isn't true.

I wish each landmark photograph out there came along with a set of documentation to show its evolution stage. We would sometimes discover that the photographer happened on the final image, almost by chance. We would learn that the photographer was confident enough to allow themselves to run free and not be too worried if the image didn't amount to much. We would also learn how the final image was a vast improvement, because of all of the objects that were removed out of the frame over repeated fine tuning. We may also learn that the photographer took a step further into the scene, and this changed the potential image  from something that was mediocre to something that was spectacular. We would learn so much.

I find it intriguing that every published image we look at, is an incomplete story. They only tell us about the final destination, but nothing of the journey. For this reason alone, they are illusions. I think that's why I love photography so much, because great images cast a spell, and part of that spell is that we were never privy to what the magician (read photographer) had to go through, to give us his final vision.

I'm coming out to San Fran / San Jose this December

I'm in the middle of planning a trip to come visit a school friend of mine this December who lives in San Jose. I thought that since I'll be out that way - if you have a photographic club, and would be interested in me coming to do a talk about my photography (I'd just need a nice digital projector and screen - and some decent audio speakers to hook up to a laptop), then please do get in touch. I've decided that on my future travels, I'll advertise that I'll be in town, and see if I can slot in a talk for a local club if I can.

I love doing talks for clubs when I can. It's very enjoyable for me to discuss my photography and relive some of the experiences I've had whilst making my images.

It's great to meet some folks, and I thought it would be a great way to get an introduction to some of 'the locals' while I'm out visiting!

Cleaning your Gitzo

Every workshop I do, means my tripod often gets dumped into salty water. Salt water is highly corrosive, and if you're doing a lot of beach shooting, you should be stripping down and cleaning that tripod of yours after each outing. One of my clients from the USA, Mihir, sent me this link today -

http://reallyrightstuff.com/WebsiteInfo.aspx?fc=150

Really Right Stuff have a short tutorial on how to dismantle, clean and re assemble a modern gitzo tripod. I've just run through it and it's pretty good advice. You may find sometimes, that you do need to use some grease on the threaded collars though - if you do - a word of advice - get the Gitzo grease. I've found others are not suitable and once mixed with salty water, can lend your tripod frozen up for good.

Book Review

Every now and then, I'm informed about a review of my first book. Noeleen Hargan has written perhaps the most objective review of my book that I've read so far. I say this, because in her review, Noeleen considers what I had to say in my text and she gives the reader an idea of what to expect, if they were to purchase the book.

This would seem to be an amazingly simple objective that a reviewer should have - to give the reader an idea of the content of the book. But as I said a few months back - I don't tend to read the reviews now, because most of them lack research - it's clear to me from the content of the review that they haven't read the text (I'm sure this is very common - and one of the many reasons why authors don't read reviews!).

Anyway, I felt that Noeleen's review of my book was very considerate. She's clearly read the contents, thought about it, and makes some points based on what she's read. Noeleen has kindly allowed me to reproduce it here for you all to read.

The lure of endless possibilities

Book review: Bruce Percy, The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples. Half Light Press, Edinburgh, 2011.

No, a photograph is not a simple visual report of “what was there”. In Bruce Percy’s words, photography is “an emotional response to what we see and feel”. His first book, The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples, its format and title paying homage to Ansel Adam and Galen Rowell, lends substance to this view.

The book’s 40 images are each accompanied by a one-page commentary providing insights into the image-making process. While the locations vary from the photographer’s Scottish homeland to further afield – Argentina, Bolivia, Cambodia, Chile, Ethiopia, Iceland, India and Nepal – before long, the book’s underlying question becomes clear: Why this photograph?

The backstage insights shared with readers include descriptions of the setting in which each photograph was created. Percy talks about his fears and worries, mishaps and coincidences, makes technical and compositional observations, and interprets the sense of his work while reflecting upon the role of emotions and the unconscious in image-making. Above all, he tries to convey to readers what drew him into an image, why that particular image was made, how he feels when he has made a good image.

Percy loves the fact that photography in general “gives us a reason to get out there and experience new locations and new people”. The “endless possibilities” offered by photography are themselves a source of inspiration, he feels. At the same time, he knows that “one of the biggest mistakes a new photographer can make is to keep moving and not spend enough time in one location”. Slow down, he seems to be saying, and think about what you are doing, why you are doing this. Or at least, this is what he seems to have said to himself at some point along his own photographic journey.

Percy knows the joys of making landscape images “at an unearthly hour, in the silence, just you and your camera.” Perhaps this is one reason why his photography often has a mystical, meditative quality about it. These days, he tells us, he is striving for an “otherwordly” mood in his photography, along with simple shapes and tones.

One unexpected component of the book is the portraiture. Until now, I had associated Bruce Percy exclusively with evocative landscapes, but now am intrigued by his assertion that “portraits should be landscapes in their own right”. He sees portraiture as “very similar” to landscape photography. As he puts it: “I’m looking for an aesthetic that is pleasing in terms of composition, light and tonal balance. But I’m also looking for a spirit, and that is not too different from landscape photography after all”.

Knowing what you’re looking for may well be half the battle or more, but photographers keen to make the most of photography’s “endless possibilities”, should perhaps take their cue from Percy’s account of finally succeeding, on his 4^th attempt, in making the sunrise image he wanted at the Laguna Torre in Argentina’s Los Glaciares National Park. As in the legend involving his namesake Robert the Bruce and a spider, Bruce Percy simply tried and tried again.

But perhaps some of the book’s assertions shouldn’t be taken too literally, such as “there appears to be no such thing as bad weather”. Try telling that to a sodden, bedraggled group of photographers from Italy, on a week-long trip to the Highlands, while they are sheltering from the Scottish wind and rain under a low stone wall near Rua Reidh lighthouse;-)

The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples is an absorbing read for anyone interested in photography, and a compilation of beautifully-reproduced photographs that you will want to look at over and over again.

Review © Noeleen Hargan, 2012

The original review can be found at Noeleen Hargan's blog here: http://www.respirolestelle.it/html/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=240:recensione-the-art-of-adventure-bruce-percy&catid=34:recensioni-letterarie&Itemid=55

And of course, if you want to buy a copy of the book, you can find it at the Half-Light Press website.

Red Morning, Reine, Lofoten, Norway

Just a quick post tonight. This image is of my favourite mountain in the Lofoten islands - Oldstind. We had some spectacular light in February (there's no guarantee what you'll get, any month).

I love simplified compositions and anything that is distracting should be thrown out. You'd think that having loads of stones in the foreground would be distracting, but for me, I'm always looking for uniformity. They all are very much alike, that my eye quickly absorbs them. That, I feel, is the key to good images - nothing should really jar with your eye's movement through the frame. It also helps that the snow is of similar tonal ranges to the mountains in the mid-ground. And of course, the light was spectacular this particular morning. Really something.

Enjoy your weekend. Many more 'wintry' images to come over the next few weeks as I work through my backlog.