Make images, Don't just take photographs

I am frightened by the amount of magazines and internet sites that share techniques and tips for taking great photographs. I guess that if you just want to take a decent photograph, something like you have seen before, the tips and techniques are useful. However, how many magazines or articles tell you about the way a photographer feels for his subject, the process of creating an image internally, or how an inspiration distils into the moment the shutter is released?

I guess that there is a good reason why the internal process of great image makers are not written down, because it is an intensely personal process. It is almost impossible to describe and not replicable by anyone else. Each photographer must not only know the craft of photography, but find a reason to shoot an image at a certain, at a certain angle with a certain type of lighting. Yes there are basic guidelines like the rule of thirds or how to use a short depth of field. However, when do you use the rule of thirds or put your subject into the middle of the frame? There is no intellectual logic here. It takes a personal asthetic judgement here. It makes an emotional sense that only the image maker has.

Craft and technique is important. You can take 'good photos' with good technique. To make an image, you need to have an element of personal commentary. There is not right or wrong here. The influences of how an image forms internally is informed by the whole life of the image maker. A photograph happens when the subject is in focus and the exposure is correct. An image forms when the placement of the subject and the darkness or lightness of the images creates a resonance between the photographer, the subject and the resulting photograph. This moment of resonance, or art making, cannot be taught by one person to another. One person can only inspire another to find his/her own truth, art, images.

What do I say to someone looking to make images? I say take loads of photographs to begin with. Yes, look at the technical aspect of your photographs, but then look at how those photos feel to you. Is the composition exciting, are the colours evocative, can you see the 'story' you are trying to tell in the photographs? When you understand how the elements in an image work, then you need to understand yourself. Why do you want to make an image? What do you want to say? When you can make the photographic images come together to convey your inner visions/emotions/stories, then you are making images.

Europe 2005 - Saint-Ouen, Paris Pt II

Dare You To Move Lyrics

Welcome to the planet
Welcome to existence
Everyone's here
Everyone's here
Everybody's watching you now
Everybody waits for you now
What happens next
What happens next

[Chorus]
I dare you to move
I dare you to move
I dare you to lift yourself up off the floor
I dare you to move
I dare you to move
Like today never happened
Today never happened before

Welcome to the fallout
Welcome to resistance
The tension is here
Tension is here
Between who you are and who you could be
Between how it is and how it should be

[Chorus]

Maybe redemption has stories to tell
Maybe forgiveness is right where you fell
Where can you run to escape from yourself?
Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna go?
Salvation is here

I dare you to move
I dare you to move
I dare you to lift yourself up off the floor
I dare you to move
I dare you to move
Like today never happened
Today never happened
Today never happened
Today never happened before

--------

This song just keeps on running in my mind. After a year of suppressing myself, I feel tired and out of energy. And yet there is so much I want to do. There is so much that I dream to do. I feel like this song is my anthem at the moment, to get me back to life, to get be back to where I should be going. I have to put my past behind me and get myself up off the floor, put one foot forward then the next.

Welcome to the fallout
Welcome to resistance
The tension is here
Tension is here
Between who you are and who you could be
Between how it is and how it should be

Forget the pain, Forget the fear. I gotta move. :)

Europe 2005 - Saint-Ouen, Paris

There is a flea market in the North of Paris in a place called Saint-Ouen. This is one of my favourite flea market in the world. Full of unusual and exotic things but so civilised at the same time. I would definitely recommend this place to any person visiting Paris.

Quote from Art & Fear

The discouraging truth is that the rest of the world neither cares whether you make art, nor has much interest in buying it if you do.

This is a quote in the chapter "The Academic World". In the next chapter "Conceptual Worlds",

Writer Henry James once propsed three questions you could productively put to an artist's work. The first two were disarmingly straightforward: What was the artist trying to achieve? Did he/she succeed? The third's a zinger: Was it worth doing?

I live in a country that is practical and art is the most impractical thing I can think of. And daily, with a chorus of "Can you earn money behind me?", I wonder if what I am doing is worth it. People pay me for practical work with an artistic flair, like my wedding work. But so few people buy my art pieces.

The only real reward I can expect from my 'Art Photography', is the process of creation itself.

Europe 2005 - Paris

A man praying in Notre Dame Cathedral.









Paris is my favourite big city. There are beautiful little towns like Florence, but cities like London and New York seem very cold to me. Paris is the only big city where I still feel charm and design amongst the bustle of a sizable place.

That Daily Struggle

It seems to be a bad time for earth in general. We have natural disasters happening on an unprecedented scale. There is an ideological warfare with terrorists which seems hard to win. At least not in the way the Americans are trying to do with brute force. And economic rise and falls are causing people to hit unexpected bad times. America and Europe are facing hard times. So are we in Singapore. Yes, the GDP looks good and MNCs are making money, but the man in the street is not.

In this season of turmoil, do my dreams matter? They only matter to me. I watch television and see American's Next Top Model next to pictures of people dying in Pakistan and Guatemala. Those inflated egos and dramatised situations look a little hollow in the face of Mother Nature's fury.

Strange, but I feel a little guilty living in the comfort of Singapore. Not that I want to face a natural disaster or even dengue for that matter. Things do not go the way I want them to. I like every other service provider faces logistics problems and plain bad luck. Still, these things look small compared to having your entire house fall in front of your face and your family buried with it. And then winter is coming without any shelter.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I am thankful that I have the chance to dream. I am lucky that I have food to eat and a roof over my head. Like so many people aspiring to be the best, to be world famous, I forget that surviving daily is a success in itself. :)

Europe 2005 - Sicily, Last look

A last few images from Sicily before I move on.


Sunset in Modica.


A retired Sicilian fisherman in the town on Medina. I have images of him and his friends playing cards, but I liked this the best.



A shrine in Siracusa.



The cat and dog in the caretakers' house.


The eletrical light bulb has replaced the candles for prayer offering. Taormina.

Europe 2005 - In Catania

I got a bit bored of the fish market and walked around Catania as well.

Tete-a-tete ends today

Well, my exhbition at Objectifs ends today. For those of you who are overseas and could not go and see it, here is the poster. It has all the images from the exhibition. To see a bigger version, click on the above image.

Europe 2005 - Catania, Sicily

Around the fish market, lots of other dead meat. ;)

Europe 2005 - Fish Market, Catania, Sicily

After all the Easter festivities, we still had some time to shoot normal life in Sicily. This is a wet market in Catania, where fish is the main feature.

I guess that I should have mentioned this ealier. The course in Sicily was organised by the Toscana Photoworkshops (TPW). The teacher of the workshop, 'Life in Sicily', was National Geographic photographer, Bob Sacha. As I am so much of an arty feely photographer, I learned a lot about crafting a photo story on this course.

Europe 2005 - Day after Good Friday, Mt Etna, Sicily

The day after good Friday is a public holiday but none of the processions are on that day. Instead, families and friends head to publics spaces for some rest and relaxation. These portraits are taken on Mount Etna. Just Italian teenagers having fun.



After Mount Etna we stopped in a small town and had some gelati. This little girl was ordering some gelati too.

Bedok Jetty - What I did not shoot

I was at Bedok Jetty last night and took this picture of a dead fish.

What I did not shoot:

A couple lying on a concrete bench looking out to sea.

Fishermen throwing nets into the sea with cigarettes in their mouths.

Two women, smartly dressed, side by side, both messaging on their mobile phones.

A couple on the floor eating a birthday? cake.

...

Changing Directions

I have been a professional photographer for six years now. I started shooting actual day wedding photographs for clients about four years ago. It has been a while since my sister's wedding in 1989 where I first took pictures at a wedding. I also shot for friends but my first paying client was four years back.

Weddings are fun and it is quite a privilege to shoot someone's wedding. There is a lot of trust tor someone to ask you to shoot their wedding. For the most part I have also had very nice clients. Some of them becoming friends.

A typical wedding in Singapore starts at 7am in the morning. This is the traditional side where the bride and groom serve tea to their relatives. Then there is a civil or church ceremony and a banquet at night. The banquet in Singapore ends about 11pm. In all, a typical wedding day takes about sixteen hours. Some people can't believe it but I will be forty next February and sixteen hour days are long for me.

I always thought that I was a candid photogrpaher, but I am now enjoying more control over my work. I like portraiture where the hours are shorter but the process more intense.

The long and short of it is that I have decided to stop shooting actual day weddings. I am still doing bridal work but I am devoting myself to portrait work. This, like all things, may change in the future. However, this is it for the forseeable future.

My Friend Zul

I met Zul at Duke's Diner. It was a restaurant that Zul and his wife Shah wanted to run on Duke's Road. I first heard Zul sing there on a Sunday jam. It was amazing to hear such great music in a live setting, for free. :) I have shot Zul in performance several times at Duke's diner and I always wanted to shoot Zul at the bar 'Anywhere'. Anywhere is where Zul and his band, Tania, play. Unfortunately, Anywhere closed down and I did not get to shoot Zul there. The good thing is Tania needed some new publicity photogaphs as they are now playing at Harry's! Wow!!

Shooting the group shot of Tania was a simple affair. However, I finally got Zul where I wanted him, in front of my portrait lens!! I take a lot of photographs for a living. These pictures of Zul and pictures like these are what makes me feel alive!!
In my heart of hearts, I still wish that I could have done these portraits at Anywhere, but I am just happy to have taken these shots. :)

Europe 2005 - More Easter Processions, Sicily