Monday, July 20, 2009

Afghanistan => Incredible + moving photography

An iPod music player is attached to the tactical vest of a U.S. soldier of 3rd Platoon from the 3rd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division as he drives to the site of a roadside bomb explosion in the mountains of Wardak Province in Afghanistan July 11, 2009. (REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov)

The Boston Globe’s Big Picture blog puts up incredible photography relevant to what’s going on in the world now.

They just put up two photo-series current Afghanistan and days of the the Allied soldiers there.

In Afghanistan, Part One

In Afghanistan, Part Two

These are powerful photos. Makes the whole thing seem human.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Must you be taking that picture?

President Barack Obama addresses U.S. troops during his visit to Camp Victory, Baghdad, Iraq on April 7th, 2009. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Look at how almost everybody in the audience is busy filming or taking pictures.

The most famous legend-of-a-man in the world is in the same room, right in-front of them and they’re not present - completely off somewhere else busy operating some finicky gadget so that they can have some crappy amateur footage to upload to Facebook or show their friends.

They should be present, listening, reveling in the moment, absorbing every glorious detail. Instead they ruin the experience by trying to be the photographer when in most cases they’d be mediocre at best.If you really want photos to take home, assign a friend or two to take all the photos and be done with it.

This happens everywhere else too. How many times have you seen someone out on a vacation they’re never really having because they’re busy “capturing the moments?”

If new dads spent less time behind the camera and more time being a dad, they’d have more precious moments and experiences instead of empty photos of times gone by.

Most pro photographers takes hundreds of shots when out shooting something professionally, and they still often can’t find pictures that satisfy themselves or their bosses. It takes a lot of effort and time and skill and luck to get what you really want. Odds are you aren’t going to be that lucky most of the time.

Instead of spending the whole time looking at reality through an LCD screen, remember that 4 or 5 well-timed shots should be enough. You don’t always need to upload that clip onto YouTube. It’s okay if you miss some shots. You can’t have everything.

So spend less time behind the camera, and more time enjoying the moment.

Or do you still not see it?

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

This why I still suck at photography

Notice the big grey chunk of missing data. Ruined panorama.

Nearly a complete decent panorama, ruined because a big chunk of the background is missing.

I didn’t have enough experience to see this coming and not enough practice to know what to do in this situation.

Sure I should be able to patch it up somewhat in Photoshop, but it’ll still be very noticeable to the experienced eyes, and still very flawed.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Today I'm just an aspiring hack

Someday I'll be making pictures like these. Until that day, I'm all but failures.

Ryan Brenizer talks about this, and this is expected and normal.

It's a shame - that until that day comes, I'll only produce shoddy crap out of all the wonderful subjects I come across. Doesn't do them an ounce of justice.
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