Some of my loyal blog readers may wonder “where has Tina been the last couple weeks, there are not any new blog stories, and there are probably some!” Well me and Mac have been having some bonding time lately. Maybe that is why so many people are so in love with Apple; they spend so much time with them. My facebook status (which I don’t usually update, but have been trying to lately) says, “Tina is still editing photos like crazy and beginning to think the computer is an extension of her body.” It’s so true!
Everyone always says it must be great being a photographer and working from home. While most of the time its true, I couldn’t be happier it is amazing–there is the other side to photography, the actual business side of photography that is far less glamorous but just as important and in many cases more so. Many times people will comment at my schedule, saying “oh must be nice not to work during the week”, or “must be nice working only a couple days a week”. But they don’t see or don’t realize that it is far more than that. -I think sometimes I don’t realize it either. 🙂 There are many painstaking hours of editing, sitting in front of a computer, until you can no longer move your wrist and your eyes hurt. Burning the midnight oil until you realize birds are chirping. (see previous post) Last night as I had two programs running batches and doing their magic, and I waited for the computer to catch up with itself I kept myself amused by catching up on other blogs in my Reader, mainly my favorite, “a little comic strip about two naked eight years olds who are married,”–wait just kidding [that was a quote by Homer in the TV show The Simpsons about comic “Love is..” which I also love.] this one is a little comic strip about a photographer duck, “What the Duck”. It offered me a much needed comic relieve from my work and as usual I found myself laughing out loud as I completely identified with this little duck character again! So I wanted to share with you some of the cartoons that kind of fit how I am feeling or have felt in the past. Since the photo blogs will be another day or two, more about that after the cartoons. [I can’t post them in here, so click on links]
What the Duck 339: Chilly Reception
WTD 485: “THE MAN in the Mirror”
That last one got me thinking a lot. What was it like to have a wedding photography business before the digital age? When I started in photography I learned on film cameras, I learned black and white film, color negative and transparency (slide) film, and even infrared film. I learned not only to take photos using film but I learned to develop all kinds of film myself and print in all mediums. It was a great experience, one I hope future generations of photographers do not miss out on. But as I finished school and began business for myself the world had changed and I changed with it. At the end of my junior year of college-in fact only a couple weeks before finals and when I needed the camera the most, my remaining Canon film cameras both broke-all cameras have only a certain amount of shutter life I far exceeded that. I needed a replacement fast. Since the photography world was changing fast I choose to get a digital SLR, with the help from my family, and I have never looked back. I often miss the film camera, but then I wonder how could I possibly do what I do with a film camera any more? I wonder how photojournalists worked back in the good old glory days having to run film back and send negatives via mail instead of satellite/internet. And wedding photographers had to stop to change rolls of film, and then there was only one set of negatives and how did they edit and store all the images. I know I know you had proof sheets with the cool red grease pencils to mark what you liked and cropping, and you printed proof books, and you put the negatives in binders and filed them. But really what was it like?
And what will the future of our profession be like? I sometimes think about the future and what legacy I will leave behind and who will look at my older work, how will they even find it. Will it be left on some abandon hard drive that someone still happens to have an adapter too, will it be a forgotten online gallery that someone stumbles upon when they do an online search or are following links somewhere, or will it be those few prints you got around to actually printing that you gave your family and happened to sign and they are uncovered in a box in a distant relative’s attic, or a client’s wedding album that’s past down from generations. I have heard when you become a “famous” photographer that people start looking at all your work as a whole, even your early work, and that is part of the genius of an artist, the learning process. I always found it odd in art history looking at a photographer’s or artist’s early work, that often didn’t seem like anything special at all, but because they went on to create masterpieces, then everything they produced became like a piece of history, a piece of that final masterpiece. Maybe in some small way that’s why I have a hard time hitting the delete key, even when its a photo I know didn’t turn out, its out of focused, exposed wrong, etc. I guess in some sense I think some day I or someone else will look at the mistakes and learn from them. I have always believed that the photos that I take will be for future generations in one sense or another. Before there was no delete, and besides cutting a negative out of the strip, which why would you do that, there wasn’t really a way to delete or throw away the bad photos unless you destroyed the whole roll of film or a series of the negatives, but they would still be numbered. So if a photographer did give the negatives to a client-which was far less common, then all the mistakes were seen. Now it is rare that anyone ever sees our mistakes, so are we still learning from them and will future generations still learn from us, if they can’t see how we got to the masterpieces?
Recently, I let a family member look at the back of the camera-well not by choice she was playing around with it, I let her take some photos and then she decided to look at everything on the card. There happened to still be an engagement session on there (even though I downloaded it, and backed it up, it was still on the card temporarily until I backed it up twice) and after viewing only a few images she mentioned she thought I “was losing my edge.” I was very hurt and offended at first, I mean after all I didn’t ask her opinion. But in the end I knew she was right-about those few she was talking about. It turned out the ones she was speaking about were ones that someone asked me to specifically create, they were not my vision but someone else’s and therefore not my style. A couple images later I took the same situation and made it my own, my style. After my sister looked at the whole shoot, she then said well actually it was quite good-I was actually very proud of the shoot and despite just a few images that didn’t work-as there are some with every shoot-I thought it was one of my best overall. My sister’s comments reaffirmed the fact that I have a distinct style and vision that I have come into my own and there are photos that you can tell were created by me. This style is ever growing and I wonder if you looked at my work when I begun would you know it is the same photographer I am today or ten years from now.
At Columbia College in one of our art or photo history classes I remember the most interesting fact, when Garry Winogrand, a street photographer known for his portrayal of America in the mid 20th century, died he “left behind nearly 300,000 unedited images, and more than 2,500 undeveloped rolls of film.” That’s amazing!!! –Ironically when I was searching for his name and a link to the story I came across a more recent and probably more famous example in famed war photojournalist Robert Capa. A suitcase containing “thousands of negatives of pictures that Capa took during the Spanish Civil War” before 1939 was just discovered in Jan. 2008. For more on the story check out the full article by the New York Times online.
Well since the beginning of the month I have photographed the following: A college graduation, a car accident, a newborn baby, family portraits, the amazing wedding of Kathleen and Richard in Waukegan, my puppy’s first birthday, storm damage, an engagement session, another wedding this time in Peoria with the lovely and talented Melissa McClure oh wait another engagement session–WOW! And there are still two weeks left in the month!!! Anyway these photos will be coming to you soon, but first comes the editing. I promise I will sit down and blog soon, but not until I have finished completely editing them all. 🙂 I just wanted to give you an update on where I have been-if I am not out taking pictures, I am probably staying in with Mac.
Tina Jean Photography 