Gear Doesn't Matter

“People think far too much about techniques and not enough about seeing” - Henri Cartier-Bresson

The above quote, in my mind is so correct. I hear so much talk about techniques and gear and I think people are missing the point of quality photography in so many ways. The Masters used gear that was far beneath what we have today and yet produced high quality work that we still value today. They didn’t have the lightning like frame rates, the ISO capabilities, the dynamic range or auto focus to name only a few things, yet they managed some of the best work that has stood the test of time.

Any camera of any brand today will more than suffice to make high quality images and yet so many of us can’t get away from looking toward that next camera or something new being released. I used to carry a heavy bag of lenses around with me, you never know when I might need that one lens, right? The one that I used once or twice a year. Did that bag of gear help me to make better images? Yes and no. What I found is that even with all those lenses I still had my favourites that got used the majority of the time yet I still carried all that weight around “just in case”.

After a trip to the UK, my wife and I decided to lighten things up a bit. We aren’t getting any younger and all that weight while traveling is not fun. We swapped our heavy Nikon lenses for much lighter and smaller Lumix gear. Are there differences and trade-offs? Sure but nothing that would stop us from shooting what we want to. The gear is just a bag of tools, the real artistic part of photography comes from us and our abilities to use those tools.

Photo of the Week #228

I have always been a person who cropped to a standard aspect ratio, you know, 8x10, 16x20, 36x24, that sort of thing. The main reason was so in the event I wanted to print the images, it would be easy to obtain matts, frames and glass for framing. Odd sized photos meant custom Matts at least and therefore, more cash. You know how many images I’ve actually framed? Not many.

The image below was used in a “Critique Night” at my local club and it was suggested to me that the photo may be stronger if I brought the bottom up a little closer to the cliff. Originally, I left a significant strip of water between the camera and the cliff. I gave it a look when I got home and this is the result.

As always, would love to hear comments and constructive criticism.

Why should I print Photographs?

In the beginning, photography was a print media for the most part. People shared their photographs as prints, they put together photo albums, we all had them in our homes and from time to time, we would flip through them remembering the times or the people in the photographs. With the switch over to digital, a few things changed with it. People began taking more pictures for one thing, but more importantly, they don't print very much any more. Your town or city has definitely seen a decline in places where you can even print images these days. There is something about actually holding a photograph in your hands and viewing it that just doesn't compare to any computer screen or even projection of the image. To me, the print is the finished product of photography.

Another interesting thing to keep in mind is that some storage medias aren’t going to last forever. For instance, CD/DVDs are subject to possible degradation, especially the cheaper ones. All the more reason to print up some photos! My wife and I have begun to print some special examples for our walls. It looks great and we get to remember great times via these prints. We also have been known to give away a print or two as well. I strongly recommend printing some images, big or small to enjoy, after all that’s what we produce them for, isn’t it?