Jamie Leigh

                          Cambridge City, Indiana

Lodge Hall No. 252

                          College Corner, IN / OH.

You only get better as a photographer if you spend time photographing.

More practice usually means that your body learns subconscious corrections during wanderings while your brain does some iterative trial and error with new techniques, layering them in with tried and true techniques. Over time your hands and feet and your brain develop a feel for images that makes your photography more fluid and enjoyable. 

 

Do Not Enter

                                                           College Corner, IN./OH.

Monday Morning Coffee: Reality

 

Intended to write about Content.

 

You know - In media production and publishing, Content is information and experiences that may provide value for an end-user audience.

 

Then decided that might have recovered enough to be able to "walk about" and capture a few images. An important event which requires a careful choice of tools. Now most of the recent work - before hip problems - has been using Panasonic digital cameras and lenses - fine light weight selection of cameras and lenses. Equipment that could be easily carried and used.

 

This “walk about” required my best equipment and decided to select my

Nikon kit. Gathered the Nikon cameras and lenses and put them in a Domke bag as usual and headed for the car. Never made it. Way too heavy. Now what - go back, pick up the Panasonic kit and move ahead or forget about it?

 

Time for coffee and reflection. Now what? What's important here? What are we after? 

 

Caught between a couple of thoughts - content/craft. In a bit of wedge.

 

 

 Craft puts you in complete control over everything from the way your content gets presented to how it meets the end-user audience.

 

Important to me - having spent some 60 years "working" on my black and white analog photography skills. Time to rethink.

 

Short story - made a decision to use a lightweight 35mm format SLR system and return to film and the darkroom.

 

More to come.

 

Fish Fry Every Fri

                                                                                                      Bartonie, Ohio.

City Court

                                                           Union City, Indiana/Ohio

TGIF: Return

                Amish School

Enough downtime already.  With the aid of a monopod/cane, picked up the camera bag and headed out the door towards the car.  Today we photograph! 

The first new image in over a year is important.  Subject should be chosen with care.  What is selected should illustrate how time away was spent, in addition to a return to active photography. 

In many ways this return is a fresh beginning.  Having spent some eighteen months viewing - not making - photographs, ideas and feelings as to what is important have grown and in some cases changed.  This time away from producing photographs to viewing others work has been an opportunity to study and review with the goal of enriching future results.

I have been in school and am now ready to apply what has been learned.

TGIF: Plan B

In athletics, the advice often given is to play your game.  This is good advice until an opponent is able to understand what you are about and has an “answer” for what you are doing.  This is when you need a Plan B.

In the last few years, professional photography has turned out to be a hard way to earn a living.  Some photographers continued what they had been doing for the last twenty or thirty years.  Now hard copy outlets like newspapers, magazines and catalogs are fading away as more and more folks obtain information electronically. The result was that as their photographic  markets vanished so did they.    They needed a Plan B.

A few photographers changed direction, reinvented themselves and offered solutions to serve the new electronic world. Video and web production were added to or replaced still photography offerings.  New markets opened up and they have been successful.

In today’s world you can’t remain in the past.   What worked yesterday needs to be updated or replaced.  Need to grow, refine, vary and improve your offerings.  

The advice – play your game – is still good advice.  What has to change is your game.

 Plan B: Update your game.