having a camera doesn't make you a photographer.

we live in the digital camera age:
everyone has a camera, and pictures are posted left and right on sites everywhere.

but just because you have a camera doesn't make you a photographer.

let me hammer down on one aspect in particular: "digital photography" and more specifically, "concert photography"

to me, taking pictures at a concert was just that. not an art, just a hobby, or a way of remembering a night out. but apparently, that's where i'm wrong.

story time:

sure i'm no professional photographer, but it's something i enjoy, and something i look at as a form of art.
i take mostly black and white (not c-41, mind you), and most of the time self-process both my film and prints, although i hate processing film. it takes a long time and the chemicals are smelly, and it's really easy to screw up your whole roll, which is one of the saddest things ever. by the way, i use a manual canon AE-1, if that means anything.

and i don't just take pictures of anything. i am quite picky. when i'm not snapping portraits of homeless people, i compose photographs anally, making sure my model is dressed how i see fit and the background and lighting is perfect. i am a perfectionist. and consequently a pain in the butt.

it all becomes worth it when i'm soaking my photo paper in the developer and seeing my image slowly creep onto the paper. that's what i live for. thats where i feel like i've truly created something.


now, i know i'm rambling a bit, but i have a point, i promise:

how can i classify my work (an that of other true photographers) as art
if kids snapping pictures at concerts on their digitals consider theirs art as well?

hmm. not so sure.
but i am sure that other photographers will second me on that.

now i dont mean that digital photography cannot be art. sure it can! people spend hours photoshopping images and adding effects to make something that film cannot even comprehend! i respect that.
even more so, it's the subject matter of the photographs, the composition, the angles, the lighting: digital certainly can be considered art. i have nothing against that.

its just when nothing of yourself is put into the photograph, no life, no personality, no meaning.
that's what i dont get.


LAME.



the bird and the bee- i hate camera
the faint-some incriminating photographs
braid-killing a camera
spoon-i turn my camera on