Today we got our cameras, learned some basic camera operations and went off to shoot pictures. Unlike the writing, I learned new things from the first minute we were taught how to set and operate the camera.
We have to use manual focus which meant I took some blurry photos, but we were taught the relationship between aperture and shutter speed in a way that should help me take better photos.
Learning to be a better photographer will not change my uneasy philosophical relationship with photography itself.
When I first got into journalism in the late 70s, I was handed a camera and told to shoot pictures to go with my stories. I shot 400 ASA black and white film and shot from multiple angles so I could get one good shot in ten.
But the camera also changed my relationship with my subjects. Some people say the camera takes the soul of the person getting her picture taken. I think it takes the soul of the person taking the picture. When I interview a subject for an article I don't care what the person looks like. When I am looking for a photo subject, symmetry and beauty lead my criteria for a photo.
The world looks so different to a photographer than to a writer.
I want to keep the Biblical view: In the beginning was the Word. Let the words determine the photo.
