Why take a photogaph?

Sorry if this seems a daft question, but what are you aiming for when you take a picture?

Are you trying to record something faithfully, or are you trying to produce a piece of art?

To give you a little information, I have for most of my life been an engineer. I deal with facts and rules and appreciate it when problems are that simple. I have no artistic bent or talent.

Another of my hobbies is Hifi. Here, I face a similar dilemma. Am I trying to reproduce an accuratecopy of the original sound or am I trying to produce a sound I like? Paradoxically, I tend toward the latter.

What are you trying to achieve by taking a photo?

Both, but not usually at the same time.

Personally I'd like to do both but not necessarily at the same time.

I'd like to be able to record a moment in time in a documentary sense which is accurate and also captures the spirit of that moment. And on other occasions be able to capture something, anything, that is aesthetically satisfactory.

I don't think I could ever aspire to do both at the same time.

Mike

I'm in the "both" camp too.

If I'm, for instance, taking photos for an eBay listing I'm striving for an accurate and truthful representation.

If I'm shooting a portrait then I'm hoping to achieve something that's flattering to the subject.

And as far as Hi-Fi goes I'm in the camp that uses equipment that produces a sound I like. Not sure Hi-Fi and photography are truly comparable though as listening to music is often a solitary exercise whereas photographs tend to be shared, hence with the latter there's a greater emphasis on trying to please others as well as yourself.

An interesting question that gets right to the point. As mentioned, some photograps are purely factual, such as an eBay listing. Others capture a moment, either as documentary (war pictures for example) or as a social record (say a wedding). Other images tend towards art and a means to express our feelings about a subject. Here accuracy in the recording of an image is less important than the emotional content.

Many of us do all of these things some of the time. A few photographers specialise in one area.

Whatever you do, as long as it gives satisfaction to yourself and/or the viewer then it's fulfilling its purpose.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and...well...my spelling sukz....

As a photograph is different things to different people,I believe that it's very difficult to catogorise.
A photograph is an instant captured by the mind's eye, and recorded by the camera.
It could be a landscape, or a portrait, or just something extraordinary, that the photgrapher wishes to record.
It might not appeal to some, but to others it may be stunning.

Some portraits are real "works of art", the difference being, that the "artist",has used a camera, instead of brushes and paints,but never the less, it's just as artistic.
So I would say that if a scene, or a subject, pleases, or interests you, capture it, as it may be gone in an instant, but you have the ability to capture it for ever.
And being Digital you can always erase it, at your leisure!

I am doing both as well. Most of the time I try to recreate my impression at the moment. This means not faithful recording only (though that usually is a prerequisite) but trying in post processing to create an image that, when viewed by me, makes me think "Yes, this was the feeling when I viewed this." (Of course I know that this is not a faithful recording of the scene.)

To say it with Don, here is an example.
This is a shot of Waimea canyon, RAW developed with SilkyPix Standard settings:
[IMG]http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t5/Prieni/_RDP2816aswas.jpg[/IMG]
So this would most probably pass as faithful recording.
But as a viewer of the scene my brain does some clever image processing of the scene and it looks more like this:
[IMG]http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t5/Prieni/_RDP2816.jpg[/IMG]
So for me this is the more truthful recording of the scene.

And then there are scenes where I imagine what the image potentially could look like with some kind of processing. Here is an example (though I have to admit that I didn't envisage the post processed version at the time of taking).

This is a shot of gondolas in Venice. It already is a bit of "enhanced" reality of the scene at the time I would say:
[IMG]http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t5/Prieni/IMGP5548.jpg[/IMG]

While that captured the scene as I saw it pretty good, this is what ended up on the wall:
[IMG]http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t5/Prieni/IMGP5548PU.jpg[/IMG]
And I think it is a better representation of the scene and mood. (Of course this is true for me and might not be true for others.)

So, this is over 4000 words now (4 pics plus my ramblings), I better end it here.

Prieni

There are many different forms of photography just as there are various types of engineering.
Some engineers build bridges and hope they will stay up, and some of us take photographs in the hope that someone will want to "put them up"

From a personal point when I take a photograph I try to achieve something that is produced by the camera and not by computer software, though many will argue that software is just what produces the image in the camera in the first place

Photography is many things to as many people and I'm sure that many of us try to include and artistic element into our snaps, just like Engineers do when building bridges.

Prieni has given good examples, how the brain makes tricks.

Too often my brain adds tons of memories to my photo, so that I see much nicer photo than the others. I see my memories, feelings, situations.
The aim should be to make the pic so fine, that people who havent seen the real sight, see what I saw.
So, every photo should be more or less artistic. Or it wouldnt be much to see for the others.

Thats why it is so good to hear comments and also critics. It makes me to see with the eyes of others. It may sometimes to be like "waking up".

I am happy when I once reach this point.

Would, " I don't know" be a useful answer.

I just wanted to take photographs which accurately represented what I saw, in a manner which others would want to see.

I too come from a "non-artistic" background and have really struggled with trying to get arty. But, what I've found is that when I try to push myself to be a bit more arty, then others are more likely to like what I've done.

So, in short: I am trying to faithfully reproduce something in an artistic manner.

I'd also add an 'inner need' to share what I've seen with family / friends. Then there's a 'family pictures' category, so I can send my parents pictures of their grandchildren

Personally I'm constantly amazed at how spectacular nature can be and try to catch it at it's best and do it some justice with my photography. Unfortunately it doesn't always work, nature is much more talented than I am !!

Three reasons:

1) The vast majority of my photography has been of bits of archaeology (from churches to coins!) for lecturing, as a matter of record and/or publication.

2) The "hobby" side of my photography is trying to create images I (and others) like and hopefully one or two that might be good enough to go on the wall. Whereas with (1) I am trying to have even light and minimal distortion in (2) I may play with extreme wide angle, contre jour lighting, or anything else that makes it a more interesting photo. There is some cross over. I hate converging verticals in architectural photos, for example, whether taken for (1) or (2).

3) In a vain attempt to win a PUG competition.

Cheers, Kris.

I think reasons change over time. For example, when I took my first pictures I was conscious of the cost of film and hoped that "they all came out," rather than anything else. Then colour film became more available and so subjects tended to be chosen for their range of, or difference in, colour.

Slide film brought another completely different dimension, allowing your efforts to be examined at previously-unattainable sizes. However, here again there was an element of hope that they reproduced what you saw.

The digital age has yet again revolutionised things. Cost is no longer a consideration (when it comes to film), you can usually see if it "came out" how you wanted it and post-processing adds yet another dimension. It's becoming more difficult on some occasions to "compose in the viewfinder" rather than simply bang off a range of exposures and focal lengths, deciding later on the computer screen if they "came out" OK and tweaking them if they didn't.

The bottom line, for me, has become a photograph that - both for myself and others - becomes a talking point, one way or another.

Ray.