2014 Resolutions

Over the last few days I've been reading a lot of 'Best Of' blog entries by fellow photographers and one thing is striking me more then ever. A lot of people had fantastic years! And most of them produced a body of work that I really enjoyed reviewing.

It's also a tradition for me to post a blog in the first week of January with my resolutions for the coming year. I believe it is a great exercise to think about your goals as much as it is to think about your photography. Goals give you targets to focus your energy towards. Maybe those goals can guide you back to your photographic path if you ever find yourself stuck in a rut.

Over the past week or so, I've been giving this a lot of thought. Here goes.

My resolutions for 2014 are:

- Start photographing in 4x5. 
My medium format gear is tucked away right now and I am not going to use it this year at all. I believe that if you want to accomplish something major, one must concentrate fully on the task at hand. When I switched over from digital to medium format, I lugged both cameras around in the beginning. Let me tell you, what a waste of time. Now, it's 4x5 and nothing else. I anticipate starting to photograph in the next few weeks. I got a few nicknacks left to buy (a loupe and dark cloth) and then I am ready to rock and roll.

- Write my first photographic article.
I got to say that I've been wanting to do this for quite some time now but I never found the strength to actually follow through. SO that is a big reason why I'm putting this on the list.

- More magazine features.
Magazine features became a very important tool for me to share my work last year. I want to continue on that trend.

- More submissions to galleries.
And maybe find another gallery or two that could potentially represent my work.

- Meet fellow togs.
Meet more photographers and befriend them. A no-brainer really.

- Print the work I feel strongest about more. 
We can stare at our work on computer screens all day long but that doesn't make it a photograph. A print is what actually defines a photograph. I need to do more printing.

- Teach and talk.
I'd like to continue the trend of teaching workshops once in a while and speak in public about photography. About what drives us to do what we do. Doing the preparations for these talks teaches me so much about my own work. It's an exercise of 'inner reflection' really. You should try it one day.

Those are the areas I want to focus upon this year.
I would love to hear what your plans are for 2014.

From Can to Can't

Before I move onto part 2 of my trip to Belgium I want to share this with you.

Last Friday I stumbled upon a song on YouTube that I had completely forgotten about. Although recorded very recently, I've only heard the song (before Friday) maybe half a dozen times on the radio. I should say satellite radio. The reason why I listen to satellite radio in my car is because most radio stations here in Calgary have gone hipster. There's one rock 'n roll station out here and it plays very little new rock. And by rock I mean the real rock, not folk rock, indie rock, alt rock, or anything else hipster.

Anyway. Too much details.

So the song I heard was called "From Can to Can't" and was recorded by Corey Taylor (Slipknot, Stone Sour), Dave Grohl (Nirvana, Foo Fighters), Rick Nielsen (Cheap Trick) and Scott Reeder (Kyuss, The Obsessed). Four great musicians with an especially talented vocal artist in my opinion. I LOVE Corey's voice (totally in a very manly way of course).

Here's the un-synchronized video for it.



The song is featured in the movie 'Sound City' and is Dave Grohl's documentary about the legendary studio with the same name. Grohl acquired some of the equipment before Sound City closed up shop. He was inspired to tell the story of that place by just the shear history that place had. The amount of platinum records that came out of that place (and probably the fact the Nevermind was recorded there).

If you really have 20 minutes to spare, check out the making of/behind the scenes of how this song came together. I find it very fascinating to see artists in their moment. I especially enjoyed Nielsen doing the solo. Man he was playing his heart out. Loved it



The reason why I bring this up is because of the following, and the subtitle of the movie already says it best "Real to Reel".

And check out the trailer before you read on.



Here are a few quotes from the trailer that stuck with me.

1. "I heard some young guy in a band say: you don't have to practice anymore. You just slice it up into a computer and it comes out perfectly"
2. "In this age of technology, where you can manipulate anything, how do we retain that human element (in music)?" 
3. "Be true to yourself and make music that you love" 
4. "How do we keep music to sound like people"

All these quotes touched me deeply. Change the word music into photography and the same quotes can apply to what we do today.

Quote 1 and 2 could apply to Photoshop for example and how you can simply pick good elements from 10 photographs and combine them into one photograph. Requires very little vision. You just combine after the fact and fake it. This sadly has become the norm in 'commercial' landscape photography these days. For examples of what I mean, pick any edition of Outdoor Photographer for example. Everything is so highly saturated and over sharpened it hurts my eyes. Not to mention the amount of exclamation marks on their covers. It really is ridiculous. I can't believe I once swore by this magazine to point me in the right direction.

Quote 3 has to basically do with your interests. Do what you love (photograph what you love) and everything will flow naturally.

Quote 4 again applies to digital manipulation beyond the normal: contrast, exposure and dodging and burning. How do we keep the integrity of our work intact when we can manipulate everything and anything in our work? It's one of the reasons why I stepped back to film.  And ultimately want to make silver gelatin prints again.

I want to follow my gut in deciding what to do in the darkroom (and not measure, and let numbers or auto masks decided for me) where to dodge and burn for example. The coordinated dance of movement of hands and dodging and burning tools is something I look forward to. And of course the magic when a photograph plops onto the paper in a development tray. Now THAT is fascinating stuff.

You might think I'm stuck in the past. Romanticizing film photography. And that I keep forgetting about the fact that everything is faster, quicker, simpler, easier today.

Sure it is. Sure I am.

But the whole point I'm trying to make is that photography doesn't have to be perfect. Photography doesn't NEED to be perfect. Something in my opinion, a lot of photographers are forgetting about these days. I believe a photograph looses it's magic when you delete all human flaws it contains.

“Have no fear of perfection - you'll never reach it.” — Salvador Dali
There. That's my thought of the day. :)