We live, we share

Human beings are for many photographers the main subject of their images, whereas in my photography, humans are often just simply part of a more general composition. Having spent several months in Japan, I feel how humanist photography is something I have neglected for so long.

The picture above shows a couple of young Japanese people watching the great summer fireworks festival in Nagoya, central Japan. It was very warm that night and several hundred thousand people had gathered at the harbour area to watch the astonishing show of light and music in the summer sky. Although this spectacle was easily the most impressive fireworks show I had ever seen, in retrospective, this is the principle photograph I personally retain from the event because of the human nature within it.

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More than the sum

Since LvxPhotography.net went online about two years ago, my biggest personal motivation was to learn how to write meaningful texts about particular images and ideas I discovered in photography. Most times I choose an image that makes me think of a concept, then I write a brief text and after a few revisions I post it online. However, I often still have difficulties to express myself in words as to why I would like to post something like this collage you see above.

This collage shows three impressions from Japan in an unconventional format. The ensemble is more than the sum of each part and also remindes myself that, after all, photography is more about feeling than about words.

The blue hour

The so-called blue hour is a concept that shows well how natural light coming from the sky changes over time. Each minute throughout the day natural light changes and thus contrast, shadows, colors and tones of photos. Some landscape photographers rightfully claim that, when the sky is clear, great pictures can only be taken after sunrise or before sunset, when the light is soft and the colors are warm. In urban environments, the blue hour is a very particular time to photograph cityscapes in the timeframe between sunset and the darkness of the night.

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Those damn tourists ?

When Japanese tourists travel through Europe, they seem to spent their whole time taking pictures completely banal stuff as if everything was exciting and worth capturing. A lot of people have this stereotype image of Asian tourists. We smile, perhaps thinking how ridiculous their touristic behaviour is. But it’s not that simple.

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High Key | Low Key

Some photographic image are not only describable by it’s composition, content, context, colors but in terms of what I call “the look”. There are many looks (or styles) of images I can think of, such as the grainy look from old film, the Polaroid look with it’s crappy colors, the sepia look, the blurry look and much more. Many magnificent photographers, like Martin Parr for example, have a look to their image, that is even unique to them. It’s about styling an image up to be visually different from the standard settings through colors, techniqual tweaks and exposures.

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Craftsmanship

Photoshop is something I have never really gotten into. For a long time I thought the program was something for graphic designers and that photographers don’t necessarily need it, since Photoshop goes much deeper than any photograph would require. Additionally, I didn’t like the idea of manipulating images in a way, that you delete objects on your photo, strech out pieces of land and sky to remove unwanted things from your landscape, or even change the shape of peoples faces and bodies etc.

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Demand and Supply

This is a test for a standard wordpress excerpt in my theme

Photography has come  a long way since it was invented over one and a half centuries ago. Photographs are produced and consumed for private, professional and artistic purposes. When you think of photographs as a product for visual consumption (memories, decoration, entertainment, documentation etc.) you can also look at them from an economic perspective, namely in terms of demand and supply.

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Joy and Pain | More than just a game

When it is time for the soccer world cup, it turns out, that soccer is more than just a game. Victory is great, defeat painful. But what could hurt me personally the most, in a moment of great victory? Click on the title to read the full article.

I could talk for hours about the FIFA World Cup that takes place once in every four years. Now, after everything is over, one sentence will always stay in my head: “It’s more than just a game”. When emotions of joy get out of hand, a good photographer can always seize the opportunity to capture motion and emotion. Continue reading “Joy and Pain | More than just a game”

Photographers are Chronists

In my previous post I talked about the value  that (touristic) images have and how it fades away when a motive is too well known. A very important concept to understand, is that most photographs are actually documentary material that reflect the time they were taken and the author. This gradually gets more interesting, the older the pictures get. At some point, people care less and less for technical and esthetic quality, but are simply delighted to see a little treasure from past times. So we have growing value of “banal” documentary photographs with age. Continue reading “Photographers are Chronists”

Postcards | Tourists | Value

Isn’t the first picture just amazing? It’s a beautiful view of Angkor Wat on a lightly clouded day with beautiful reflections in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Does the first image look familiar to you? Even if you have never even heard of Angkor Wat you might have seen this image and that is excactly the problem. It’s the same motive that every tourist (millions per year) has taken for over a hundred years. The perspective may vary slightly, but essentially it’s always the same.  Continue reading “Postcards | Tourists | Value”