Week 4 Quotes

“Look at the things around you, the immediate world around you,” he said. “If you are alive, it will mean something to you, and if you care enough about photography, and if you know how to use it, you will want to photograph that meaningness.”

Paul Strand's quote is stating that if you are passionate about photography it will show in your work. He is stating that when you care about photography there are pictures every where around you.


“Your photography is a record of your living--for anyone who really sees,” Strand said. “You may see and be affected by other people’s ways, you may even use them to find your own, but you will have to eventually free yourself from them.”

Paul is saying that no matter how influenced you are by others you and your photographs are unique to yourself. You will find your own style and way of doing things

Week 3 Quotes

The great end of education is, to discipline rather than to furnish the mind;
to train it to the use of its own powers, rather than fill it with the accumulations of others.


Tryon Edwards

Tyron's statement is Making the claim that education is more about training yourself to educate yourself and better yourself. It is a program that you enroll in to practice improving yourself.

The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance;
The wise grows it under his feet.

James Oppenheim

James' insight is to enjoy the fruits of your labor as you watch them blossom and grow. Don't wait to enjoy something until it is fully grown. I guess he is merely rewording the statement. "Life's a garden, dig it!"

Fall Colors, or colours if your Canadian

I did this short photo story on the colors that are all around us during this wonderful fall season. They are all around us and we sometime don't have the time, or if you are like me the attention span, to stop and smell the roses, no pun intended. Here are my photos from under the bridge by Spokane Falls Community College.

I recently learned that scientist still don't know why leaves change to a vibrant color of red in the fall. They have their guesses, but still no official word from them. Their best guesses are to warn off insects that might eat the leaves by using the color red to warn them off danger.

It always amazes me the beauty in the simplest things in nature. I love to go for walks and see the little things that most people will glass over. I love to look for the hidden beauty in life.

Week Two Quotes

“I visualize a story as a beaded necklace – a pearl necklace- coiled up in the muck at the bottom of the sludge collected at the bottom of your subconscious.  When you start yanking on the string, an old string that’s been rotting in the muck for years, the string breaks.  But you’ve got one gorgeous pearl left in your hands, and you’re motivated to roll up your sleeves and stick your hand down into the muck to find the rest of the pearls you just barely glimpsed. And one by one you fetch them up.  But without their string (the plot; the because-sequence is the string) they come up in a random order.  In fact, some of the pearls may not even belong to this necklace.

Eventually, when you’ve got them all, you can sit down and make the “outline” of the story.  You look at the pearls and your sense of ART tells you which ones go with which – by color and shape and texture and size –and you arrange a set of pearls so the big one is in the middle and the small ones on the end (or however your Art says to do it).  At that point, you know which pearls don’t belong on this necklace and set them aside.

C.J. Cherryh

What C.J. Cherryh is saying in this quote is that a story is a wonderful ting when it is complete and finished, but in order to get there you need to find each individual piece and sort through it all to find the order and complete the story.

“The method I use now is to present ideas through impressions. Readers immersed in the gradually unfolding impressions will form their own ideas, which might or might not be in agreement with the author’s; that is fine either way.  Ideas are like the string that turns the pearls into a necklace.  The string is invisible, but it is not dispensable and cannot be broken.”

A dialogue with MuXin

MuXin in stating a similar idea to C.J. Cherryh. The message is that there needs to be a solid underbody or guide to a story for it to be fluent and complete.

Week One Short Photo Story

New Life With a Newborn

Brian and Janae McGregor just recently were graced with the gift of a wonderful baby girl, Peyton Kiya McGregor. This short story is about their exciting new life, and how their everyday routine has dramatically changed.

 Now they have found a wonderful new lifestyle, and they are taking it all in. Peyton has changed their schedule dramatically between the constant feeding, changing, crying, and napping she takes up almost all of their time. They wouldn't have it any other way though.

 

Brian and Janae both are still getting used to having an extended family and recently being married, but they are as happy as ever. So here is to the happy family.

Week One Quotes

“Thinking should be done beforehand and afterwards - never while actually taking a photograph.  Success depends on the extent of ones general culture, on one’s set of  values, one’s clarity of mind and vivacity”

-Henri Cartier Bresson, 

Harpers Magazine, November 1961

What Henri is saying is that if you take time to pre visualize your next shoot, and time to reflect on the last shoot. You will grow mentally and professionally. It is centering your mind and preparing you mentally for anything you encounter.

“Pointing a camera at a live event is not journalism. Journalism is sifting the wheat from the chaff and selecting what to include and what to exclude and put things into some sort of perspective”

-Ted Koppel

Interviewed by Marvin Kalb

Ted Koppel is saying that we all have a general idea of what news looks like, but we need too show what no one has seen in the news before. We as photographers need to sift through what is mundane and repetitive and find the heart of the story that needs to be seen.

Let us first say what a photograph is not.  A photograph is not a painting, a poem, a symphony, a dance.  It is not just a pretty picture, not an exercise in contortionist techniques and sheer print quality.  It is, or should be, a significant document, a penetrating statement which can be described in a very simple term - selectivity”

-Bernice Abbot, 1951

Bernice abbot is saying that a photograph is a selective way of representing. A way of interpreting and displaying a point of view, or making a clear statement.