Orderly, Oddly or not!

Everything in order, everything at its place, this is the world like I prefer to be in theory as in practice! If you know the fictional character Hercule Poirot of Agatha Christie, you understand exactly my state of mind. And contrary to that many may pretend, even (true) nature is in fact in some kind of order. There is a graphic logical sense that you can observe all around this material universe surrounding us.

The proportions are part of it. The equilibrium is a must requirement. Opposite contrasts are a necessity. Light distribution and detail rendering are fundamental quality criteria. The careful deep of field application is an essential exercise. In brief, photography is an orderly visual art. There is no such totally improvised world where elements are simply positioned by chance because attractions and interactions are the base of everything and have started right from the Big Band.

And order also means comfort, pleasing sight, secure state that we can appreciate every day and try to enhance every time we can!

Time flies (over my head)!

Time flies over my head

Time flies over my years
Time flies over my life
Time flies over my accomplice wife
Time flies over my friends, over my family, over my love ones
Time flies over my mind
Time flies over time!

Overcast and stormy future times ahead

 

We are entering the fall season (October 2021) with more apprehension that we were expecting to have few months ago. Yes, many things in this world seem to finally be set on the positive way but many others are waiting to be addressed after the sanitary world crisis. For example, even if travelling is now partially available, we are far from the previous recent era of easy multiple destinations at low rates and open possibilities. Certain parts of the planet are still almost "sealed" and many people fear the uncertainty of the foreign health conditions.

Photography also reflects about that unpredictable future. For one, candid photography has become more difficult to realize and defiance is shared by the population as by the different authorities. The place for spontaneity has been replaced by a general skepticism again photographers, and those who want to be seen, want it only to their selected own angle of view. For sure the "selfie-planet" have not vanished in a glimpse of the eye, but plasticity has taken the place of ingenuity.

It is not hard to say that something is missing in the present photographic world such as its originality, its impact, its disturbance. What we are seeing today is picture product that have never been so predictable to match the suppose general expectation and part of the responsibility of this phenomenon should be assumed by the different plate-forms that are diffusing the photographic content. Nobody want to derange, and everybody want to be "liked". Hopefully, photography, in the past, was able to escape sometimes and in some ways the boring diktat of the general rule of beloved.

So, what is pending ahead for the photographers? We hope a better open-mindedness from our fellow people into the context of their surrounding world assorted with curiosity and desire to experiment instead of repeating the same preconceived ideas about life and its universe. Let's hope of this for our own photographic creative sake!

On the line of the (foto) duty

 

The golden crossbars

The hook and the ballybar

The far unfocus bar

I'm not a collector, for sure! (... or not!)

Photography can be one of the most accurate "time-machine"
over other kind of archival documentation.

 This is something I am not, to be a collector because accumulating things that I will never further use is not my thing! Take, for example, books. During all my modest (intellectual!) life, I have always been cheering to read new books, magazines, newspapers, etc. But I won’t invest to a personal library considering the obvious ecliptic of my various choices of subjects. Therefore, since a very young age, I am found of scholar or public libraries that are so full of different written opportunities to discover.

Working in the photographic business has been a good way to try several camera models and different photo techniques. And I did as an in-house or specialized news photographer, as an agent for camera gear compagnies, even as a photographic teacher or monitor. Almost all camera models have an interesting and different perspective on how to use them. This differentiation is forcing you to invest on a learning curve and to try getting pictures on your taste if possible. What this phenomenon of collecting is teaching us? First, I would mention modesty on a technical and creative points of view because it is up to us to be able to extract the real potential of a camera model even for the simple ones.

Paper has been the favorite photographic picture support
 with a very good potential longevity. 

Secondly, it emphasizes how the race to upgrade the photographic tool is never ended and how it is hard to follow this pace over the years. The big bang of migrating from the traditional analog photography to the digital era is a strong illustration of the technical photographic advancement that have changed many strong but past habits among photographers. Yes, you can ask you about the necessity to be involved in that continuous race, but we are always surprised that new technologies will enhance our creativity to new frontiers like, for example, the availability and ease to succeed using photography in low light condition.

Thirdly, there is also an esthetic view about photographic devices that you cannot ignore. Those "fashion" trends are present in our society for decades if not centuries. Man-made or designed objects are a true cultural expression of our human civilization. They represent artefacts that can explain the structure and organization of our living world especially for those in the future that will be tempting to understand our way of life.

If we have been in the past impenitent collectors in face of this world, we are now frenetic consumers that are literally creating a horrendous amount of wasted material that eventually pollute our fragile surrounding. By having no real long-term respect for thing that have initially fulfill our ephemeral desires, we are destroying our own evolution for an uncertain and none-definite future. Billions of cameras (as for electronic devices) have been discarded over the decades (especially the most recent ones) for many futile reasons outside our true needs.

History is often about a heritage of many things but the lack of historical interest in our present world could be scaring at a point that it may questioning the longevity of this human civilization. We have to pay respect of our past and invest more in collecting objects and representations that illustrate our historical path. And photography is part of it...