RE: [Leica] Intimacy with long lenses....

["B. D. Colen" <BDColen@earthlink.net>]

> This is one reason it is so hard to edit your own film. When one has gone
> to great lengths to make a particular photo, then you think it is a great
> shot, when the better one is actually the one where you simply stood
> there and made the photo with little relative effort.
>
Harrison - I know. I think this question of photographer intent v. what the
photo really conveys is one of the great generally undiscussed topics in
photo journalism/documentary/ street photography. You may or may not
remember some discussion on the list a while back about an on-line photo
Zine that some kids had started which included their coverage of the Million
Man March....I made the observation that I felt the photos were very
mundane, and that they didn't in any way match their captions. I said I
thought this was an MTV generation problem, a failure to understand that a
still photo is a static image that stands entirely on its own - the
photographer may have "Seen," experienced, heard, smelled, what ever, what
he photographed, but all that ends up in the final print is what the light
passing through the lens placed on the film.

I remember, a zillion years ago as a kid in high school, taking school
newspaper and yearbook photos of hockey games and wishing there was some way
my photos could convey the sound of the music on the PA system at the rink,
the sounds of the skates on the ice, the Whappp! of the player's hitting the
boards. Well, they couldn't. Film can. Video can. Still photos can't. Still
photos can have unparalleled emotional and visual impact - far greater than
that of film because they are in front of us longer and can be observed and
contemplated longer. But they remain still. And photographers have to
remember that.