Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/12/20
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I have been giving this question quite some thought, and I think technique, though very necessary, is not the most important thing we can learn from photography. When I started photographing many years ago, technique was my middle name. I knew all the sunny/cloudy/whatever rules off by heart. I could talk, at great lengths, on the merits of various tranny/neg/developer combinations. I could split a subject into thirds with a golden meanness that took one's breath away. It took a personal tragedy (the nature of which I will not bore you with) occurring, resulting in me setting aside my cameras for a while, for me to realize what a profound change photography had wrought in me. When I look out my window now, I see a hedge, stripped by fall and winter into its seemingly dreary dormant state. At first it looks just brown but slowly as I LOOK shades of various browns, grays and muted greens appear. Meaninglessly tangled brush resolves itself into shapes that shift as I perceive each entangled layer interacting with those around it. I have no desire to photograph this, I just see it as I never would have before. Is there a photograph there? Is there a way to share the way I am seeing/feeling this hedge? Maybe, but for me, the fact of SEEING is more important than recording. I think this is what attracted me to the M cameras. There is nothing but a piece of glass, like the pane of a window, between me and the scene. The M viewfinder is like walking around with a pair of cropping "L"s. Just you and the scene, nothing changing or interfering with your vision. I hope that all of us on this list has the same feeling. I still remember the first time a pretty sunlit "field" suddenly resolved itself into a myriad of soft golden tones and shapes taking my breath completely away and leaving forever changed. John Technique Colier Bruce, you don't mind if I call you Bruce, wrote: > I know some of you must view your Leica as a means (the tool) to an end > (unique photographs). Equipment aside, I'm interested in what you think > the 2 or 3 most important techniques are that made your best pictures > your, well, best pictures. In other words, what have you learned/what > do you know now, that you wish you knew when you started?