Hmm… I sense that art/photography post I want to do is definitely getting closer. Thanks.

I confess that I have actually done little to nothing to my pictures taken in the past with my digital point-and-shoot cameras (Canons A95 & A630). First, there is only so much you can do to a jpg file in the first place, but more importantly I have simply been capturing a moment for posterity. Most of my pictures are of family, friends and the pets (which I photograph the most – as you can see by my new header – that’s Maggie) and as I’m simply recording for posterity the overall quality of any given picture isn’t too important. It’s the captured memory that is important.

That said, I fully intend to continue to take pictures of the same with my Canon 40D in hopes that I will get better pictures primarily thanks to the much faster response of the camera to the pressing of the shutter release. I’ve missed so many opportunities because the point-and-shoot cameras are so much slower to actually ‘snap’ the picture. However, I also intend to start photographing new things in an attempt to be artful, if you will, with photography.

I wonder if we haven’t much thought of photography as art because we consider pictures to be snapshots of a moment in time? We think of them as being meant to capture information (a birthday party, the cat playing with a toy, etc.) as opposed to capturing a mood, or better put, conveying a mood or event. Or am I even making sense?

On another yet related matter… photography as art. This has been the topic of an off/on discussion/debate I’ve had with a mate, emerging from which has come the realisation that I’ve never really thought the issue through to any great extent, but have tended to not regard photography as art.
Having started to give some thought to it I find (typical me) that I think I’m probably changing my opinion, and I have every intention to at some point in the not-too-distant future set pen to paper (um… finger to keyboard) and through the medium of a post here see if I can make some sense of my rather confused thoughts.

In support of your new found acceptance of post-processing consider all that one does during pre-processing or better put, the process one takes to frame, compose and set camera options before shooting the picture. We utilize all sorts of devices and take advantage of all sorts of techniques to create the picture. We use a flash to lift shadows or to simply make it possible to take a picture if it’s too dark. We make adjustments to aperture to change depth-of-field. We change shutter speeds to add motion or to remove it. And with digital photography we can change sharpness, hue, saturation, sensitivity, white balance, etc. all in advance of pressing the shutter release. I actually find it incredibly liberating as for the first time in my life I have been able to play with various settings and see the results immediately, which helps me ascertain what does and doesn’t work under given circumstances. In my film days I simply couldn’t afford to pay for a roll of film and have it developed only to find a handful of useful pictures (and as you mention I would have no idea what the settings were that resulted in the good pictures!).

While I abhor folks who say things like “Don’t worry about it. I can fix that in post-processing.”, because I believe one should strive to get the picture ‘right’ from the start (and therefore not rely on software to fix what could have been done right to begin with), post-processing does have its place in photography in my opinion. And this is certainly true when one views photography as art as opposed to the citizen journalist.

It’s nice to see that other folks wrestle with the same issues as have I and perhaps more importantly come to the same conclusions.