about photographs, practice and the machine

A bit of history

My camera shelf is changing.

When a friend (check out Mark Foard's work; you won't be sorry) brought me back to photography seven years ago, I bought a used micro four thirds from him and added a couple of used lenses. Not long after, I bought a more "professional" body, again used and still in micro four thirds. All the while, the "full sensor" crowd did a decent job of tapping into my sense of inadequacy.

I may be stubborn. I may be slow on the uptake. I stuck with what I had and added more lenses.

Earlier this year, I closed my Instagram account and my Google accounts. I work here and on Frames.

Last month, I took out the OM2n my brother-in-law passed along and shot film for the first time in twenty-five years. And last week....

Last week I went full circle, in a sense.
Forty years ago, I shot film with a Yashica SLR, then made no photographs for decades.
The Yashica Mat 124G is a medium format film camera. So back to film and yes, to a larger capture medium.

Limitation

But there is more to this as I see it.

Limitation is not a bad thing.

I can't control more than few variables. I can't think of more than a couple at a time.
But I do want to affect what I make and that involves some measure of "control".

Every beginning photographer learns about the fundamental elements of that control (at least as far as light is concerned): aperture, shutter speed and ISO/ASA.

Automation

I'm not sure that holds for most any longer. The computation in any relatively current digital camera or phone camera is as pervasive as it is effective. Wonderful as it is, it shapes output.
AI "photographs" flood the zone and so does AI editing. (I use inverted commas above because AI images are never photographs in the common sense: no light was captured by any means to "create" them).

Clearly, I am not in the mainstream here. Along with an increasing number of others, I am paddling against the current.

Presence and the struggle for our attention

But why?

I can't claim any forethought about this. Neither am I working out of a developed theoretical framework. But I do have some ideas.

As I mentioned, limitation has its advantages.
Ari Jaaksi speaks eloquently to this. And his photographs are personal and beautiful.
Or look at Søren K. Harbel's photographs. He has shot with a single body and lens for years. The results speak to his craft and insight.

Limitation gets us back in the game. It slows the process. It demands more attention. It demands intentionality. It demands presence.

AI claims to eliminate limitation.
I won't comment on AI's claim to "intelligence", but my intuition is that it's more adept at reconfigured regurgitation.

Here is the problem, no matter how great the AI photograph or text may be:

what happens to my authorship, to my practice, to my attention, to my workflow?

More seriously for me, what happens to my dialogue with you, the viewer?

And where do new insights and creations come from?
I can't avoid the feeling that I am being asked to give up my soul. I know, drama....

That's a rough sketch of my aversion to automation that takes over my practice and my intuition that a return to the limited and analogous is what I need.

Beyond individual practice

There are other reasons to eschew AI. It is controlled by an ever diminishing number of individuals whose aims appear to be antidemocratic and, even at the level of discourse, totalitarian.
I like to be able to speak. I want to hear from my fellows, from you, as YOU speak.

If that weren't enough, AI may well be the proverbial straw that broke the environmental camel's back. This short video from the New York Times tells the story all too clearly.

So

Here are some digitally made photographs from the last couple of weeks. They were shot on an iPhone in Lightroom. Make of that what you will in the context of this letter.
I am waiting for the analog films to be developed. I am not retreating into some delusional nostalgia for a pre-digital practice. I will continue to work with digital (but likely not AI) tools.

I am learning already, though. And it's engaging and fun.

There is peace after social media.

There is time to be jealously carved out and experienced outside the machine (well partially outside, at least).

Thank you for reading. Thank you for being here.

Be well.

I am always interested in your thoughts. Please leave a comment or send me a message at photosmm@pm.me.

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