Crammond Tower

Sometimes I think I see the world in a way that no camera can.

I see things that I think are interesting, compositions that I like, then I point a camera at them. Through the viewfinder, seeing with one eye only, the scene flattens out. The colours flatten. Motions, however tiny, are frozen. Shadows and highlights are blunted by dynamic range. I press the shutter release more in hope than expectation, but the magic I see with my eye was never destined to work in photographic form. At least it was never going to work for me, with my limited skills and knowledge of the art.

Sometimes I wonder if beauty is cumulative. Many times I walk or drive somewhere and think "this is beautiful", but when I start framing stills in my mind I can't find a composition that matches what I sense.

Today was such a day. In my minds eye I had the shot framed before I arrived here. I looked and saw my blip, but the camera couldn't capture what I saw.

When I dissembled, when I stripped away the smell of pollen, the warmth of the sun, the buzzing of bugs, and the chorus of birds the spell broke for me too. The light was poor, the sky dull, the scene flat and devoid of shadows to give depth. I blink a few times to shake my mind free and I'm back enjoying my experience of the place, but the blink of the cameras shutter doesn't liberate the camera... It still tells its own story.

I don't like the photo because it is completely disconnected from the experience I was having when I took it. So I have bent it to my will. Now at least it looks like a cartoon of what I felt, even if it is no literal representation.

Pretentious? Moi?


and now for something completely different

I have posted a couple of back blips:

Saturday: Experiment
Sunday: Blue...