Motivation

What is it that drives us to create, to discover something new, or just want to keep learning? I go through periods of intense creativity and then long patches of the doldrums where noting seems to inspire. You would think after many years of making photographic images I would have a better understanding of the creative cycle and be more accepting of it, but I am not. I am sure most creative persons has asked themselves these types of question many times. How do we balance this cycle of the creative process? I think sometimes we need to step away from what we are doing and clear our minds of the pursuit we are on. Sometimes we are simply over trying and making ourselves frustrated. Second we all have the tendency to compare ourselves to others. It is easy in the current social media world to ask ourselves why do some people get all the attention and our work gets overlooked. That is another trap that will completely engulf you if you put your focus there. But then there is another aspect creatives all deal with. You ask yourself, "I've created so much stuff what is the point of making anymore"? Just yesterday I was going through some of my many archival boxes of my darkroom prints that were fully matted and ended up putting them in the trash can. Then today I am putting together this above image in a matte and a frame, and the haunting question came again, "why make more"? After so many years what is the point, no one is going to buy it, and it will end up in my closet with a bunch of others. But a voice in my head asked me "do you enjoy it"? and my answer was yes. So the voice said, then keep doing it. In life we need to focus on the journey and not the destination. As artist we are always looking for the completed piece but in our minds it is never truly completed. There is always something we could add or change, and that is ok. Just keep doing what brings you joy.

Tower Studio

Off the coast of Newfoundland is the island of Fogo. It has long been a fishing community and that is the main livelihood of the island for centuries. In the past few decades the fishing industry has been on the decline because of over fishing, but in the past couple of years it is showing signs renewed growth with the fishing regulations that were put in place to bring back the fish population. If you visit the island there are some interesting artist studios to visit with working arts. This one is called Tower Studio and is an oddly shaped building positioned in coastal landscape. I find doing an architectural study of these various odd shaped buildings gives me a new insight in how an abstract structure can be a place of quiet and peacefulness due to their unconventional design. We usually think of things in architecture as form over function. That concept is clearly apparent with this structure of making a creative space for artist to work . The building in itself it an expression of art.

Learning to wait

Learning to wait is a struggle for everyone. It rarely exists in a young child, but as we mature we hopefully develop an increased ability to wait and be patience. Living most of my 74 years in a very small town, waiting was seldom a concern because dealing with crowds and traffic was never an issue. My little town didn’t have a traffic light, and waiting in line to buy something was a rare event. Now living my retirement years in a community with a high density population, I have to learn to deal with waiting and the frustration that comes with that. It is a certaiinty that humans have little capacity to wait. I see it in nearly every situation I am in when out in public. Rude people are people who have no capacity to wait, and sadly as the speed of our lives quicken there will be more rude people to deal with in our lives. So how does all this refer to photography and the process to create? As photographers the more we learn to wait and be patience the better our work will become. Unlike other artist, we have to wait on the light, the weather conditions, and the potential obstacles to get to the location of where we want to make an image. Looking through the many years of the images I have made in various locations I think about the time that was required to get to the location and then wait for the good light to hopefully appear. I sort of equate photography with fishing. You buy all the right equipment. get up early and head out with great expectations for the day, but more times than not you come home empty handed. No fish or no photographs. In my early years this use to frustrate me as a wasted day with nothing to show for it. But as the years passed I realized that the special images, the true keepers, was well worth the wait an effort. Just like fishing, you always remember that big fish you once caught, and when heading out, that is hope and goal. You learn over time that if you come home empty handed it is all part of the experience of pursuing your passion. I made this image in Newfoundland on Fogo Island. I rolled out of my warm comfortable bed on a cool morning and drove out in the early morning light only to find a dense fog at the location I wanted to photograph in. A bit discouraging, but I waited as the sun started to rise over the North Atlantic ocean and burned through the fog. The image I was hoping for was turned out better than expected and it is all because I was willing to wait at the location.

A quiet time of day

I am always in search of a remote quiet location to do my photography. The stillness lets me take my time to connect with the environment that I am in. I don't like rushing around when doing landscape photography. Being rushed often leads to making numerous poorly composed images that just fill up a memory card. It is better to make a few good images that represents the emotions you feel about the subject and location, than just to fire away hoping that you get something that inspires. I learned to take a slow approach with landscape photography with my many years of working with a film and a large format camera. It is easy to fall into bad habits with camera that think too much for you. I pretty much use my mirrorless cameras in fully manual mode. I really don't bother to learn the multiple features that modern digital cameras offer. I find it too difficult to be occupied with many functions and settings that are built into these cameras for my style of photography. Certainly if I was still doing professional sports photography I would utilize many of the features these new cameras offer. This image is from a Canada trip around Lake Superior. It was long after sunset on a calm and quiet summers night.

While traveling in Canada last summer around the North side of Lake Superior. I found some interesting hikes that took me along some streams flowing down off the nearby mountains. It was a cool and rainy month of August and the waterfalls were full of energy. On my hike I noticed from a distance a rock that appeared to look like a profile of a face on the side of wall. I stopped and took out my rectangle viewing card that I always carry with me, and determined I would need a 400 mm lens to get the subject framed correctly. I found a good spot for my tripod and a comfortable big rock to sit on, and took my time just enjoying the rushing sound of the water and the solitude of the location. The rock figure looks like an Indian Chief or an old fur trapper that lived in the area centuries ago. As I was sitting there after making my photograph a young boy and his Mother saw me and wondered what I was photographing. I pointed out the face I saw on the rock wall and I could tell they didn't see it. So I let them look at the view finder of my camera and they were both astonished that they would have missed this scene on their hike. It is always gratifying to come upon the unexpected when our hiking and having my camera gear with me.

Another 3am image

The older I get the less I sleep.  At times it is frustrating dealing with insomnia but I find that the wee hours of the morning gives me the quiet time to work on an image without any distractions.  I think back of my many years working alone in the darkroom and it was a space of little noise or interruptions.  Once I entered the space I had a mind set and focus of working on printing an image.  I knew I had maybe three to four hours of a good concentration level before I tired out. After that I would mix chemicals or do other mundane task the darkroom work required.  The digital darkroom is much harder to maintain a steady concentration when working on an image.  There are frequent distractions that come with being on a computer and doing photography.  A simple notice of an incoming email message will take me out of my processing mindset and I end up just saving the image off to work on later.  If you take your photography seriously you will need to find a way to work without frequent interruptions.  The steps to processing of an image takes analysis, execution, and finalization in order to achieve a satisfactory image.  A disruption in any phase will most likely end up with falling short of achieving a successful image.  So, do I like working on my images when I should be sleeping? No, but it does help me produce some of my favorite images.