Learning To See

I tend to be a curious person. If I come across something that I don't understand, or something that I don't think I know enough about, I have the need to learn more. My interest in photography evolved in this way. It was around ten years ago on a trip home to visit my parents in the suburbs of New York City that my interest in photography began. On one particularly beautiful day I decided to hop on a train and head into the city to roam around and take in some sights. Just before leaving the house I asked my mother if she had a camera and she handed me her simple point and shoot film camera. At this point in my life I had absolutely NO interest in photography. It was a great day and I shot a couple of rolls of film. A few days later I got back the most horrible, unrecognizable photos I had ever seen. They were unrecognizable because many of the pictures were of things I didn't even remember photographing! My interest was peaked and I began the quest to answer this question: "What the hell happened"? It's now ten years later and I still continue to learn almost daily. From the beginning of my quest I found that one of the skills that is most commonly suggested that the aspiring photographer learn is to develop the ability to see. At first this struck me as odd...I would think to myself "I know how to see...I have great vision"! After some time it became evident to me what learning to see really meant. Here's how it usually happens. You go out and find a nice landscape to shoot and you take a bunch of what you think are great shots. You then go home, copy the photos onto your computer hard drive and for the very first time you see that green dumpster in the corner of the frame. How the hell did I miss that? From that point on you begin to learn to see. Learning to see means learning to see what the camera sees. Learning to see what the camera sees is very different from what most people view as "seeing". The more and more you shoot the more and more you will learn to see. Eventually you will notice the little candy wrapper 20 feet away in the grass. You will notice the streak of bright light in the corner of your frame which can be fixed by slightly altering your angle...and you will also begin to see "good light". (Much more on this later). Once you learn to see as the camera sees the quality of your photos will improve dramatically. You will be on your way to becoming a proficient photographer and you will begin to see the weaknesses in other photographers photos. As you look through photos of other photographers you will begin to hear yourself ask this question over and over again..."How could she have not seen that"!!?? When your ability to see is sufficiently developed you will experience sights much more completely than the casual observer...another benefit of honing this skill. The next time you take a vacation you will remember more detail about the sights than anybody else who was with you (unless you go with a group of photographers). I will constantly come back to the idea of "seeing" as time goes on but for now I will end with a final example. The other day I went to a little league baseball game to take some shots of the action. While leaving the field as the sun was setting I noticed a lone baseball sitting on a post behind one the backstops. I took many shots that day but one of my favorites was this isolated baseball. The photo, which is at the top of this post, is a simple shot that most people would never take. Before I learned to see I never would have noticed that ball. Is it a masterpiece?...of course not. However when you learn to see you will begin to produce photos that are somewhat unique...photos that most people never even consider taking. The ability to see will come up again and again as we continue our conversation of all aspects of photography.