I spent yesterday morning with a cup of coffee at the local marina, staring at the boats and the light and breathing it in, my deep pleasure at doing nothing at all spoiled only by an apple croissant that was, in fact, filled with marzipan. A nice surprise if you like marzipan, but I think it tastes like the inside of a goat. Still, the quiet was good for me. I drove home to find an email from a friend which included a link to this video about JW Turner, Ernst Haas, and Venice, and that kicked off a series of reflections about that city I have loved and photographed for so long, and some meditations about the craft that has evolved for me as I have done so.
In the 24 hours since I watched that video, the thoughts that keep resurfacing are about the value of slowing down and falling in love, and perhaps if you’re sitting there now with a cup of coffee of your own, these thoughts will take you somewhere, too. Stick with me because this one isn’t linear—it drifts a bit.
Photography, as a craft, frowns darkly on those who are in a hurry.
We rush to learn, to upgrade, to get from one photograph to the next. We rush to edit and develop and post that work, and move quickly on to the next thing. I have nothing more than my own experience to lean on, but I don’t think that manic pace is ever the progress we mistake it for. It’s movement, perhaps, but it’s not necessarily direction. It’s movement on the wrong axis, along a surface rather than into the depths.
True seeing takes time; real perception doesn’t happen in a glimpse. A scene is not understood at a glance, and insight doesn’t come quickly.
But do you remember the saying about the camera pointing both ways? It’s as important that we see and understand ourselves as it is that we take in the scene in front of us, and that kind of seeing takes not only a long time, but a slow time.
My most productive creative times are when I can pull into myself and sit with my thoughts. When I give myself the time to absorb not only what I see, but what I smell, what I hear, what my other senses tell me, and what I think and feel about it all. If you go back far enough, the word contemplation implies gazing into sacred space, watching and waiting for signs and omens. It was important stuff. I worry that I’m sometimes closer to glancing into those sacred spaces than gazing deeply.
Photographers tend to pay more attention to what they see than how they see.
I don’t mean the mechanics, I mean the way they perceive the world, and how they think about it. And that’s a shame because the way you perceive the world is the way you will photograph it, and the awareness of that doesn’t come to a mind that won’t sit still, constantly distracting itself. The mind that’s in a hurry will miss things, seeing what it wants to see and little else.
When I look back at myself as a younger photographer, I see a young man in a great hurry, arriving at a place with a mind so clouded by questions about how to photograph that place that he skipped over the part where he just experienced it, and took it all in long enough to have thoughts or feelings worth expressing in the first place.
I wish I could whisper back in time to that person and remind him that he’d make a better photograph if he first had something to say. If he took the time to think and feel more deeply.
“Fall in love first, and then write the poem about it.” That’s what I’d like to tell him, if he’s open to the metaphor. I might also tell him that falling in love can happen quickly, but that loving takes time.
Put the pen down for a while, feel the love as deeply as you can before you get busy writing a song about it. The more deeply you explore it, the more depth you’ll be able to bring to any effort at expression. The more you’ll have to say about love (or anything else, like perhaps Venice, autumn colours, or a songbird), the more you’ll understand your feelings about it. And the closer you’ll be to finding ways to express that.
Candidly, I fear that my memory of any place or event, any encounter, will be a memory of photographing the thing and not a memory of experiencing the thing itself.
Returning to the metaphor, when I’m so busy writing poems about love, do I even have the time just to be in love without picking it apart, reducing it down to the parts that rhyme?
Maybe it’s another discussion entirely, but could it be that some poets are more satisfied by writing poems about love than with actually being in love? Or (even worse, but just as likely) are they more in love with using fancy pens and writing on expensive paper? And if either of these is the case, do you want to hazard a guess about which so-called poet will write something that is not only beautiful but also true?
I love the young man I once was. I love his fire and his urgency. But I don’t envy him for how much he missed in that rush to move through life, to get not to the next moment, or the next experience, but to the next photograph. And I wonder how much better those photographs might have been if I had slowed down, quieted myself, and experienced those moments a little more purposefully—savouring them a bit more—before I pulled out my camera.
I know that sometimes savouring the moment is better with a camera in my hand. Sometimes it’s the window through which I first see the thing with which I didn’t yet know I was falling in love. Either way, my hope for that photographer remains, and it’s the same hope I have for you as you practice this craft with me: that you slow down and find the quiet in which to fall in love with something more than the tools of your craft or even the end product of your work. Something bigger and worthy of your love and effort.
I hope you’ll take the time to breathe more deeply and contemplate, gazing into the sacred spaces and experiencing them before you pick up the pen to start writing your poem.
For the Love of the Photograph,
David
Comments
Thank you for the article, David. I have been slowing down in recent months. It’s easy when photographing your city, but next month I am going to Istanbul for the first time, and I know that everything will look new to me and I will be shooting like crazy. It happens to me every time I shoot a new location or subject.
David, thanks for an excellent article. Drinking in the spirit of a location without a camera in hand is really important, and in the end will make one’s photos more memorable because they will bring back your feelings of the place. I’d like to suggest that, for people like me who have difficulty getting enough time to get out for long enough to let a location penetrate my thick skull and then also capture photos of it, the activities can be partitioned. Get out in the location and wander without a camera. At home, think about what you saw, and maybe poke around a little more with Photo Ephemeris, PhotoPills, or whatever. Go the location another time, this time with the camera. I know it’s not perfect, but it’s kind of a workaround when you aren’t able to get the block of time to do the whole experience at once.
Hi David…I agree about slowing down. I think that your new course, The Creative Photographer, leads me in that direction. You clarify the steps that make a good/great/beautiful photograph. This causes me to think about what I am looking even while driving or walking about what I’m seeing and how I could photograph it, slivers of light, find a window, find a stage, find a moment etc. It’s a new way to slow down and see the world through a different lens.
Thank you for giving us vision — Jim
That’s music to my ears Jim. Thank you for that. Love to you and Jo. Thinking of you both.
Once again, your thoughts are spot on. I’m an early-stage macro photographer and after finishing a trip to Costa Rica I reflected on how I felt rushed, particularly when with a group, to get some photos quickly. In retrospect, I should have slowed way down. Your writing has helped shift my focus to what I’m seeing and feeling in the moment and not on the settings on my camera.
We have just finished a project in my area of the world where we asked people to return to the same location in nature and to record something (photos, poems, drawings, etc.) about the location each time. We titled it The Creative Witness Project. A focus was paying attention to how the space changed and to attend to various parts of the space by lookin up and around on week one, down at your feet on week two, imaging who and what walked there before we did on week three, and to imagine what the place will look like in 100 or even 1000 years on week four. It shifted my attention, made me slow down and immerse myself in that location.
Love your work.
Thank you, Bob. What a great project that sounds like. Anything that helps us pay attention to the world around us, to notice things – really take note of them rather than just glancing – is time well spent. Good luck with the macro work – that’s a discipline build on slowing down, isn’t it?
Hi David,
I had oncethe honor to have my work reviewed by you in one of Lens Culture ‘s contests, and it left an impression.
I love this post about slowing down and taking time to absorb and immerse in the surrounding before thinking about action.
It make sense. It gives you time to form an impression and a general intent.
It blends intuitively with the kind of meditative photography that you do in places like the desert, the forest, or landscapes or still life in general.
But what do you do when engaging in the type of reactive and instinctive photography used in genres like street, documentary, photojournalism, and sometimes wildlife?
It seems like a contradiction, a paradox if you will, at first site.
Yet, for me the general process is pretty much the same.
I give myself the time to absorb, to immerse in the place and the atmosphere, time to form an impression, a mood, a general intent, in short – to fall in love.
And then, I proceed to photograph, to react to the changing situations, the dynamic flow of characters and the word that comes to mind is convergence. My impression, my intent, my mood, and the stiuation converge in a single instant yelding a frame, suggesting a composition and I react to this moment instinctively and intuitively and immediately.
So basically it feels like the same process to me.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this perspective if you havw the time.
Thanks
Haim, I think you’ve described this well. There’s an expression I’ve heard in other circles: slow is smooth and smooth is fast. It speaks to the idea that once we train our instincts, which is a slow process, they become more naturalized and once that happens we can be faster. Being a slower, more instinctive photographer has many benefits, one of which is that it does allow us to operate more quickly when the circumstances call for it. An example: tai chi is considered moving meditation, it’s slow and intentional, but it’s also a martial art and that slow, practiced movement, can be very fast indeed, and much more accurate for all the slow practice. Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.
I always enjoy your email posts! I may be a quiet commenter, but I have learned so much going to school with your posts. This one hit me me in the heart. Why? Because I SO believe in the slowing down in life generally, so that, I don’t miss so much with my camera, and thus, miss the joy of life. Thank you for so consistently sharing them because it is how I learn from the best…you. Blessings!
Thank you so much for that, JoAnn.
Hi David
Thank you for such an intuitive and insightful article. I think some of what you are experiencing is ageing and maturity. I say this as an 80 year old still enjoying photography. As one ages one has the time to slow down” the movement through life”, reflect on many
thing’s and enjoy the process.
Regards Joel
Joel, I think you’re absolutely right. As we age we do have the time to slow down. Sometimes against our will! 🙂 But we also begin to see the value in it. We see time as the much more limited resource it is and treat it as such. Or so I think.
Hi David. Thank you.
You have this uncanny knack of providing just what I need to hear at the time in my journey I need to hear it.
Having just gotten my first “adult” camera (as in full frame mirrorless with so many features I don’t know where to start), I have been racing around taking photos without purpose.
As I read this, I felt my breath slowing, my mind stilling and calm excitement for this next stage in my journey. I am still learning how to take a photo, so no need to race around taking snapshots. I will slow down and enjoy the journey.
Jen – You can do both: there is time for running around just to play and discover and be reckless about the whole thing, and there’s time to slow down and be more intentional. Both teach us something. But in my experience the running around eventually points in the direction of needing to slow down. Enjoy that learning curve with the new camera – the buttons are different but it still does the same thing. 🙂
A thoughtful piece as usual David. I don’t disagree with the slowing down: I really don’t but I find that my own photography is moving in the opposite direction at present. I’m doing a lot more cruises and fairly extensive trips over 3 -4 weeks. With cruises, you have a limited time in each port. With extended road trips, you set a schedule around things to see and although you don’t intend it to be rushed (you are after all in charge of your own schedule), it often feels like it it is. Indeed, I think that it becomes a skill to capture the significant cultural and geographic features in the limited time available. In fact, turn that point around: we always have a limited time available in each place so actually the question becomes how much do we want to drill down and explore and absorb the local culture in the time we’ve got?
Scenes and insight do take time, but our time is not infinite so we still need to call a halt after a while. I lived in Delhi for 2 years – an enormous amount of time to reflect on what I was seeing and photographing but the more you understood, the more you realised you were only scratching the surface.
In the end there is a time and a place for most approaches. Perhaps sometimes the slowing down is a training mechanism for the times we need to be speeding up. If the slower pace teaches us to see better, deeper, more creatively, then we can use that skill in moments when time is less generously afforded us. See my comment about Tai Chi to Haim Berman on this post, it might resonate.
Yes, I see your point David. I think that once trained, the brain can work very quickly subconsciously and that is a deliberate biological trait. It’s why, when we’re driving a regular route, our minds go into automatic and we often don’t remember the drive. It’s the brain’s way of being more efficient and pushing repeat tasks to the subconscious which frees up the conscious brain for new tasks. In the same way, a photographer may not know why they have taken a picture but an experienced photographer will often find that in retrospect, their brain has taken care of the composition for them and got it reasonably correct.
Thanks David. This prompted me to review my own process, And I wonder if I did not evolve – or recess? – the other way round. I remember strolling through the Medina of Sfax, Tunisia, first exploring without a camera, then coming back twice, morning and afternoon, and a roll had only 36 frames. I was 23, I think. Now (77), maybe I am rushing: am I feeling some kind of “countdown”? I think your “food for thought” is just what I need right now.
Maybe as we age we get better at slowing down faster? Not sure that makes sense, but perhaps speed is all relative. Maybe what is slow for you now felt much faster as a younger man or vice versa. What matters is that we pay attention. I haven’t found a way to do that quickly except by first doing it slowly. See my response to Haim Berman on this post, it’s about Tai Chi and might be relevant. Thanks for chiming in.
A very nice piece, David, one of your best. It reads (to me, anyway) like a love poem to an imperfect self.
A lovely way to look at it, Kerry. I hope you’re well and taking some time to get out in the canoe this summer. No better time to be in Ontario than the summer!
This really made me think. I am such a fast person-always with my to do list, moving quickly from one task to another. This comment is powerful: “Candidly, I fear that my memory of any place or event, any encounter, will be a memory of photographing the thing and not a memory of experiencing the thing itself.” This is a good reminder to slow down, to experience, to see, and to perceive. This is important for experiencing life itself and not just for photography. Thank you.
You’re welcome, Laurie. Thank you for reading and taking the time to reply.
LOVED this article! 😃
So true for other forms of art as well (I paint)
Always enjoy your articles by the way!
And hope your foot/ankle are doing well…
Take care and thanks again! 😁
Thank you, Colette. Much appreciated. And yes, it applies to other art forms and life in general, I think. Appreciate your thoughts about my foot/ankle. I had it amputated and the carbon fibre and titanium replacement is doing just great!
The young man might have been in a hurry because he knew his chops were not yet strong enough to express what he wanted to. No harm in storming to technical proficiency, it’s just that it comes at a cost.
I have been thinking about AI generated artworks recently, and have decided that AI will only ever approximate existing art – it will never speak from human experience. Case and point, check out the following piece by Japanese artist Hiroshi Nagai:
https://nagaigallery.com/products/summer-madness
Only someone who has experienced late afternoon poolside, and has that essence burned into their being, could capture the vibe like Hiroshi does here.
That’s what I’m hoping to do with my photography from now on.
Thanks, Gavin. “The young man might have been in a hurry because he knew his chops were not yet strong enough to express what he wanted to. No harm in storming to technical proficiency, it’s just that it comes at a cost.” There’s a lot to unpack there but I think you nailed it.
So very true. For years I chased what I thought might be the perfect photo at that given moment of time, thinking about making the perfect marketable photo to sell. I had forgotten about why I started taking photos in the first place. I had forgotten the sense of peace I felt when I just slowed down and observed what was in front of me. Recently, I sat down to observe some geese with some baby goslings and after about an hour I recognize that the perfect photo came to me. All I had to do was wait and observe and that sense of peaceful stillness returned. I was somehow able to translate the moment into the image. Later, people wanted it.
Regards,
Larry Austin
I think alot about how our definitions of “perfection” can shift, and I think our appetite for it also shifts. As I get older I mean a different thing when I use the word and if I chase it at all it’s the chase that excites me, not the end result. The anticipation, the waiting. If the final result is something I love, perfect or otherwise, it’s less satisfying to me than the act of making it.
I fell out of love with photography for a while – what made me return was challenging myself to learn to use my grandpa‘s 1950s medium format folding camera. It really forced me to slow down, to get to grips with the mechanics, setting all the parameters, dialling in the correct focus with the range finder, then waiting for the film to be developed, and it‘s been by far the most fun I‘ve had with a camera in years. I fell in love with using the camera, and it returned my love for making photos consciously and experimentally.
I love that, Janika. Something I didn’t hit on in the article is that slowing down allows us to be absorbed in the challenge and it’s that challenge that is so important to get to creative flow. I’m so pleased to hear you’ve found the joy—and the fun!–again.