Sometimes a Surprise
In an effort to perfect my Leica snobbery (or is that snootiness?), I’ve lately been reading and watching quite a bit of Thorsten Overgaard, excuse me - Thorsten von Overgaard. Not that Thorsten is a snob, far from it as far as I can tell. But one doesn’t have to spend much time in Leica land to come across his name because he does love Leica (and who can blame him?) and is quite the Leica authority. Plus, he not only knows his Leica stuff, he has some wonderful thoughts about photography that are worth listening to. Thorsten, (who is Danish in case you were wondering who names their child Thorsten) is a street, travel and portrait photographer who has also done a lot of commercial work, among other things.
Thorsten is known, in part, for his photo walk workshops and his approach to photography. I dare say he would be fully supportive of my morning walk shots given his “always carry a camera” motto, while waving his finger at me for, well, not always carrying a camera with me (especially my Leica). He also believes in a slow-paced, wandering with no destination type of photography that includes stopping frequently to look around and actually see, stopping to wait and see if anything is going to happen, stopping to get a cup of coffee to look around and see if there’s anything to photograph that you might have missed, and not pulling out your damn phone and checking to see if you have any emails or messages. He thinks you shouldn’t pressure yourself about images, just go and make them and don’t chimp on the screen immediately afterwards. You can’t really tell which ones are good or aren’t from a 3” screen. Just go out and make a picture because you think it might be a good one, or you don’t know and want to find out if it could be. Then go make another one and then another one. You’ll find out at the end of the day (or whenever you download the chip/process the film) whether any are any good or not. Don’t sweat it one way or the other, just keep going out and doing what you love. Make the process of photographing enjoyable. It’s a rather nice relaxing way to photograph (I tried it the other day in downtown Braga, yes it is). Good photography isn’t easy, which is why so often even images you get excited about while making, in the end wind up being a bit disappointing. That’s another point he makes. But then he’ll add that, every once in a while comes a surprise when you least expect it.
So last Monday I was out in my morning walk though, to be honest, I wasn’t very hopeful. There are more images coming (I can’t post every day) and I’d felt like maybe I wasn’t really doing anything good, or perhaps I was simply repeating myself. But like Thorsten says, have your camera and look around, you’ll see something. I took one of our usual alternative routes and sure enough, after a while, I saw a playground differently than I had before. And then off to the right, another potential photograph.
One of the things I’m coming to appreciate about the Q2MR is that it’s forcing me to see wider than I normally do. The crop mode is great and I use it quite a bit (favoring the one-step in to my usual 35mm [23mm converted] field of view, sometimes even closer). What I like about it is the crop mode simply imposes lines on the larger image (like a rangefinder camera) and still shows the whole 28mm field of view so you can see what’s around what you’re framing. As I was walking up to the scene, I knew where I wanted to stand and made the crop in the camera (press that upper function button once) even before I got there. Once there I lifted the camera and was exactly where I had planned to be with that 35mm crop.
Except there was this odd thing outside the frame off to the right. As I turned towards it with the camera to see exactly what it was I thought, wow, that’s interesting. So I switched the camera back into the standard 28mm view (3 more presses of the function button) and started walking backwards one step at a time. And the image got better and better, and I got more and more excited about it. The pre-pre-dawn glow had started above the Bom Jesus on the hillside, the full mural on the right came into view and suddenly the image came to life.
I can’t explain why I was so excited about this image. That’s another thing Thorsten says, geometry and all of that stuff is the result of after-the-fact analysis, while you’re photographing just rely on your instincts. In this case, that meant not being frustrated with my shadow but incorporating it into the image. There was something special about this mix of light conditions, shapes and textures and I was going to frame it until I felt I’d gotten it right.
Urban Self-Portrait
And for once, my excitement was rewarded when I downloaded the chip. I’d become nervous that I’d exhausted this “shooting on my morning walk” thing and would just keep repeating myself, and then I came across this. He’s right, sometimes you’re surprised when you pick up the camera. That’s part of the joy of it.
Oh yeah, and the other photographs from that area aren’t too bad either.