What Is A Photograph?

Thank you sir for very informative information .

Ted, I am very happy to understand what you said in this episode. Thank you so much.

To me, a photograph is a representation of a certain place, at a certain moment, from a certain angle. The picture itself gives informations about the subject(s) and/or environment(s) involved, it can suggest a purpose, an emotion, a vision of life and the different universes we live or do not live in. However, it can't impose an idea or a way of thinking. It's more of an inspiration to creativity, a playground for interpretation, the seed of interest. Photography doesn't give it all to you, you have to put your own memories and experiences into it to make it happens, works, comes to life. Sometimes that activity asks a lot of patience, to deal with our own perceptions and/or preconceptions, at other times it's as intuitive as it can be, a passion that attracts us to merge with it. 

I think that, as for any inventions, from the simplest stick of wood to the most complex social network, linking from satellites floating into the outer space to computers (which are pretty complex inventions themselves) around the world, we can do a very good or a very bad use of photography. I don't really mind about the overuse of photography by the medias or by the high percentage of people using it that are not artists or intellectuals. I care about beauty, interest, experience, spreading concerns, informing the population. In fact, i guess i'm more attracted by trying to share and understand than trying to impose.

I know one guy that is a top leader into sharing, trying to understand and not trying to impose, Ted Forbes. I gotta thank you a lot for what you're doing up here, it's a real joy to mention your channel when i'm explaining to people what i'm doing for a living. I'm doing photography and i'm following a guy's channel who gives higher education level advices and commentaries. I follow every video you're posting and I think that this concept is the futur of learning. I deeply thank you once more for your incessant pertinence and your unshakeable enthusiasm! Keep up your excellent work! Later!

– Marc-André –

To me it's about respect. Respect your cameras, respect every frame that you captured.

Ted I would love for you to do a video on camera-less photography. Some practitioners that come to mind would be, Susan Derges, Adam Fuss and Hiroshi Sugimoto lighting fields series.

We take thousands of pictures every day with our phones, digital cameras, etc, and there's nothing wrong with that. But for some reason I always have my beloved film camera with me, just to shoot what I like on the streets. So I guess for me a "photograph" is different from an average picture I take with a phone, because there's just something more to it. Even if the final image is not great (or if it sucks), the intention behind is what counts. Everything – whether it's digital or film – could be a photograph (and not just a meaningless picture) if you've got something to say with that.

I always think about Vivian Maier who wasn't recognized as a photographer when she was alive, and yet she was just shooting everything she saw – until she died. I guess that's one possible answer to your question. 🙂

Excellent episode, as always! I agree with everything you say about the photograph being more than the technology that produced it. I especially liked your comments about photographs that you did not like immediately; but upon getting to know them and getting an understanding of the context, you came to love. I really appreciate you doing AoP — it is very helpful to me in many ways.  

Hey Ted!
First of all: Well done video! It is so important to think about what youre doing as a photographer on a philosophical or abstract level. It is also one of my favourite Bresson quotes: "Question yourself – it's essential!"

Having said that, I will continue with a weird mixture of philosophy, science theory, and personal thoughts – though I am used to scientific and technical argumentations I hope, that there are some good thoughts for you, who are still reading this post!

If we are talking about this topic, I think that we have to go a littele deeper still and ask ourselfs the question: "What is Art?" or more precisely: "What is the reason for human beings to create art?" In my opinion one possible explanation is the quest for a meaning of live, geometry, color, and so on. More precisely: It is for me a aproach to understand life and to illustrate compley thoughts, that were gathered by contemplations (case studys) in a physical way.

Following my argumentation I divide the construct "Visual Art" into two different items: First there is the visual and conceptual part and secondly the workmanship which transfers our thoughts into a physical thing, which can be contemplated by other people. By this seperation we draw borders to e.g. Literature and as well distinguish conecpt and the creation. Furthermore they are quite suitable to contemplate the difference between photography and photographic art. It has to be said that interactions between those two items are difficult to include in this argumentation.

Probably everybody would agree that the concept part is common to all artists per definition – I can hardly imagine how one could create art whithout thoughtfulness. The key thing to make visual art perceptible for other people is the objectification which is achieved by the artist with oil and brush, a chisel, and so on.

Photography describes, like you mentioned, the physical act of capturing electromagnetic waves and saves the gathered information on whatever medium. In my argumentation, to take a photograph is a direct way to objectify a Physical scene. For me it does not make a conceptual difference whether you display this object on a paper or a screen (though real prints could be more beautiful from an aesthetical point of view, which is highly subjective of course). In the end its light again, which will be percieved by ones eyes and converted into a sensation. Though the craftmanship had been replaced by chemistry and digital technologies I would tend to conceptually consider it the same thing.

For the conceptual part it is all about the person behind the camera. For me this is the key point of the discussion: If somebody is conscious of himself taking a picture and if he furthermore does this because of an intrinsic motivation, its a photograph.

I want to end with a freely trnslated quote of Heidegger: "Mankind is about to geto onto the whole world and their atmosphere […]. The same mankind is unable to explain in a simple way, what really is, that we call a thing. Everything there is, is the object of a single will to exploration."

In my humble opinion the core magic of photography haven't changed since the very beginning: capturing a moment, a feeling, a mood which won't ever return in the ever-changing world. You can try and take several pictures of the same subject anytime, but you're never going to recreate the same moment again, because everything changed including the photographer – you yourself as well. So being able to seize a moment and preserve it for the future is such a great ability and possibility we almost have forgotten about while falling into technical details. It does not matter what your intention is: documenting, expressing your thoughts, making art or simply preserving memorable moments in your or someone else's life. And also doesn't matter what technique or gear you use. You can cut out these never-revolving moments from the timeflow and make it an eternal thing. That's the real core magic – at least for me – of photography. 

I met a street photographer who learnt a great lesson about having the best equipment. He became a fantastic chef, one of the top young chefs in the UK, but he had always taken photos from an early age. He made a lot of money very early on and bought the best Canon camera and all if the L series lenses etc etc. He found, however, that his quality of photography went down dramatically. After a few years he quit being a chef and wanting to become a professional photographer and he sold EVERYTHING. He bought a cheap canon film SLR and a 50mm lens for about £30 and his photography improved dramatically, he's even publishing a book. He inspired me to continue shooting film even though i had found it difficult to work with in the very beginning and that its the photographer who creates the photograph not the equipment.

Unfortunately photography today is often about getting recognition and approval. You see a lot of people doing pretty much the same thing just do get recognized. Oh the irony. For me photography is more close to the exact opposite of that. It's about individuality and personal expression. I love to see peoples 'point of views' in life. I get very little recognition for my work but I love my pictures,

I don't consider a person who takes digital pictures and posts them exclusively on the internet and doesn't print a photographer, they are not a photographer. I draw the line at whether or not one makes a print. It's the same as a painter who doesn't use paint, they might be an artist of some sort but they are not a painter if they don't paint. You can even take a brush out of that person's hands but they are still a painter if they use paint. The problem I see is people never referred to negatives as a "photo", so I don't see why it should be any different if an image appears on the screen? It's still not a print at that point. There is a reason why people don't use the term "Photo Analyst" in the military anymore, instead they are "Imagery Analysts" because of the digital switch. One who uses a photographic medium to create digital images are is not any better or worse as an artist in my eyes, but it is a distinction between a digital artist and a photographer, a photographer prints. For what it's worth, that's how I see it.

For me, photography is capturing the world trought my eyes. I love looking on how others interpret places, people, things that i saw too and the same time, but little bit differently.

And therefore my problem with the idea of "abstract" photography.  By definition, photography is representational and although representational images can be highly altered, it is at its foundation a copy of something in the real world and therefore not abstract (discounting photograms and other non-image/non-lens means of exposing film).  There are certainly lots of images, some famous ones, that are at some distance from crispy-clean and perfect, but there are no abstract photographs in the way that there are abstract paintings.  So, what do we call photographic images that have been abstracted (muxxed, glitched, defocused, ???).  Surely there is a more technically accurate (and respectful of the photographer's intent/practice) term than "abstract" photographs?   Thanks for the philosophy episode Ted.

Very good questions raised in this episode, made me think,  that when I had my camera with just one 28mm lens , I had way more "artistic" fun and results almost always kept me happy .Now I have several cameras, dozens of lenses, its also a great fun too, but I feel its a bit like a gadget fetish that dims the real reason of wanting to capture life around me… Maybe I should try  "One lens-One month " treatment 🙂

Bravo on this episode Ted! Technology is not art, technology is a means to make art. 

Great discussion. I guess we should always be ready to do a rethink on just about anything and everything.

Are there any aspects of photography that you feel shouldn't qualify as art, science or documentation and should be a practice that people put a stop too?

I try to appreciate photography as often as possible and try not to take a cynical vies to other peoples photographs but one thing that annoys me more than anything that people do with their cameras is to take photos of museum paintings. It annoys me immensely when I see it happening in museums and even more so when I see it later on whatever social media. 

A more reasonable example is that there is a strong school of thought that street photographers shouldn't take photographs of the homeless as it is very hard to fully represent their circumstances.

Great talk and it comes at just the right moment for me. I have been contemplating this question myself for a few weeks now as I watch my students. Having fun with their gear, happily mega-pixel bashing each other. We get a lot of laughs about it. But, what does photography mean to me, what makes it so special? Sharing personal moments, documentation, journalism and fine art (which I put above anything else) all important concepts. But I think there is one really amazing aspect to photography (and maybe I am being a bit philosophical now); catch a single fraction of a moment in time, something that never ever happens the same again, and save it 'forever'. I think that's pretty beautiful.

Great video. You touched on a lot of things that I think about with my photography. As a former graphic designer and one time publisher/creative director of a small web based mountain bike magazine I have worked with a lot of photos and photographers over the years and have learned to really appreciate the variety of skills they each can bring to people (commercial, print, advertising, fine art, travel, food, etc.,).  Through all of that I've become more inspired to try and have a camera with me nearly all the time, whether it be phone/p&s or DSLR) and to keep learning the aspects of photography that I neglected over years in Auto Mode. Yet no matter how much I learn or how many photos I take, I always question if I am a photographer or a picture taker? Ha, either way, it's all good, for me it's about learning, keeping my creativity going and helping to tell stories whether it be through goofball blog posts or Facebook and Instagram. I also enjoy the access we have to viewing so many amateur and pro photographers and "picture takers" and I never get tires of that feeling you get when you see a photo or style that you KNOW you like (or don't like). Thanks again for your work.

The technical stuff "… do not have any impact in the final story". So crappy film or low dynamic range in a sensor doesn't have any impact? Not ANY impact?

The person learning won't be misled into doing some bad habits or influence the photographer by limiting his/her situation or at BEST as a distracting issue when shooting or make them less than satisfied with the results when using inappropriate and/or inferior gear? I suspect a rather too much of a broad brush statement, Ted!!!