What Do You See?

Context is pretty important.

If you are a lifelong supporter of my blog and/or photography, you’d be familiar with my least favorite photo. It is a picture of a bird, a chickadee to be specific. It was captured in the winter and was one of the first pictures ever taken with my new camera. However, context becomes increasingly more important the longer I vent about this hated photo.

Being the one who took that picture, I’m keenly aware of the context surrounding it. When you see a bird, I see the day I went out to take a photo of the bird. When you like the picture of a bird, I’m knowledgeable of the circumstances of taking the photo. When you start purchasing prints of the bird, I begin questioning your eyesight. It’s a bird, the bird is running, it’s adorable, but it is just a BIRD! It’s not even an uncommon bird, it’s literally one that you see in your backyard everyday. Stop with the bird!

Clearly we’ve struck a nerve.

But the point is the same. Let's “branch” out to a different photo so I can stop making you all uncomfortable. You invested real money to “nest” this print into your respective homes. Thank you, by the way. I genuinely appreciate your support. Knowing that you all enjoy my work that much leaves me “flying” high and “flapping” with excitement... Every ornithologist just slammed their laptops closed and flung it out a window. I’ll stop.

What do you see?

You likely see a waterfall. And you’d be right, your skills of perception are overwhelming. You may infer other things as well, such as time of day or location based on assumptions. But you can only conclude those things based on what I captured in the picture. You have a forced perspective created by yours truly (yes, I have manipulated you in a strange way). I have only allowed you to see what I wanted you to see. Below is what I actually saw.

Notice that there is much more to the scene. There is the stone path that wraps around to the left, the steep walls of the gorge on either side of the creek, even the pop of green from evergreens up above the waterfall. However, I didn’t want you to see any of that. Thus, I limited the context in order to make it my own. I focused in on what I wanted to portray. Anything outside of that may have taken away from my intent of the photo.

Here then lies something super interesting you can consider when taking photos. No one, and I mean no one, will ever experience your photos the way you do. You stood in that exact spot with your camera. You dialed in your settings with your equipment. You were privy to seeing all the surroundings that brought that photo into existence. You know what's to the left, the right, up, down all around that area. You know what day it was, the weather, you are familiar with the environment and circumstances of the picture.

You create your own context.

Your viewing of my photos are limited to the 3:2 ratio of my camera sensor. You will only see what I capture. You will only feel what I choose to display. You will know nothing of the events of that day, my emotions, how I came to the place of actually taking the photo. The pixels on your screen are the closest thing you’ll experience to what I experienced as the photographer.

My feet got wet taking this photo. Deductive reasoning from you, my dear Watson, may have led you to this conclusion. This was the first time I had seen this waterfall in person. You’d think I would have gone to capture this during a prettier time of year. That morning my grandfather passed away. That would be much harder to know aside from those closest to me.

This picture was never meant to be cheery, colorful, or even pretty by most standards, because I felt none of those things. It was meant to feel isolated and cold, yet serene. Those were the emotions I was experiencing and I strove to capture that. I had peace. I was also sad and alone. The photos of that morning were never meant to simply capture the scene. They were intended to reflect what I felt. Thus, I created the context.

Photography is more about creating a scene than capturing a scene.

This is something I’ve thought a lot about lately. Where I’ve struggled is when I try to capture a certain emotion and the image falls flat. The emotion is real, but I wasn’t able to cause others to experience that same emotion. There were likely things I could have done to improve the context of the photo by possibly adding more or cropping something out.

It is important to note that I can never fabricate someone else’s response to a photo, I can only merely influence it. Here in lies why I will spend hours cultivating a piece of art for people only to have it largely ignored, while snapping a picture by accident becomes your #1 best seller. The nerve is being exposed again …  *twitch* Birds …

So, what’s the point?

The better question is, when do I ever have a point? If you have to work extra hard to create your context, reflect your emotion, capture what you want others to experience, with no guarantee that it will be appreciated, photography just sounds like a thankless job.

Photography for me has become more about self-reflection than anything else. I refused to believe that I had a creative bone in my person. However, this subtle shift in purpose and enjoyment in photography frees my mind from the enslavement of social approval. I take the photo because I like it. I capture it for my benefit, it is fulfilling for me. The value of an image should have less to do with others appreciation and more to do with my personal approval. Sounds awfully selfish.

Social media has stripped photographers from this luxury. Likes and comments drive traffic and influence algorithms, which will make or break your success online. These “clicks” reflect tangible approvals. The more “clicks” you receive the more exposure you receive, which continues to drive more traffic. That inevitably encourages you to produce and to share content that only receives more public approval.

Long story short, take photos of birds. People like photos of birds.

Did you see the face in the waterfall at the top of this page?