Voice In A Landscape

[amolitor]

Looking through the annals of photography one finds almost no photographs which are both:

- Particularly good photos.
- Straight landscapes without the hand of man, etc.

The form is murderously difficult. The easiest photo to take is a mediocre landscape and among the hardest is an excellent one.

[kencameron]

The form is murderously difficult. The easiest photo to take is a mediocre landscape and among the hardest is an excellent one.

Which, it belatedly occurs to me, may well be what Ansel Adams meant (I know, I know, I promised to STFU, but this is  a mea culpa).

[AreBee]

Ken,

I will see if my local library has a copy...

To aid you:

ISBN: B001J85HLY
Publisher: NY Time-Life Books C; 6 edition (1980)

What I was trying to say...is that when I look through histories of world photography, I don't find the photographs of landscapes to be the best, the most interesting, representative of the highest artistic achievement in photography, etcetera. In that context whether those photographs were taken by "photographers" or "landscape photographers" seems to me immaterial.

You seem determined to misread the quote credited to Ansel Adams:

Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer - and often the supreme disappointment.

The quote is couched in terms of the challenge that landscape photography personally presents to a photographer - it makes no claim on the superiority of landscape photography versus other photography.



Andrew,

The form is murderously difficult.

Everything's easy when you know how.

[Isaac]

Everything's easy when you know how.

Things we know how to do may still require great effort.

[AreBee]

Isaac,

Things we know how to do may still require great effort.

Yes, my comment was poorly stated. Thank you for the correction.

[kencameron]

You seem determined to misread the quote credited to Ansel Adams:

The quote is couched in terms of the challenge that landscape photography personally presents to a photographer - it makes no claim on the superiority of landscape photography versus other photography.

Good point. I still think there might be some implication about the relative quality of your results if and when you actually pass "the supreme test", but that is certainly not stated, and Ansel Adams might simply be saying, as others have, that landscape photography is very difficult, and hence explaining why there are not so many outstanding landscape photographs (relative to outstanding photographs of other subjects).

[Tony Jay]

Good point. I still think there might be some implication about the relative quality of your results if and when you actually pass "the supreme test", but that is certainly not stated, and Ansel Adams might simply be saying, as others have, that landscape photography is very difficult, and hence explaining why there are not so many outstanding landscape photographs (relative to outstanding photographs of other subjects).

Yes, IMHO, while there are many photographic genres there are only photographers.
Also, despite the variety of photographic genres they are all complementary.
We may all tend to specialise in particular genres but often the best way to create a really striking result in a particular genre is to employ a technique, an approach, a philosophy that might be more conventionally thought of as belonging to another genre.

It is true that landscape photography can push the boundaries of one's skills, both technical and artistic, but it is also true, for example, that having good skills related to portrait photography can be very helpful, not because one can control lighting as is done with portraits, but rather, that one might recognise the circumstances of light prevailing and exploit it to the full.

For me personally I am finding that the more I experiment with genres other than the outdoor/landscape/wildlife stuff the more and varied ideas I have about how to do things. This is still a work in progress for me.

Tony Jay

[Rob C]

Yes, IMHO, while there are many photographic genres there are only photographers.
Also, despite the variety of photographic genres they are all complementary.
We may all tend to specialise in particular genres but often the best way to create a really striking result in a particular genre is to employ a technique, an approach, a philosophy that might be more conventionally thought of as belonging to another genre.

It is true that landscape photography can push the boundaries of one's skills, both technical and artistic, but it is also true, for example, that having good skills related to portrait photography can be very helpful, not because one can control lighting as is done with portraits, but rather, that one might recognise the circumstances of light prevailing and exploit it to the full.

For me personally I am finding that the more I experiment with genres other than the outdoor/landscape/wildlife stuff the more and varied ideas I have about how to do things. This is still a work in progress for me.

Tony Jay

Tony, I'd agree with that 100%.

Though landscape doesn't cut it for me, I do know that the more I play with things beyond my comfort zone (oy vey!), the more my general standard in whatever I do improves. I think so, at least, and that's what matters most to me.

Compared to when I was working, I find that I do far more different things now than before, but that's probably just due to lack of clients to pay for the girls needed for me to keep on truckin' in the old genre. I'm not saying that I prefer the new reality, simply that I've accepted the inevitable and still keep busy with something else.

I guess the important thing comes in two parts: I'm able to stave off too much boredom; I still love photography most next to family which, of course, is numero uno.

Rob C

[tsjanik]

Thanks for your article Declan.  I should add that in general I don't usually find much of value in essays dealing with the metaphysics of photography; I often find them saying something I really don't understand or expressing something I find somewhat pretentious.  Yours is an exception; the mention of Paul Klee drew me in and I found myself understanding and agreeing with your thoughts.   I find real joy in photography's ability to call attention to the unnoticed.

Here are two images I like, you and posters to this thread may as well.  The first I titled Mark Rothko Visits Lake Erie; it could have been a typical sunset image over the lake, but I find this much more interesting.  The second,  Winter Blues : a horizontal pan of a frozen harbor. 

Regards,

Tom



Mark Rothko appears in Lake Erie by tsjanik47, on Flickr



_IGP0917-1 copy 3 by tsjanik47, on Flickr

[AreBee]

Ken et al.,

Did he explain why he thought this?

Apparently the quote was not first published in the Photographing Nature edition of the series LIFE Library of Photography by Time-Life. My copy arrived earlier today and this is what it has to say:

Nothing seems easier, to a person who has never tried it, than photographing a landscape. The beauty is all there to start with - the bright flowers, the rich forest greens, the clear or cloud-studded sky, the gently rolling fields and hills. Surely all the photographer needs to do is point his camera and click away. And surely nothing is more exasperating than the pallid snap-shots that usually result. Where is the panoramic sweep, so clearly remembered, of those rolling hills? The wild flowers seem barely visible in the finished print, and the groves of trees have turned flat and colorless. How did those telegraph wires get into the picture? And the little blue bump on the horizon - could that be the distant mountain that looked so majestic to the eye? What went wrong?

Almost everyone, after shooting his first casual landscape, faces such a moment of truth. For landscape photography is no casual matter, but a skill that requires time and patient effort. Ansel Adams, who has spent a lifetime at it, calls it "the supreme test of the photographer - and often the supreme disappointment." Scores of variables must be considered. Each hour of the day, each change of weather, the slightest shift in viewpoint, can radically affect the way a picture will look. A range of mountains that looms dramatically in the dawn light, with the oblique rays of the sun casting each spur and pinnacle in bold relief, may shrink into insignificance under the hard unyielding light of noon. A field that seems visually exciting when dappled with the shadow patterns of clouds may turn drab and monotonous under a clear sky. Yet all these pitfalls may be avoided by applying a few basic principles...

The above is written by "The Editors" of the book. The bibliography lists the following under Adams, Ansel: Camera and Lens, Morgan & Morgan, 1970.

I have ordered a copy, although it is likely to take a fortnight or more to arrive. I will post my findings in due course. For those interested, the ISBN is 0871000563.