THE BEGINNING

In this series I shall assume that one is starting from simple beginnings and that his purpose is to produce a picture or series of pictures which convey a message.   A photographer is someone who can convey his ideas to fellow people by using a camera.   If this final purpose is achieved with the minimum of equipment, he is a good photographer because he is working efficiently.

Photography is not a technical achievement of the Computer Age, but the simple outcome of a scientific discovery made more than one hundred years ago, which was that light could chemically affect certain compounds, notably salts of silver.   This discovery, coupled with the study of Optics, by which light can be manipulated and its behaviour predicted using simple mathematics, enables us to draw a picture, not like the painter, using brush or crayon, but using light itself to do the work and then by developing the image chemically to obtain a two dimensional projection of a scene in real life.   Just as the painter needs only the simplest of equipment to produce a picture, a good photographer can also produce a similar result using the minimum of technical aids.   The skill of the painter in projecting life onto canvas is replaced by the photographer’s skill in choosing the aperture, shutter speed and optical alignment.  The result is the same in both cases.   We have produced a picture using our skills.

Being capable of producing a picture on canvas or photographic paper is only the beginning.   To be an artist, the painter or the photographer must produce a picture, which can convey a message.   For this they must compose the elements of the picture; shapes, light, perspective and colour to produce the desired effect.   We will talk about composition in a later article.

The reader will notice from the above that I have suggested that only the minimum of equipment be used to start photography.   Basically, a camera and film are all the equipment needed.   A few other photographic aids will be mentioned.   I must, however mention here that the creative photographer must have full control of his equipment.   So, his basic need is for a camera having full manual adjustment of all functions.   Automation is a refinement that he most certainly can do without.   This means that he can obtain one of a number of excellent cameras on the second-hand market for a remarkable low investment.

Once he has his basic tools, the task of the photographer becomes essentially the same as that of the painter, to paint a meaningful picture, and he must follow the centuries-old rules of artistic composition and Aesthetics.   The next article will deal mainly with the camera, the basic tool of the photographer, and how to choose a suitable one from the staggering range available, many of which may be totally unsuitable for the creative photographer.

RL 24/4/85