In our poemcrazy book club, we’re talking about the importance of observation and details in our writing. Maureen Doallas has been interviewing specialists in fields requiring a high level of observation through a particular sense. Last month, she spoke with birder Heidi Betts about auditory observation. Today, Maureen shares her interview with photographer Claire Burge about visual observation.
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What kind of person makes the best photographer?
It all depends on your definition of “best”, but I believe that any skill can be taught, which means that anyone can learn the skill of photography; however, learning to capture artistically what is distinctly “you” requires many hours of dedicated practice and refining. It is work from “distinct voice” photographers that I find most engaging and appealing.
What or who inspired you to become a photographer?
It was a combination of the smell of developing chemicals in my father’s darkroom, the way an old film camera felt in my hands, and a very particular black-and-white photograph that I once saw.
What’s involved in teaching your eye to see creatively?
Being willing; seeing and learning again and again how to see differently from the way you do currently; studying really good art to understand what makes it good; asking questions; experimenting; avoiding poor imagery; asking for mentoring and putting into practice what is being taught to you; documenting and reflecting on your own process so that you can understand where you are getting stuck, where you are progressing easily, and where you are feeling uncomfortable; studying basic compositional rules; breaking the rules; studying light and understanding how it refracts inside a lens; studying and grasping exposure, white balance, film sensitivity to light (ISO), aperture, and shutter speed; and many, many more things that each individual experiences along the way.
What’s your most pronounced characteristic as a photographer?
I somehow manage to capture detail that other people don’t see.
When composing a photo, what do you tend to see that others might miss?
Textures, details, and angles.
What do you learn from looking at other photographers’ work?
I am most interested in how other photographers use light to compose their images.
How do you enhance your visual perception skills?
I read poetry. Seriously! Poetry has taught me the power of being succinct.
What distinguishes a good photograph from one that’s outstanding?
Taking light and using it as a tool within an image to achieve something, rather than just capturing the light as it is.
The cliché is that a picture’s worth a thousand words. How is a photograph by you like a poem? Like a story?
Only a viewer of an image can decide if that image tells a story in a poetic way.
What words do you visualize when you’re taking a photo?
[My visualization] is different for every frame I see through my viewfinder. If it isn’t, I know I need to put the camera down.
What words do others use to describe your photographs?
“Light”, “evocative”, “thought-provoking”, and “real” were the exact answers I got when I asked my blog readers this question. [To read Claire’s post about her survey of her readers, go here.]
What do the line, texture, pattern, or color in an image of yours tell us about you the photographer?
The inside is what I want to get to. Always.
What has been your greatest photographic challenge? Were you successful in meeting the challenge? Why or why not?
Currently, I am in the midst of learning how to transition from predominantly artistic shooting to moving into high-end editorial shooting. In other words, I am learning the business of photography and what it means to generate an income from photography. It is hard but I am enjoying the process. It is stretching me.
What mistakes do even the best photographers make?
A mistake I see photographers repeat over and over is shooting for editorial requirements rather than remaining true to their authentic voice—the very reason the client hired in the first place. Balancing artistic voice and client need is an ongoing challenge that all artists need to think about if they are in the business of generating an income from their art.
What do your own photographic mistakes teach you?
My most common mistake is going into auto-pilot mode and just shooting. I need to stop myself and go back to planning and actively thinking about each frame.
If you could photograph anything anywhere in the world, what would it be, and why?
My life goal is to set up an educational fund for children in South Africa [that would allow me to] work with carefully selected individuals to mentor them through school and university. I would like to photographically document these lives over a period of years.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received from another photographer? From a non-photographer?
From another photographer: “The business of photography is hard, and you need to learn how to make art of that, too.”
From a non-photographer: “Capture what you love.” It sounds simple but it takes time to figure out what you love.
If you were to teach a class of poets how to improve how they see, what would you advise? What could they learn from observing you?
Because I am a visual person and because most of my workday consists of online time, I am very aware of how people present themselves visually and digitally. It has always been a remarkable fact that writers, poets, authors, and other word artists tend to neglect their visual appearance, instead depending on their words to carry them. I am of the opinion that it is no longer okay to do this. The world is becoming increasingly visual. You need to make a visual impression if you want to make any impression.
Photos by Claire Burge. Post by Maureen Doallas, author of Neruda’s Memoirs: Poems.
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Buy a year of Every Day Poems, just $5.99 — Read a poem a day, become a better poet. In April we’re exploring the theme Dragons and Creatures.
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- Healing with Poetry: Interview with Fred Foote (Part 3) - September 10, 2015
Sam Van eman says
I like this best: “A mistake I see photographers repeat over and over is shooting for editorial requirements rather than remaining true to their authentic voice—the very reason the client hired in the first place.” I think you could exchange “photographers” for any number of artistic labels: “designers,” “writers,” “poets…”
Thanks for the interview Maureen and Claire.
Maureen Doallas says
Thank you for reading and commenting, Sam. I agree.
As Tracy Kidder and Richard Todd say in their fine book “Good Prose”, “. . . The creation of voice is the providential result of the writer’s constant self-defining and self-refining inner dialogue…. Listen to yourself, and listen to those writers who are so great that they cannot be imitated.”
Claire Burge says
I LOVE this quote! It just went up onto my wall …
Claire Burge says
Sam, I remember working with you as my editor. You taught me to lift my voice out distinctly. For that I am forever grateful because I have applied it to my photography as well.
Sam Van eman says
The gratitude is mutual, Claire.
L. L. Barkat says
And why can they not be imitated? (following up on Maureen’s comment and Claire’s words in the interview now…)
I believe it is because no one loves in exactly the same way. That is why we must capture what we love.
Claire wants to see the inside. It is how she loves.
Though I am a lesser photographer (no patience for all that light and aperture stuff 😉 ), I have an equally strong voice. It’s the voice of love that stands in awe of the intimate and gently brings that forward in a way that can be shocking. Because the object is now “known.” Ah, how bold to try to know another. How vulnerable to be known and yet how powerful an ultimate presentation to the world.
Claire, I like what you said about writers not simply depending on words. It goes further than the visual, in my opinion. Writers may never be great artists or musicians or cooks or athletes, but to bring oneself into these worlds is to bring vision and fragrance and movement and texture and sound into one’s words. You are cultivating even more my Art of Fine Living thoughts I was sharing here with Anthony yesterday. 🙂
Claire Burge says
Laura you make a very powerful point here and one that many professional photographers wrestle with because they get annoyed with people who simply pick up a point and shoot camera and call themselves a photographer.
I think if we all learn to recognise that we love differently, we won’t mind when so-called ‘amateurs’ enter our domains, in fact I would like to hope, we instead seek out the ways in which they love instead.
Maureen Doallas says
You do indeed have “an equally strong voice” that you bring to all of your work, Laura.
Love how you expanded the thoughts here.
Fear, especially of taking risks, can keep us from loving and from seeing and from doing. Figuring out what matters and cultivating that, making it the truth with which to live, opens up a world of possibilities.
L. L. Barkat says
I wonder, Maureen…
maybe fear of loving keeps us from seeing and doing? (Oh, I know we’re always getting into these chicken-and-egg discussions, but I am really thinking hard now about this question).
Claire, who is the black and white photo of? Is this your mother and father?
L. L. Barkat says
and fear of loving might be, at its root, fear of knowing and being known.
For a long time, I didn’t write fiction, because I couldn’t love the world that way, because I felt I would be more known than I had ever been. This is why ‘The Novelist’ must be a landmark work for me, more than anything else to date.
Monica Sharman says
Brave. Landmark of courage, then.
Monica Sharman says
And I find it interesting that fiction, more than memoir, would make you feel you’d be more known than ever.
L. L. Barkat says
Funny, huh?
Fiction explores the *possible,* rather than chronicling the *done.*
The *possible* issues from our imagination, which is otherwise largely hidden.
Maybe that is why.
(Oh, and it should tickle you, then, that my fiction put memoir in the mix. Double whammy 🙂 )
Claire Burge says
Yes that is my mom and dad. That is the very first photo I took, with a film camera when I was 14 or 15, that I really fell in love with. My love for the subject was visible to me for the first time.
L. L. Barkat says
i think it is so important that this photo ended up in this post then. You are going back to go forward, which seems a necessary step in my mind.
Also, the vulnerable side of your mother is drawn out in a fascinating way. And that, for a woman who I think seems anything but vulnerable. You definitely got inside on this one. It is a taste of your future as well as your past.
Ann Kroeker says
Oh, how I wish I were a visual artist! This inspires me to keep trying, yet reminds me how far I am from achieving results I really want.
I was so mad at myself–I have a gigantic tote bag I carry because it has an insert so I can carry my DSLR at all times. During a chaotic week of serving friends during their family tragedy, I lightened my load by setting aside my camera, but then…oh, then of course I missed moment after moment that should have been documented in love.
{thunk-thunk-thunk}
(sound of Ann kicking herself)
Thanks for reminding me to capture what I love. The sun is up, streaking warm across the lawn this morning, and my kids are home.
L. L. Barkat says
Ann must not kick herself 🙂 I think that’s part of it too. I think the more I learn to love and not punish myself, the more open to the world I become.
(teasing you a little here… your “thunk-thunk-thunk” made me smile, but it did bring me back to a thought I had earlier after commenting. Oh dear, I think I’m going to be in this post comment box all day! 🙂 )
Ann Kroeker says
True, how can I capture love when I am frustrated with myself?
Maureen Doallas says
Ann,
The thing about frustration is that it can be resolved; it takes patience.
Have you read Tana Pesso’s book “First invite Love In”? I reviewed it on my blog after it was published (2010). Just search on the author’s name in the search box on my blog and it will come up. I think you might find it a helpful and insightful way to think about the question you’ve raised here.
Ann Kroeker says
Maureen, thanks for the book recommendation. Will hunt it down.
Claire Burge says
i think at some point i learnt that being frustrated with myself had to become part of the art and i am learning to make it so …
Claire Burge says
Ann a remarkable thing about you, the person Ann is the practical nature of your love. I would love to see that emerge in your visual art.
Ann Kroeker says
It’s true…I’m not all that abstract. I don’t have any idea what I’m doing when I venture into visual, so I’ll just keep snapping and learning and trying to see.
That photo of your parents? LOVE.
Megan Willome says
Maureen, I’m reading “Good Prose” and loving it. It made me delete and rework a sentence with a cliche this week.
And Claire, on writers needing good visual representation online, well, that’s why I hired Will.
Claire Burge says
And you sure made a good hire there 😉
Maureen Doallas says
Megan, I agree that it’s a wonderful book. I’ve read almost everything Kidder has written.
I like your point about employing the talents of someone else when you’re cognizant of what you need. It’s tricky; translating what’s inside into something visual, including words on a page, takes insight and time and patience. Our editor a particular talent for understanding what’s behind the public face, I think.
Darrelyn Saloom says
Claire, I love that reading poetry has taught you the power of being succint to enhance your visual perception skills. Something to think about next time I shoot pics of the farm.
Great questions, Maureen. Enjoyed!
Maureen Doallas says
Thank you so much, Darrelyn.
Kathleen Overby says
Great post, interview, and comments/conversation. Love the deep magic happening here. You all have given me a gift of great inspiration and education. Grateful for you.
Maureen Doallas says
Thank you, Kathleen. I like your comment about “deep magic happening”; I think we see that in all that we write and photograph and create but also such acts as how we set a beautiful table and present a lovely dinner or plant a garden or even just take time, as you do here, to tell us, “I see you”. Grateful for you, too.
Shari Dragovich says
I truly appreciate this interview. I love Claire’s response to what is involved in teaching her eye to see creatively:
“Being willing; seeing and learning again and again how to see differently from the way you do currently; studying really good art to understand what makes it good; asking questions; experimenting; avoiding poor imagery; asking for mentoring and putting into practice what is being taught to you; documenting and reflecting on your own process so that you can understand where you are getting stuck, where you are progressing easily, and where you are feeling uncomfortable; studying basic compositional rules; breaking the rules…”
Her answer spoke to me as a writer – continually working out an image, correct poor imagery, study and learn and put into practice…. all the things necessary to finding the “distinctness” within me – reaffirming and reminding me: in order to find my “distinct” voice it takes much practice and patience and willingness to fail – but not all the way to failure.
I also the appreciate the ensuing discussion – especially L.L. Barkat’s words on capturing what we love. How true for a writer – every artist! How can we come to our most “distinct” selves if we are not continually writing/photographing/drawing/painting… what we love?
Thanks for a great interview – it has been inspiring and thought-provoking 🙂
Maureen Doallas says
Shari, thank you for your generous comments!
The only thing I wish I could do when interviewing is ask follow-up questions to specific responses (that works best in live situations).
I’ve been delighted with the threads of conversation begun with Claire’s responses. It’s the kind of conversation I’d love to have around the table.
Donna says
Claire, i love your work and have been wanting to ask you this…. So glad for this wonderful chance to do so! Do you notice a difference (in what you can create) between film and digital work? Are they each better suited for different uses in your opinion/experience? What is your preference?
Donna says
(I meant to say between FIlm and digital CAMERS)
Maureen Doallas says
I’ll look forward to Claire’s response to your good question, Donna.
I have a friend who has resisted making the switch to digital but because of the increasing unavailability and cost of film and time required to process it is beginning to make a switch.
My son took four years of classes in non-digital photography and much prefers it.
Claire says
Donna thanks for asking: Before I give my opinion, I think it is important to say that every photographer you ask this question to, will have a very different opinion, because there really is no right or wrong answer. Rather there are preferences.
Firstly, digital camera technology has come along so far, especially in the area of lens and sensor development that I do not think you can do more with a film camera than you can with a digital camera or visa versa. Of course it is important to add that it is always important to compare apples with apples. You cannot compare a high end digital camera with a entry level film camera.
Secondly, what can be captured on a digital camera can be edited to look just like film in Photoshop or Lightroom. I have always maintained that using Photoshop and Lightroom is an art in and of itself.
The only exception to the above statements is the video capability that higher end digital cameras have, that film cameras do not have. This is also the reason why I have chosen to embrace digital technology alongside film technology. I use digital cameras for all of my client/paid work and I do personal projects on film. I also choose not share these as I find that having my own private space in my art is very important to my creativity.
For me where the difference comes in, is with the ability and skill level of the photographer. A very inexperienced photographer can take a very good photo with a digital camera but not really understand what made it good or what happened inside their camera to make it good. It would be very hard for this to happen with a film camera.You need to understand ISO, white balance, aperture, shutter speed, film speed and lenses in order to create a really good photo with a film camera.
So for me photographers who still use film cameras and create really good images with them, are the artists who truly understand the ‘art’ of photography. The photographers who do not understand the constructs of the art are still photographers but they would be like an illustrator creating all their drawings digitally without every having picked up a piece of charcoal to put a face to paper, if that makes sense?
That was a really long answer 😉 I would love to know why you asked the question …
Donna says
Thank you so much. I really appreciate your time in giving me such a thoughtful reply. To answer your question I suppose I have a lot of reasons for asking. I’m naturally nosy, for one 😉 and for another I have been noticing that very artfully done images possess something unique that mine do not. I am a hobbiest, unschooled in photography, and have been in the ‘mucking around’ phase of photo play. Don’t get me wrong, I have loved this phase and it has actually be very therapeutic! I don’t devalue this phase, but I’m getting bored and am feelings stuck. I think you hit the nail on the head with this; “A very inexperienced photographer can take a very good photo with a digital camera but not really understand what made it good or what happened inside their camera to make it good.” I have been looking into taking photography classes for quite some time and notice a lot of prerequisites regarding FILM, DEVELOPING, etc. I wondered why, if this was a ‘digital world’ this was still such an emphasis? But after reading what you said it makes so much sense to me. I don’t understand all of these aspects of images that you mention. Heck, I can’t even remember them let alone understand them, but I want to! It’s the difference between using a computer and programming, or using a calculator and understanding mathematical concepts deeply. Unless I understand intimately the layers of what happens in a great, artistic image, I’ll stay stuck here taking okay pictures. Nothing wrong with okay, but I just feel ready for mor. As my writing evolves I want my photography to evolve, too – they go together for some reason for me. I’m not sure why they have to, but who am I to argue with such a nudge? LOL! 😀 Thanks again!
laura says
What a lovely interview and conversation! And Claire? Knowing that photo is your parents has kept me here–somehow feeling the love you captured and going back and forth between your voice and that image. Beauty.
Maureen Doallas says
Laura,
Thank you so much for stopping by, reading, and commenting. I very much appreciate your kind words.