Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2005/05/16
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]To caption, or not to caption: that is the question: Whether 'this nobler to spell it all out leaving nothing to the imagination. Or let them sit there dumbfounded, not having a clue. I thought the other day I should get a digital tape recorder so I can record where my head was at when I took the shot. But then why not just do that and skip the photo altogether? They say being deaf is far worse than being blind. Why not record sounds instead of pictures? Make sound collages. But put stuff in like "print this real low key" otherwise I'd just lighten it up like a dumb machine print printer every time. "put dark rock at III" "print it dark stupid" Dorothy Lange or someone lately I was reading though thought you need to do some serious writing with every right off the bat shot or your not doing it and I thought there was something to that. I should try doing that. Might have even been Dianne Arbus! Click shutter, wind camera, write stuff. I like to see the photo coming first. I'm less of a photo journalist kind of guy.. A writer who takes pictures. I've done a little of that. I had my pad with me. Got all the names. In a sense like this it's more of a travelogue kind of thing. The photo is almost like clip art. It's like you'd grab it from anywhere you can. A big help in illustrating the caption though. "Here's the copy now where can we get a shot?" The picture should say a thousand words. Not twenty at the bottom doing it for you. That's my manifesto for the evening. It's like the best images in your mind are the stories you heard on the radio. I do have fun putting weird photo's in emails though. Just sliding them right in there. Ones I shot or ones I get from Google-image. I love getting that big contact sheet from the world up with the Google-image. So many pictures in the world. I just read that's why the Surrealists liked photography. Because it was no big deal. Still images raining like confetti from everywhere and anyone could do them. That's why Breton liked them. That's why photos were "marvelous". I think "marvelous" might have meant "fun" sometimes. Mark Rabiner Photography Portland Oregon http://rabinergroup.com/