Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/10/19
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search][CONTINUED....] There are two main strategies that work for me and for the people I've advised. One you might call the "Build around the hits" method, the other the "Culling" method. In the Culling method, you'd first put together a working set of all the pictures you've ever made that you like or that you think are good--slides or black-and-white prints or whatever. Throw in everything you think is a good solid maybe. This grouping should be several hundred at least and possibly more. Once this group exists (again, you have to put it in real form, not just ideas, memories, and selections in your head), the process is basically a slow culling-out of the weaker work. Take a few weeks to get it down to a hundred, then take your time picking the absolutely best 40, and then wait a couple of months and select 24 from the 40 to print as a portfolio. In the culling method, you can get other peoples' input. You don't need to let them actually eliminate pictures; just ask them to pull out the pictures they like less well. Take their input as suggestions. Probably the supreme example of the culling method I know of was done by Christopher Bailey, a NYC photographer who has never gotten any recognition but is an outstanding artist. Chris would make tiny "matchbox" portfolios of images no more than 2x3 inches in size, in small, handmade boxes about the size of a deck of cards. Then, as he made the rounds in the art world and at parties and bars and so forth, whenever he got into a discussion about photography with somebody and they concluded by saying, "I'd love to see your portfolio sometime," he'd answer, "I've got it right here--want to see?" The upshot is that Chris got literally hundreds of people to look through his work. And he'd simply watch their faces as they looked at each picture. Gradually, he got a sense for the pictures that people responded to most consistently. Sometimes the consensus surprised him--he found that people passed right by some of his own favorites, and _did_ respond to certain pictures he hadn't really noticed. But let me tell you, when he had finally put together one portfolio of _all_ the pictures that people most consistently reacted to, it was really a stunner. It would make a great monograph book. In the Build-around method, you start from the other end--with the "hits," the special, spectacular shots that you just really love and that you know are among the best things you've done--the shots you just can't bear to think of leaving _out_ of a portfolio of your best work. That might be only three, seven, or however many shots. Then, you study that group and take your cues from those pictures, sorting through the rest of your work to find pictures that look good with those core pictures. A portfolio doesn't all have to be equally strong; it can modulate, have a pace to it, like a movie or a book--it's okay to do things like start with active, dynamic pictures, put some quieter ones in the middle, and then end with a bang. If your goal is simply to show off and set out those "hits," you can usually build a whole portfolio around them that looks good and communicates effectively. One thing you might learn from this process so far is that you simply don't have enough to work with. Maybe you just haven't had a clear enough idea what you're after when you're out shooting. Maybe you just don't shoot enough. Lots of people don't. Probably the most common weakness of all--a student epidemic disease--is putting together a portfolio from too small and weak a base of raw material. The other major pitfall is having too literal an idea of what it means for two pictures to work together. A major flaw and failing of many serious portfolios--especially in the art world--is thinking you have to have a dozen or two dozen pictures that are essentially different versions of the same thing in order for them to be presented together. If you're doing portraits, you _don't_ need to have the same backdrop and the same lighting for every damn picture in order for the portfolio to work--the opposite is more likely the case. If two pictures are too similar, your responsibility is to _choose between them_ rather than include them both. Many "art photography" portfolios are just multiple versions of the same picture. This is as much a failure of editing as it is a triumph of it! [CONTINUED....]