Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/02/08

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Subject: [Leica] a short story
From: james at tingphoto.com (James Ting)
Date: Wed Feb 8 17:34:52 2006

Ted,
I enjoyed your comments, and agree with much of it.  I see vision as
something that many people have inherently but need to be sharpened and
crystallized over time through the vicissitudes of life.  In most cases,
these are the people with strong inner compelling forces that drive them to
capture their visions, and they would be miserable if they're not out there
capturing what's necessitated by their heart, gut, or being.  An
understanding of relationships in multiple dimensions is also an important
characteristic, and not just in the physical senses but relating physical to
the spiritual or emotions.

It would be interesting to hear more people in this forum talk about *why*
he or her takes photos.

James


-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+james=tingphoto.com@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+james=tingphoto.com@leica-users.org] On Behalf Of Ted
Grant
Sent: Wednesday, February 08, 2006 6:21 PM
To: Leica Users Group
Subject: Re: [Leica] a short story

James Ting offered:
>>Between vision and technique, I'd vote for vision as the more significant
>>part, and trying to establish a unique vision has probably been the
>>toughest challenge in my photographic life.<<<

Hi James,
Like yourself I believe vision is absolutely number one. It doesn't 
necessarily come from the eyes, far more from what we feel in our heart or 
gut on a given day.

That's why some photographer's can be as hot as a firecracker one day with 
almost every photograph they capture is stunning. The next day they couldn't

capture a moment with feeling, if it was hitting them over the head.

They're "vision dead!"  It's like being an actor or writer, excellent one 
performance, terrible the next. The writer has the mental block and can't 
put two words together to save his life.

Some people are blessed with "vision" as a God given gift and produce 
wonderful photographs without any effort, where others can't see their feet 
for looking.

Some folks never attain it in a life time, they see things but not the 
vision to truly see the nuance of the country side, people, the sunset with 
vision.

If you like, one might refer to it as a "style" of shooting, something we 
recognize in the photography from the greats of history. I don't believe one

can establish vision because it isn't something you can create by numbers, 
you either have it, find it during your walk through life and eventually it 
appears in your photography.

Like I said, "some folks have the gift of vision."

ted


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In reply to: Message from tedgrant at shaw.ca (Ted Grant) ([Leica] a short story)