Food for Digital Thought: Idealism Vs Realism

When Idealism meets Realism.

One of my favorite Pearls of Wisdom that I often say to my online class with the BPSOP and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind Workshops” I conduct around the planet, is “in a perfect world, what if”. I’ll bring this up when I’m discussing one of my student’s photos and ask them if they could go back and re-take the photo, and could add, change, or do anything they wanted, what would they do.

I do this then explain that whether or not they could change anything isn’t the issue. It’s just an exercise to sharpen the mind and have them always thinking about improving their photos so that one day when they could actually add, change, or do anything, they will be ready for it.

The Realism comes from the photo as they first saw it. If I had a quarter for every time a fellow photographer or student told me that they never thought about adding, changing, or doing anything they wanted, to create a stronger image, I would be writing this post on my island with a blue and frothy cocktail resting comfortably on my stomach…with an umbrella perilously hanging from one side. They just figured that if it was the way it was, then that’s the way they should shoot it.

Now, I know that there are photographers out there that believe you should never alter anything before you click the shutter. If that was the way it was before they got there, then come hell or high water that’s the way they were going to photograph it. Well, that’s all well and good, and I hope all their photographic dreams and endeavors come to fruition. My problem is that most of the time, I never like things the way they are.

Since my background is in painting and design, I think of my camera on a tripod the same way I would have a blank canvas on an easel. With a canvas, you add pigment until you get your finished ‘work of art’. That’s the way I approach my photography, I still consider myself a painter. I chose a camera instead of a paintbrush.

The Idealism part of this post is when that same fellow photographer or student tells me things he would have liked to have added or changed. That’s the ideal world, not the real world talking, and that’s the world I live in…photographically that is!!!

In the above photo, I was shooting an annual report for a pharmaceutical company. Although this kind of activity was going on (Realism), this photo was a part of my imagination (Idealism). In other words, I put all the elements together and staged it.

If you want to “take pictures”, then by all means live in the real world where Realism is the common denominator. On the other hand, if you want to “make pictures”, then it’s the ideal world for you. Don’t look at what’s there, look at what you’d like to be there.

As for me, my mother always said I was a dreamer!!!

Visit my website at www.joebaraban.com and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.

JoeB