Article written by Valeria Lasso.
I wish I remembered the first time I took a camera and snapped my first picture. Retelling that experience would be a great way to start this article, but the truth is that I don’t remember. I do remember, however, the first camera I had. It was a purple ‘Bratz’ film camera. Cool. I know, right?
Jokes aside, I thought it was probably the coolest camera I have ever seen and I loved it with all my heart. I took pictures of literally EVERYTHING. The coolest part was when my mom would come home after printing the film and I got to see all the random pictures I had snapped over the last few days, which to my surprise were actually not bad at all.
Back then, I would have never considered what I was doing was anything close to art. I thought it was cool and a fun way to pass time, but not art. And yet photography has been considered fine art since the 20th century. Surprisingly not that long ago. But then again, functioning cameras weren’t invented until around the 1800s. The initial use for cameras was mostly for science, but that concept slowly changed over time.
It took a while for photography to be accepted as art because many people doubted the person’s skills. This occurred because photography doesn’t seem like a hard thing to do. In order to be taken seriously, some photographers made their pictures look like paintings. They played around with the negative and applied blurry and other kinds of effects.
Fast forward to the 21st century and photography is not only art, it is also a hobby, it’s commercial, it’s a passion. People take pictures all of the time for different reasons. People can make a career out of taking pictures of other people. We can display pictures in galleries and museums. We can post them on social media. We can hang them up on the walls of our houses. Pictures are amazing gifts, especially when they come in a pretty frame.
It’s amazing when you think about what a picture really is. It is literally a capture of an exact moment in time, which will never repeat itself the same way again. Each picture is unique; one of a kind. I don’t care how dumb this sounds, it’s so cool to think that you can capture a moment and keep it, share it, destroy it, gift it. But it’s a moment that will never occur again and it’s yours.
I like photos as a form of art because no matter who takes it, it will be honest. It is what it is. Photographers cannot change what they capture (apart from cropping it and adding colour effects), while a painter can easily modify what he is painting in a way that goes with his views and thoughts.
I know I haven’t mentioned how photos are great for capturing moments with family and friends. Don’t worry, I’m getting to that part. As ‘un-artistic’ as some people might think this part might be, it is still a very important part of photography and if you ask me, one of the most beautiful ones. When you spend time with your family and friends, there is no better way to remember it than having a photo of a happy moment.
I’ve always thought it’s rather ridiculous getting everyone to stand next to each other and make a fake smile at a camera so that it looks like a happy moment. I would much rather have candid pictures that we can look at and go back to that exact moment. When you have a normal posed-picture you can remember the day. But, when you have a candid you remember the moment.
One tricky aspect of making photography art is that you need to either do justice to what you see with your eyes, or you need to make it look even better. I don’t know if you’ve ever attempted to take a picture of the moon, but if you have, you’d know that it’s f*cking hard. To you, it might seem like a beautiful moon that takes up half of the sky, and when you take the picture with your phone all you see is a tiny white dot on the top corner of the screen. It is very frustrating, I know. But that how you know that being a good photographer requires more effort than you would think.
If photography is something that you would like to know more about or if it’s something that you do because you have a passion for it and you live in Brisbane, then you’re in luck because the Canon Light Awards is coming to Brisbane this September 2018. During the 1st and 2nd of September, you will be pushed out of your comfort zone with a Masterclass and a 24-hour brief with some of the photography industry’s greatest. You will take amazing pictures and receive feedback from the best of the best. You’ll even be able to submit your best picture to run for a chance to win a $1000 voucher for CameraPro. Go to their webpage and buy your tickets now! https://www.canon.com.au/lightawards/participating-cities/brisbane
Whether you do this challenge or not, I hope that you continue to take beautiful pictures. And if taking pictures isn’t really your thing, that’s completely fine. You can stand on the other side of the lens, or you can simply admire the pictures. What you do with pictures is up to you.
I hope that I was able to bring you to a more conscious understanding of what photography is and what it means to the art world. Hopefully, the next time you are admiring a picture you can put yourself in that exact moment in time.
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