Photographers or Camera Operators?

Beauty and mystery, the essence of photography. Sunset at the chapel, Nigeria.

 Are we photographers or camera operators?

There is a distinction. We may be skilled at using our cameras, lenses, and lighting equipment. And we should be. But does that make us photographers? Only in the technical sense.

Because photography is not about us. It's about the subject.

If we've been reading equipment reviews, many (maybe most) blogs, and watching YouTube videos, we might be forgiven for thinking that photography is about the equipment. But sorry, photography is not about the equipment, even though equipment is essential for creating photographs. Nor is it about our skill in using these tools.

Others tell us that photography is about expressing ourselves, and certainly it can be that. But not in the way we think

Contrary to what most of us have been taught, photography is not an art of self-expression. Photography is above all others the art of self-effacement. Photography reaches its highest plane when we have so mastered our tools and processes that we are able to use them to take ourselves out of the way and allow the subject to speak, to reveal itself through our skill. Paradoxically, it is only then that we fully and truly expresses ourselves.

Another paradox is the fact that looking at a photograph of something is often the best way to see it. "...the camera's innate honesty...provides the photographer with a means of looking deeply into the nature of things, and presenting his subjects in terms of their basic reality. It enables him to reveal the essence of what lies before his lens with such clear insight that the beholder may find the recreated image more real and comprehensible than the actual object." (Edward Weston, "Seeing Photographically," The Complete Photographer, January, 1943.) 

Chicago buildings. What else do you see?

Our work as photographers is to isolate and clarify so that others may through us see the things that are around them. Our expensive equipment and our skill at using the processes of photography are enjoyable in themselves, but are ultimately pointless unless they become the channels through which we empower our subject to reveal the essence of itself.

This post was adapted from my article The Three Stages of Photography, which appeared in the December, 1999 issue of Rangefinder Magazine.

About the equipment:  Both photos were made with an Olympus OM2n camera and Fujichrome 100 film. A Tokina 100-300 f4 lens was used for the Nigerian photo, and probably an Olympus Zuiko 24mm f2.8 lens for the Chicago skyline.

Blog Note: Sorry this post is a day late. I had computer problems.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     film photography      Olympus OM film camera     Olympus Zuiko lenses   Nigeria     Fujichrome 100 film    travel photography     Chicago      Tokina 100-300 f4 zoom lens    Edward Weston     Rangefinder Magazine

A Walkaround in Orange Walk Town

Belizean fast food. (Not Kentucky Fried Chicken, in case you were wondering).

 In March of 1989, my client, Church of God World Missions, sent me to Belize and Guatemala to document missions work in those countries. I spent a week in Belize, then moved on to Guatemala. My work in the northern Guatemalan village of Mayalan is posted here. 

I spent most of my time in Belize in Orange Walk Town, a city in the northeastern part of the country. With a population of about 13,000, it is the fourth largest city in Belize and was the location of a Church of God mission. Orange Walk Town is an easy place to get around, if one doesn't mind walking, and the fact that the official language is English (Belize is a former British colony) makes it easy to talk to people.

A Belizean family in front of their home.

My photography schedule with the mission wasn't intensive, so I had quite a bit of time to walk around and photograph the town and the people.

A Belizean street market.

The people of Belize are certainly poor by our standards, but they mostly seem to be relaxed and content with their lives. I believe that discontent and envy are most often triggered by comparison with others who appear to have more of life's good things. Television is probably the biggest contributor to envy and discontent.

Kids are everywhere.

Bright-eyed, friendly kids are everywhere in Orange Walk Town. They were eager for me to make their pictures, and I was happy to oblige.

A nice house in Orange Walk Town.

Most of the houses in Orange Walk Town are made of upright poles bound together, and roofed with sheet metal. This house is very well-kept and landscaped by local standards.

The Orange Walk Town neighborhood market.

Not exactly Kroger's, or even Walmart. But it fills a need in a culture less consumer-driven than ours, and it's a reasonable living for the shopkeepers.

A young Belizean boy on his way home from the neighborhood market.

 Carrying a can of what I think was oatmeal. My eye was caught by the unusual shape of his eyes, the slanting light, the brilliant colors of his shirt, and the complimentary blue of the background.

 The neighborhood laundromat.

In poorer countries such as Belize, a washing machine is an unimaginable luxury. This lady washes her families' clothes in the way countless generations of women have done before her. I'll never again complain about helping my wife with the laundry!

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     people photography    film photography      Olympus OM film camera     Olympus Zuiko lenses   Belize     Guatemala    Fujichrome 100 film    travel photography     Orange Walk Town      Church of God World Missions

Getting Closer

 

Praying woman in worship service. Mayalan Village, Guatemala.

 

 

The great photojournalist Robert Capa said, "If your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough."

 

I don't fully agree with that maxim, and there are exceptions to every rule. But the man has a point. Can you imagine how much impact the picture of the woman praying in the little village church in Mayalan would have if I had stood ten feet away? 

So my rule is, get closer -- when you can.

 

Of course, it's not always possible to get as close as you would like. Some subjects are not welcoming, some are not safe, and some are better photographed with a bit of space around them. But still, get closer when you can. 

 

If your subjects are people, try to engage with them whenever possible.

 

People will not open up to you until you open yourself up to them. Put aside your fear of photographing them openly. Project sincere attitudes of  friendliness and courtesy. Don't talk any more than necessary. A smile will open more doors than words any day. These are not aliens from another galaxy -- they're people, and they will respond to your efforts to relate to them as people. Don't try to hide in the shadows and pick off shots with a long lens. If you're furtive, if you appear indecisive or uncertain, you'll be greeted with suspicion. 

 

Don't let fear hold you back. Fear is the number one hindrance to good people photography. For that matter, fear of being open and vulnerable is the greatest hindrance in most human relationships. Fear often comes in the form of an inertia which suggests all kinds of reasons why you shouldn't take the picture now. Later will be better. The light will be better. The people will be more receptive. You don't have the right lens. Later...but not now. If you want to make good photographs of people, you must put aside your fear and inertia by an act of your will and begin to photograph -- now. Not later -- now! 

 

To quote another great photographer, Jay Maisel, "Shoot it NOW!

 

Parts of this post were adapted from my article The Fascination of Foreign Faces, which appeared in Rangefinder Magazine in August, 1999.

 

About the equipment: The photograph of the praying woman was made with an Olympus OM2n camera with the Olympus Zuiko 85mm f2 lens, Fujichrome 100 film, and two Vivitar 283 flashes -- one on camera, and one on a stand to my right.

 

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     people photography    film photography      Olympus OM2n camera     Olympus Zuiko 85mm f2 lens   Robert Capa     Guatemala    Fujichrome 100 film    Jay Maisel     Vivitar 283 flash

Life's Greatest Adventure: 59 Years and Counting

The Adventuress on our new tractor. Ready to bush-hog. 2005.

I've always believed that marriage is life's greatest adventure.

Louise was 19 when we met, just before she began her junior year at Florida State. The next year we were married on August 21st, 1965. 59 years ago today. We spent our honeymoon rambling around the northeast Georgia mountains, the first of many, many travels. I began to realize on our honeymoon that I had married someone whose spirit of adventure was equal to my own. As she told me later, one of the reasons she married me was because she "knew it would be an adventure."

After she graduated, we moved to Miami, where we both taught. Donny was born in 1968, and that fall we began two years of teaching at a private school in Miami.

The verdant Louise. Miami, 1970.

In 1970, we moved to Chattanooga, which I consider my home town. In 1972 Louise began nursing school, fulfilling a lifelong ambition. When she graduated, she went to work as an emergency room nurse. In the late '70s she began working as a home health nurse, driving the back roads of northwest Georgia to care for home-bound patients, often in remote areas.

In 1975 we moved across the state line into Georgia. All three of our sons graduated from Ringgold High School. In 1985, we began to look for property in the country. That fall, we found 30 acres in northwest Georgia's McLemore Cove and bought it.

Don, our youngest, joined the army in 1987, and in December of that year we moved into a 12x40-foot mobile home on our little farm, where we soon began to raise a small herd of cattle. I was 50, Louise was 42.

In 1994 we built the home where we lived until 2021. Then followed two years of travel in a fifth-wheel trailer. In 2023 we moved into our present home in Knoxville.

Louise in Italy, 2005.

Through the years we've been privileged to travel to many of these United States and to more than 30 foreign countries. Our spirit of adventure is undiminished, but age may be beginning to catch up with us!

We have been blessed to have had many adventures. But the key point in this narrative is this: just about everything we did was an adventure for us. Because we made it so. 

About the equipment: The picture of Louise on the tractor was made with a Canon EOS 20D camera and a 50mm lens. "Verdant Louise" was photographed with an original Nikon F, my first really good camera, a 135mm Tamron lens, and Tri-X film. The photo of Louise in Italy was made with the 20D and an EF 24-85mm lens.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    digital photography      film photography     Canon EF 24-85mm lens   Canon EOS 20D camera     Nikon F Camera     Tri-X film    Tamron lenses

Bye-Bye Big Guy

 The Fujifilm X-H1 camera with vertical grip.

The Fuji X-H1 isn't a big camera, as cameras go. It's smaller and lighter than the Canon 5D and 6D that preceded it in my kit, but it's the largest and heaviest of the Fujis. I was still photographing weddings when I got the X-H1, and it solved a couple of problems for me.

After the departure of the Canons, and before the arrival of the X-H1, I had been using a Fuji X-T20.  Although a very capable camera, the T20 is tiny and did not balance well with my big Canon EX 580II flash, nor with my Fujicron 55-200mm lens. The X-H1, with its larger size and extended grip solved both problems.

I also used the X-H1 extensively in 2021 and '22 to make new photos for the second edition of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia. It proved itself completely reliable and capable.

However, I'm no longer photographing weddings (not for money, anyway), and I'm not currently working on a book. I no longer need the X-H1's special capabilities. And recently, I've found its weight increasingly burdensome. More and more, when I go out the door I'm picking up the X-T20 or the X-Pro1 as my carry camera. So it's time to move the X-H1 along to a new home.

I've always preferred small and light cameras, as witness my 13 years with the Olympus OM film camera system. So what I'd like to get is a clean, used-but-not-abused Fuji X-T3. It's a little bigger than the X-T20, but not by much. I've been checking the Buy and Sell listings frequently at https://www.fredmiranda.com/, but haven't found one for sale yet. I may have to settle for an X-T30 or another X-T20.

Fred Miranda is also the place where I'll list the X-H1 for sale.

Why an X-T3, you ask? Why not an X-T5, the latest model? Two reasons: 1. The X-T5 has a 40mp (megapixel) sensor. Nothing I do requires that many megapixels cluttering up my computer. I'm just fine with the 24mp sensor in my X-T20, and many expert photographers agree that 24mp is the "sweet spot" for digital sensors. The X-T3 has a 26mp sensor, which is still okay. 2. A new (or even used) X-T5 is much more expensive than a used X-T3.

So it's bye-bye to the big guy.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    digital photography      Fuji X-T20 camera     Fujiinon XF 16-80mm lens   Fujinon XC 16-50mm lens     Fuji X-H1 camera     Fuji X-T3 camera

Ramblin' 'round East Tennessee

Twin silos at Callaway Farm dairy barn. U.S. 11, Louden County, Tennessee.

On Tuesday I made my first serious effort to begin rambling the backroads of East Tennessee. I had been delayed in doing this, first by the truck -- the cost of diesel fuel made it too expensive to ramble around in. I could have taken the car, but I didn't want to leave Louise without transportation (think shopping). Now, however, the truck is gone and we have two cars.

Second, Louise has had a string of health issues since mid-March and I didn't want to leave her alone. But finally, things seemed to be stabilized, so I took a day out.

Unfortunately, it was kinda a bust. I drove more than 60 miles on U.S. Highways 11 and 70, both two-lane roads, and all I found was this old dairy barn. It was interesting because its twin silos are very reminiscent of some old rural churches I've seen.

Knoxville is a very spread-out town, and you pretty much have to go 20 miles in any direction to find anything that looks like country. Everything touched by Knoxville is either industrialized, commercialized, or prettyfied. 

But I'll keep trying, and hope that I can find some interesting things to photograph without having to drive 200 miles a day. I sometimes drove 450-500 miles a day and photographed six to ten sites while working on the Rock City Barns book. But I was younger then.

Shed with Pennsylvania Dutch (?) hex sign.

Here's a shed I found a year or so ago near my son's home in Anderson County (just over the line from Knox County). Is it actually a hex sign? I have no idea.

About the equipment: The silos were photographed with a Fuji X-T20 camera and the Fujinon XF 16-80mm lens. For the shed, I used the same camera, but with the Fujinon XC 16-50mm lens.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    old barns   East Tennessee     digital photography      Fuji X-T20 camera     Fujiinon XF 16-80mm lens   Fujinon XC 16-50mm lens

More Found On Road Dead

 

1954 (I think) Pontiac. Georgia Highway 192, Stillmore, Emanuel County.

Although photographer Dennis Mook and I have been emailing and commenting on each other's blog posts for years, I had never met him in person until he came to Knoxville last week for the wedding of Dave Hileman, another friend and photo-blogger.

Dennis and I have similar ways of looking at the world, photographically. We both love to photograph the old, the abandoned, the passing away of the American rural landscape. Quite often, he posts a picture that makes me think, "I wish I had made that shot!"

A few days ago, Dennis sent me an email about a very successful YouTube photographer named Keith Dobson. When I went to his site, the first thing I saw was his Georgia Road Trip, featuring, up front, the same old Pontiac that I had photographed in a little wide spot in the road called Stillmore, Georgia in 2021, while I was working on the second edition of Backroads and Byways of Georgia.

Apparently, Dobson makes substantial money selling large, black and white prints of his scenes of abandonment. I wish I knew how to do that. Marketing has always been my Achilles heel throughout my career. Probably why I'm not rich and famous.

Anyway, here are some of my old car pictures for you to enjoy. Maybe someday they will appear in a book to be titled Found On Road Dead. ((But don't hold your breath. I am doing my best to live up to my son Rob's admonishment: "Don't die with all your projects completed!")

Early 1950s Nash Ambassador. Old U.S. Highway 27, Trion, Chattooga County, Georgia.

Late 1930s Hudson Terraplane. Indiana Highway 158. Silverville, Lawrence County. 

 

Cudzu Nissan. Three-Notch Road, Catoosa County, Georgia.

Dennis Mook blogs at https://www.thewanderinglensman.com/

Dave Hileman blogs at http://www.twolanetouring.com/ 

Check out their blogs. They are both great guys and fellow believers in Jesus Christ. (Dave is currently on his honeymoon and won't be blogging again until August 19.)

About the equipment: The Pontiac and the Nash were photographed with a Fuji X-Pro1 and the Fujicron 27mm f2.8 lens. For the Hudson Terraplane, I used an Olympus E-M5 and the Panasonic 14-140mm lens, and the Cudzu Nissan was photographed with a Canon EOS 10D and EF 50mm lens.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find what you want there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    old cars   Georgia   Canon EOS 10D camera      Canon EF 50mm lens   digital photography      Fuji X=Pro1     Fujiinon EF 27mm lens   Olympus E-M5 camera     Panasonic 14-140mm lens     Nash Ambassador     Hudson Terraplane

Telling Stories

Lights Out!

Cordele Drive-In Theater

U.S. Hwy. 41, Crisp County, Georgia

Blog Note: This is a repost from January, 2021. 

The thing I most like to do with my photography is tell stories. Early in my career I realized that, for me, photography is above all an art of exploration. Yet, it took a long time for this understanding to come to fruition. For many years I randomly clicked my shutter at anything and everything without any structure or purpose other than I thought it might make a good picture. My professional work was moderately successful, but I did not really know who I was as a photographer.  

In time, I gradually came to realize that in order to be fully engaged I need to be working toward some sort of story, whether a photo essay or a photos-and-words story. The best years of my career were the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, when I was traveling around the country and internationally, developing and shooting A-V programs. Telling stories in photos and words. This kind of work was even more comprehensive than shooting for a magazine article, because it was like making a movie; telling a complete story, but in still photos rather than motion pictures.

Later, I moved on to creating books, which is also a great vehicle for photography; perhaps even better in some ways because books are more permanent.

I’m not an art photographer, except perhaps incidentally, or perhaps I should say accidentally. I’m always looking for visual puns, of course, but other than that I’m mostly not looking for stand-alone photographs, although I certainly take them when I find them. Some photos, of course, are a complete story in themselves and require neither context or prior knowledge. Most, however, work better when accompanied by captions or other pictures or text, and some are basically meaningless without that context.

Many of my photographs are not strong on their own, but gain strength from their context as part of a story or sequence. The thing I do, though, is photograph the “thereness” of things. Many of the photographs in my limited edition book Georgia: A BackroadsPortrait are like that, just “there.” Presented without art or artifice. A good example is the photo of Katie’s General Store on page 64. It’s just there and that’s just the way it looked. It bears quiet witness to a vanishing way of life in rural Georgia. As Wright Morris might have put it, it's "commonplace." Not a remarkable picture in itself, but stronger because it's part of the sequence of photographs that precede and follow it.

Katie's General Store

GA Hwy. 376

Echols County, Georgia

On the other hand, "Lights Out," the photograph at the head of this post, can stand alone, telling its story without need of a context. But it also adds strength to the sequence in which it appears, a story of time passing, a world fading away.

My domain is the old, the odd, and the ordinary; the beautiful, the abandoned, and the about to vanish away. I am a visual historian of an earlier America and a recorder of the interface between man and nature; a keeper of vanishing ways of life.

 

Both of these photos were made with a Canon EOS 5D Classic and the Canon EF 24-85mm lens.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

If you would like to have a print of one of my photographs, check out my online gallery at https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  If you don't find it there, let me know and I'll arrange to include it in the gallery.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography    travel photography   Georgia   Canon EOS 5D camera      tCanon EF 24-85mm lens   digital photography      Telling stories

Photographing a Wedding for Fun

Dave slips the ring on Jill's finger.

Who photographs weddings at age 87? 

Well, I do. But only when the happy couple are friends. There was no pressure on me, because there was another photographer present who was being paid to give the event complete coverage. For me, there was the nostalgic enjoyment of doing something I've done hundreds of times in my life, and the pleasure of giving an unique gift to my friends.

Even though weddings were never the primary thrust of my business, I've done several hundred of them in my career. When someone asked me to photograph her wedding, I never said no. Participating in a joyful occasion, surrounded by happy people -- what's not to like? So I kept at it. The last one was when I was 83.

Do I miss it? Sure. Sometimes. I don't miss the hard work of carrying heavy equipment around, or scrambling to be in two places at the same time. Most of all, I don't miss the post-processing -- editing and polishing the files, of which there can be several hundred.

Ashley and Bowen, Valdosta, Georgia.

 I did my first wedding in 1972, using a Rolleicord twin-lens reflex camera and two rolls of 12-exposure film. In the late 1970s I began using 35mm cameras and stuck with them until switching to digital photography in 2003. Wedding photography was an interesting and enjoyable part of my career. In fact, if I could, I'd like to start at the beginning and live my life as a photographer all over again. But God doesn't give us that option.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Check out the pictures at my online gallery: https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  Looking is free, and you might find something you like.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography     wedding photography   Rolleicord film camera      twin-lens reflex camera   digital photography      Rolleicord twin-lens reflex camera   Film photography