OBSERVATIONS & INTERPRETATIONS
Contents
I. Dorothea Lange, Words and Pictures, Photo Art or Not
II. Congratulations, Indiana Dunes National Park!
III. Exhibited Photos and Ekphrastic Prose
IV. Celebrating the Art and Influence of Frank V. Dudley
V. An Anticipation of Autumn
VI. Seeing to Learn
VII. Maintaining the Mystery of the Moment
VIII. Film Photography: End of an Era
IX. Landscape Photography: Ethical Engagement in the Environment
X. Photography and Memory
XI. Creation and Appropriation in Photography
XII. Adopting the Pace of Nature
XIII. Reflection on Representation and Explanation of Images
XIV. Captions and Captured Images
XV. Romantic Images and Objective Observations
XVI. Exercising Selections
Continuing commentary appearing on this page will be dedicated to presenting a series of brief essays concerning the process or production of photographs, as well as offering perspectives on the relationship landscape photography has to other art forms. In addition, contributions here will focus on essential connections perceived between pictorial content and personal contemplation, especially when examining specific aspects innate to scenic depiction of natural settings.
I. Dorothea Lange, Words and Pictures, Photo Art or Not
“All photographs—not only those that are so called ‘documentary’…can be fortified by words.”
—Dorothea Lange
Following more than four months of a well-advertised $400-million worth of expansion, renovation, and reorganization, the Museum of Modern Art recently reopened its doors to visitors near the close of 2019, and in the weeks beginning February 2020 premiered an exhibition, scheduled to extend into May, featuring documentary photographer Dorothea Lange, whose portfolio frequently focused on specific less visible sections of mid-twentieth century American culture and society.
Dorothea Lange’s iconic photographs of the Depression years, particularly those shots chronicling the tragic circumstances faced by farmers displaced by the great Dust Bowl drought of the 1930s, are among the most expressive images in American history. Certainly, her Migrant Mother, the portrait snapped in 1936 of a desperate woman—decades later, after Lange’s death in 1965, identified as Florence Owen Thompson—holding an infant and flanked by a couple of her older children, both with faces hidden against their mother’s shoulders, illustrated the plight of distraught families experiencing poverty, hunger, and an uncertain future.
Supposedly, among other reported controversies or confusions that have arisen about the image, Lange had promised Thompson the intimate photos of her family would never be published. Instead, they would only be shown to government officials as a way to engender greater sympathy for the migrants’ situation as well as to procure increased aid in food and funds, efforts which were successful. Today, this image is inarguably one of America’s finest portraits, and some propose it may even be seen as our nation’s Mona Lisa. In 1998, the Getty Museum bought a print for nearly a quarter million dollars.
Titled Words & Pictures, this new exhibit’s examination by the Museum of Modern Art focused on work from such a renowned figure suggests written commentary often complements imagery, a perspective sometimes historically seen as contentious in communities wishing photography to be considered as art equivalent to any genre and to be regarded without any assistance from other media.
Indeed, some still insist that photos, like paintings, must only stand on their own. Perhaps these people remember the difficulties faced by photographers in an earlier era, when museums refused to show photographs or even acknowledge photography as a legitimate art form rather than merely a mechanical craft. Coincidentally, Lange was included in the initial exhibit devoted to photography at the Museum of Modern Art in 1940. From the origins of photography in the first half of the nineteenth century, the process was depicted as a threat to painters, such as Frenchman Paul Delaroche who famously—and hyperbolically—stated in 1839: “From today painting is dead.”
In the twentieth century, photographers like Alfred Stieglitz fought to have their works honored as distinct objects of art rather than images associated with paintings. Ansel Adams, the great landscape photographer, commented: “I’ve always thought photography was an art form, but it had very low appreciation in the beginning except for some Europeans and of course Stieglitz. Stieglitz always considered photography to be an art form and is the ‘father’ of the creative concepts of the twentieth century.”
However, Lange observed: “All photographs—not only those that are so called ‘documentary’… can be fortified by words.” The MoMA exhibit uses Lange’s 1939 photo book, An American Exodus, which connects pictures with captions containing explanatory or analytic text, as well as contemporaneous excerpts from various forms of literature, ranging from news articles and journal notes or social studies to poems or popular song lyrics. Moreover, Lange displays purported quotes from the mouths of those individuals who are the compelling subjects presented in her excellent portraits.
As mentioned in one of my previous essays, “Exhibited Photos and Ekphrastic Prose,” I note that the partnership of photography with prose in my Indiana Dunes project intends to “explore and explain the topography” depicted, “as well as to reflect upon personal inspirations, observations, and experiences.” Due to my additional background as a published author, English professor, and editor, I especially appreciate the influential impact language can exert on the point of view brought to a visual representation of any setting in my photography, and I do not believe the aesthetic stature of a photograph is diminished by complementary commentary.
Further in that same article, I expressed a personal attitude toward “those prose writings linked with photographs exhibited in my ‘Photographs & Paragraphs’ journal entries. I consider the commentary as ekphrastic paragraphs suitably complementary to my photos, seeking to combine simple description of the images (a verbal mirror) with an exercise—perhaps at times even an experiment—in language that examines and expands the framed setting on display, as well as offering the remembered experience or stilled moment frozen in the photograph through a brief yet loose or implied narrative. The result may sometimes be seen as documentary and sometimes deemed speculative, either inviting or permitting a certain range of emotional reactions from readers and, I hope, through tone, connotation, or symbolism opening the works to greater ambiguity and more complex interpretation.”
Eighty years after that first photography exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, the status of photos in the minds of the general public or among cultural criticism has been altered by time and technology. Indeed, since the oldest known photograph was created by Louis Daguerre in 1838, then traveling forward to the ever-present camera phone nowadays, the evolution of this art form has resulted in about 2 billion digital images captured every day and posted online in social media platforms during 2020, almost all accompanied by narratives or at least brief explanatory captions. (In fact, the total of photos now taken in a single year might likely exceed 1 trillion.) Consequently, the old-fashioned concept that words and images ought to be separate in order to preserve a perspective of the photograph as a distinct art form surely seems outdated, and Lange’s opinion that supplemental language can add fortification to a photograph seems even truer, more acceptable, as observers view the words appearing beside her pictures in the new MoMA exhibit.
II. Congratulations, Indiana Dunes National Park!
“…one can hardly help feeling that an understanding and appreciation on the part of the public will be slow. But this does not change the fact that it is unnecessary to journey great distances to find a locality rich in almost unpaintable charm and picturesque beauty….”
—Frank V. Dudley, Prairie Club Bulletin (Feb. 1922)
In various types of writings—journal entry, commentary, editorial—I have presented during the past few years of work on my grant project exploring and exhibiting the landscape of the Indiana Dunes through prose and photography, I have advocated for the re-designation of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore to the elevated rank of a national park. Indeed, in my journal entry posted October 5, 2017, I remarked upon this next possibility, which would “mark the end of a journey begun just about 100 years ago when the National Park Service was instituted in 1916 and Stephen Mather, who visited the Indiana Dunes and held hearings on the proposal for ‘Sand Dunes National Park,’ became the first director of the National Park Service in 1917 with recommendation for such a status. Unfortunately, that proposal coincided with World War I, and it was set aside at the time; however, the good work and dedication of many individuals over the decades now seem ready to be rewarded.”
A subsequent journal entry chronicled that a proposal had been “sent unanimously by a House of Representatives committee for passage in Congress that would designate the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore as Indiana Dunes National Park. In my search for the text of the bill (H.R. 1488: ‘The Indiana Dunes National Park Act’), I discovered language in the findings section that testified to the importance of this region in Northwest Indiana. Some statements included the following. ‘The southern shore of Lake Michigan includes some of the most geologically and biologically diverse areas in the United States…. The unique features that comprise the southern shore of the Lake Michigan, also known as the Indiana Dunes, were formed over the course of 12,000 years by natural forces, including glaciers, wind, and water. Glacial melting and fluctuations in the water level resulted in the formation of as many as 7 shorelines. This process resulted in the biologically diverse beaches, sand dunes, and inter-dune wetlands that can be seen today.… The Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore and the adjacent Indiana Dunes State Park are comprised of over 15,000 acres of dunes, oak savannas, swamps, bogs, marshes, prairies, rivers, and forests that are currently preserved for public enjoyment…. The Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore is one of the most biologically diverse National Park Service units, containing 2,336 unique species, including 896 animal species and 1,407 plant species…. The Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore is an especially important feeding and resting area for migrating land and water birds, boasting 350 unique species.’”
One of my journal entries in early November of 2017 noted how “I was pleased to learn the House of Representatives unanimously approved upgrading the status of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore to designation as the country’s newest national park.” In a follow-up piece written upon viewing an exhibition of Indiana Dunes artwork by Frank V. Dudley, the Painter of the Dunes, at Valparaiso University’s Brauer Museum of Art, and attending a presentation by James B. Dabbert, an expert on Dudley “and his influence on the preservation of the Indiana Dunes,” I quoted “Dabbert’s latest book, The Indiana Dunes Revisited: Frank V. Dudley and the 1917 Dunes Pageant. He declares: ‘…Dudley began to exhibit Dunes paintings both in Chicago and nationally to promote the Dunes, an agenda championed in National Park Service Director Steven Mather’s Report on the Proposed Sand Dunes National Park, Indiana, published in 1917.’”
Dabbert’s book also quotes a writing by Dudley from the Prairie Club Bulletin in 1922: “Each year painters go to the four corners of the earth for inspiration and subject matter for their work, while here at our door-step we have a unique landscape which is most paintable. The only objection being that it is possibly too new a subject—a type of landscape almost unknown and perhaps without seeing, hard to understand, and for that reason one can hardly help feeling that an understanding and appreciation on the part of the public will be slow. But this does not change the fact that it is unnecessary to journey great distances to find a locality rich in almost unpaintable charm and picturesque beauty.”
In December of 2017, as the future of the Indiana Dunes was being considered again one hundred years after the famous Dunes Pageant, I reported being “referenced in a minor way as part of a debate over officially designating the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore as the Indiana Dunes National Park.” A Chicago Tribune editorial by John Copeland Nagle, a Notre Dame environmental law professor, in early December of 2017 “declared such a transition ‘a really bad idea’ because the Indiana Dunes is not ‘incredibly special,’ and its inclusion as a national park would diminish the stature associated with lands deemed ‘national parks.’ The following day, Dwight Adams reported in the Indianapolis Star on Nagle’s essay and opposing viewpoints, particularly as represented by Indiana congressional members. Adams’ article appeared online and included a number of posts on twitter about the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, including one by me from 11/27.”
I am now pleased to see that the process begun by local leaders and social visionaries seeking to protect and preserve the environment of the Indiana Dunes, plus to raise its prestige as a national treasure, has finally achieved its goal. On February 15, 2019, a joint resolution of Congress—supported by Indiana Senators and House Representatives, both Republican and Democrat—to re-designate the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore as the country’s newest national park was signed by President Trump.
Consequently, I am delighted to witness fruition of that dream intent on sharing the richness and beauty evident in nature contained among the Indiana Dunes landscape along southern Lake Michigan, as imagined by early activists and later advocates such as Steven Mather, Frank V. Dudley, Jens Jensen, Henry C. Cowles, Richard Lieber, Thomas W. Allinson, Dorothy R. Buell, John T. Hawkinson, Jane Addams, Paul H. Douglas, and numerous members of the Prairie Club at the Indiana Dunes, just to recognize some of the crucial historical figures. Congratulations!
III. Exhibited Photos and Ekphrastic Prose
“The words are only speculation / From the Latin speculum, mirror….”
—John Ashbery, “Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror”
Although I know most viewers of my web pages visit for the posted photographs and the majority of responses received address those featured images, I also appreciate occasional instances when some—perhaps out of politeness as much as anything else—extend a kind comment on the accompanying prose. As I have noted in supplementary pages to my Indiana Dunes project, the partnership of photography with prose intends to “explore and explain the topography” depicted, “as well as to reflect upon personal inspirations, observations, and experiences.”
Two of my primary teachers and influences—maybe even mentors, with whom I studied for years as a young apprentice—were the poets John Ashbery and Mark Strand, both also known as aficionados of art and authors of books containing criticism or commentary on visual arts. Moreover, John’s most famous work is a celebrated ekphrastic poem, “Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror.” Additionally, although in interviews Mark took credit for writing only two truly ekphrastic poems during his career, he suggested many others might be considered as created ekphrastic compositions—a sort of notional ekphrasis—poetry revealing and reviewing scenes painted within his imagination, which seems appropriate since he began as a painter and an art student of Josef Albers at Yale University.
Ashbery admired and enjoyed authoring ekphrastic poems—not merely those focused on paintings, but works in response to music as well; therefore, he appeared to relish opportunities to reflect on the arts in prose pieces, which he did for decades as a working reporter or guest columnist with newspapers and art journals. John seemed to regard this practice as a way to navigate the narrow strait between a pair of formidable land masses: painting and literature. As David Bergman remarks in his introduction to Reported Sightings: Art Chronicles 1957-1987, an anthology he edited of John Ashbery articles on art, those works served as “a halfway point between the visual and the linguistic and often a place to explore ideas that make their way into the poems.”
On the other hand, in his typically wry or self-deprecating manner, Strand sometimes wondered aloud whether such poetic pieces responding to artworks were objects of inherent laziness, and he questioned the level of value in ekphrastic poetry—by himself or by others—which to him on occasion could be regarded as almost parasitic, feeding off the original artwork and source of inspiration. Nevertheless, he seemed to differentiate poetry from prose, and in the preface to Hopper, his collection of concise commentaries in response to Edward Hopper paintings, Mark indicates these short essays represent a reading of the “virtual space” perceived in the paintings by viewers, that location where “the influence and availability of feelings predominate.”
Likewise, I have adopted some of the attitudes expressed by Ashbery and Strand in those prose writings linked with photographs exhibited in my “Photographs & Paragraphs” journal entries. I consider the commentary as ekphrastic paragraphs suitably complementary to my photos, seeking to combine simple description of the images (a verbal mirror) with an exercise—perhaps at times even an experiment—in language that examines and expands the framed setting on display, as well as offering the remembered experience or stilled moment frozen in the photograph through a brief yet loose or implied narrative. The result may sometimes be seen as documentary and sometimes deemed speculative, either inviting or permitting a certain range of emotional reactions from readers and, I hope, through tone, connotation, or symbolism opening the works to greater ambiguity and more complex interpretation.
IV. Celebrating the Art and Influence of Frank V. Dudley
“I think one of the greatest of God’s gifts to humanity is the beauty and the joy of nature. Yet the great majority of us go through life unmindful of it….”
—Frank V. Dudley
Since we celebrate the 150th anniversary of Frank V. Dudley’s 1868 birth on November 14, 2018, this seems an apt moment to again emphasize my appreciation for the influence and guidance he demonstrated as the “Painter of the Dunes,” whose artworks and friendly persuasion helped early efforts by activists in obtaining the protection and preservation of vast tracts of Indiana landscape adjacent to Lake Michigan. I have repeatedly written in my journal entries about the debt I owe as a photographer to Dudley for examples of artistic composition depicting details of the Indiana Dunes.
A word search reveals that he is mentioned by name nearly 60 times during the course of my journal posts over the past two years (2017-2018). In a commentary of June 3, 2018, I share a note “about Frank V. Dudley’s famously influential paintings created at the Indiana Dunes, and how my pictures sometimes attempt to imitate a few of the artworks by shooting the photos in locations or with perspectives similar to the ones Dudley chose. An active man, Dudley frequently hiked trails deep within forests just inland from the cottage he and his wife had built beside the beach in 1921. Dudley’s waterfront studio was situated at the base of a sand dune below Mt. Holden. Paths leading to the shore not far from the Dudley structure would include Trails 4, 7, and 8. Not surprisingly, these trails seem to be depicted in a number of his pieces. Indeed, one of the paintings bears a title identifying itself as The Seventh Trail (1953).”
A piece I published in November of last year discussing release of a new book, The Indiana Dunes Revisited: Frank V. Dudley and the 1917 Dunes Pageant, quoted author James B. Dabbert: “…Dudley began to exhibit Dunes paintings both in Chicago and nationally to promote the Dunes, an agenda championed in National Park Service Director Steven Mather’s Report on the Proposed Sand Dunes National Park, Indiana, published in 1917.”
Dudley’s exhibitions of Indiana Dunes paintings were usually displayed at shows in Chicago, where he and his brother Clarence owned a family photography business. Although Clarence appears to have been more devoted to chronicling activities and historic moments (including the 1917 pageant) through photographing the Dunes while Frank placed images of the settings on his canvas, the painter often employed tactics and composition skills familiar to photographers when arranging elements in his works. In fact, as I remark in a September 2017 post concerning a recent exhibition devoted to Dudley at Valparaiso University’s Brauer Museum of Art, “Frank also occasionally used photography as a preliminary step in his process and would frame settings in front of him through a lens holder. Indeed, the exhibit even includes a pair of Dudley’s vintage Kodak folding bellows camera models from the early 1900s and his tripod.” Further, a June 2017 observation reveals “Dudley acknowledged sometimes aligning his perspectives through a small rectangular metal frame, as one prepares a photograph in a viewfinder, and in later years he even took Kodachrome shots of locations around the lake, employing his camera as a tool to remember specifics when creating a new artwork.”
In another September 2017 entry, I confide how “I have often written about the importance of Dudley, ‘The Painter of the Dunes,’ on my decision to chronicle the Indiana Dunes in photos and prose, and I have attributed his influence on the compositions of scenery displayed within my photographs. Among the characteristics witnessed in Dudley’s artworks, I especially appreciate settings in which he isolates a patch of marram grass, wildflowers, shrubbery, or small trees among the sand dunes with a glimpse of Lake Michigan seen in the background. I frequently marvel at the ability of foliage or flowers to appear and to bloom along the beachfront in the middle of an arid area. In fact, I regard such a location of growth as a dune oasis, a distinctive spot of interest and engagement for the observer.”
Through study and exploration, I have determined the exact site—now unmarked and overgrown—where Frank Dudley and wife Maida lived in a cottage just above the beach of the Indiana Dunes. In a narrative from my journal written June 18, 2017, I explain: “As I always do when passing this way, I stay a moment to rest in the gray stain of shade beneath an isolated tree among the foredunes. Although the landscape before me may appear less interesting than other images I might capture today, this place has become my favorite location in the Indiana Dunes. I consider this a sacred space. Through research I’ve discovered here is where Frank V. Dudley, ‘The Painter of the Dunes,’ once built a cabin and worked in his studio facing Lake Michigan with the distant skyline of his Chicago home on the opposite side.” As my January 5, 2017 post notes, Dudley was “permitted to keep his cottage studio among the dunes, after the State of Indiana assumed ownership, for an annual rental fee of ‘one large original oil painting.’” Recognizing “his reputation as a crucial figure who championed the Indiana Dunes,” this contract was maintained until Frank Dudley’s death in 1957.
Indeed, at the start of my Indiana Dunes project, I posted another entry in January of 2017 that offered the following about my process: “I committed to sometimes even photographing the same locations—creeks, trees, beaches, bluffs, etc.—over and over again in different seasons and under varied circumstances to more fully display the delight evident in the environment…. I adopted as my model artist Frank V. Dudley, ‘The Painter of the Dunes.’ I wished to emulate to some degree this man who visited, depicted, and then lived in the Indiana Dunes for fifty years, accumulating—through life and art—an experience and an expertise in authentically representing the setting he so deeply appreciated.”
V. An Anticipation of Autumn
“How beautifully leaves grow old. How full of light and color are their last days.”
—John Burroughs
Photographers and painters of natural surroundings, especially those who inhabit temperate zones like mine in the Midwest, learn to fully appreciate even the slightest changes of nature brought during transitions in all four seasons. Most of those I know who capture landscape images are educated and experienced in the intricacies of weather, as well as its impact upon the visual details of terrain framed by a camera’s viewfinder or brushed within the boundaries of a canvas.
Although local conditions in the climate throughout every section of the calendar offer distinct characteristic elements to enjoy, many of my fellow photographers in this region anticipate the arrival of autumn scenery created by cooler temperatures as much as any of the other times of the year or divisions within weather patterns. When summer winds slowly shift to northern currents so that the air gradually chills in October or November, and the sun’s position in the sky begins to drift farther south each day, establishing sharpening angles of sunshine, the overall tone witnessed in snapped pictures frequently becomes more remarkable.
As everyone is aware, the most noticeable feature of fall happens to be the grand transformation of trees and shrubbery. The sea of green leaves above me gives way to an array of shades, and a colorful chaos commands attention all around with its assortment of tints. Even looking down, I see those lost leaves that contribute color to the winding lines of trails beneath my feet as I hike through dune woods or forest ravines. Moreover, at times a crispness in the atmosphere brought by brisk onshore breezes will awaken the senses, and I find myself more alert to dimensions in texture, such as the crunch of hardened soil underfoot, the slick sheen of weeds polished by morning frost, or the caw of a lone crow overhead.
Though written in a work mainly focused on another segment of the year (“Winter Sunshine”), naturalist John Burroughs once described the unique mood one feels in fall: “The air is not balmy, but tart and pungent, like the flavor of the red-cheeked apples by the roadside. In the sky not a cloud, not a speck; a vast dome of blue ether lightly suspended above the world. The woods are heaped with color like a painter’s palette—great splashes of red and orange and gold. The ponds and streams bear upon their bosoms leaves of all tints, from the deep maroon of the oak to the pale yellow of the chestnut. In the glens and nooks it is so still that the chirp of a solitary cricket is noticeable. The red berries of the dogwood and spice-bush and other shrubs shine in the sun like rubies and coral. The crows fly high above the earth, as they do only on such days, forms of ebony floating across the azure, and the buzzards look like kingly birds, sailing round and round.”
Among the great traits of photography is the fact that it isolates and saves moments or memories, preserving brief periods and temporary states before they pass from our purview. Due to the fragility of fall and an especially nagging uncertainty about how many days—maybe an entire week, or perhaps two—peak foliage might last, anxiety can exist in the minds of those of us who wish to seize this fleeting season. We nervously watch weather reports for factors affecting peak season, and we seek predictions from interactive maps available in apps or at online meteorological sites offering fall foliage forecasts. We wait with great anticipation for the vivid scenic images of October and November, photographers hoping to provide permanence in the form of a magnificent print to those short-lived gifts from nature these late months bestow.
VI. Seeing to Learn
“A photographer seeks intimacy with the world and then endeavors to share it. Inherent in that desire to share is a love of humanity.”
—Barry Lopez, “Learning to See”
Most readers know Barry Lopez as a highly-respected author of nonfiction and fiction focused on elements of the natural world, a writer whose works have received widespread praise and earned distinguished awards. For instance, Of Wolves and Men was a finalist for the National Book Award while Arctic Dreams was a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and won the National Book Award. In an accurate yet elegant style of writing, Lopez fashions language that is learned, lyrical, and luminous, and his descriptive prose shows someone who perceives the world around him with visual acuity. Consequently, some might not be surprised by the fact that Lopez began his career as a landscape photographer whose words accompanied his images.
As Lopez notes in “Learning to See”—an article first published in a journal (Double Take) during spring of 1998 and included in About This Life: Journeys on the Threshold of Memory, his collection of essays released later that same year—his landscape photography skills and portfolio of works were sufficiently advanced in quality to obtain an interview in the middle of the 1970s with an assistant editor at National Geographic for consideration as a staff member. However, since Lopez’s selection of wildlife photographs and people portraits was more limited, the magazine could not offer assignments.
The essay explains further that Lopez, who had once thought of his photographic work as “a conscious exercise in awareness, a technique for paying attention,” began to view his photography in a different manner during the late 1970s after accidentally losing a box containing about 300 of his best photos. At the same time, he started to see his pictures as printed couldn’t fully recreate the scenery he’d witnessed: “I realized that just as the distance between what I saw and what I was able to record was huge, so was that between what I recorded and what people saw.”
Other factors appear to have contributed to Lopez’s loss of enthusiasm as a photographer, including the desire by publishers only for uplifting and idealized visions of nature rather than realistic images that sometimes might be grim, as well as the exploitative use of nature and landscape photographs for advertising or promotional and editorial purposes. Still, Lopez expresses a continuing great admiration for masters of landscape and wildlife photography who maintain integrity.
Finally, and perhaps most significantly, Lopez confides he feels the process of capturing a setting in a photo caused him to be too limited in his overall perception or somewhat distracted from engaging more necessary details a writer hopes to reveal about the complete setting before him: “Finding some way myself to render volume successfully in a photograph would mean, I believed, walking too far away from my work as a writer.” Moreover, he concluded: “…by trying to both photograph and write, I’d begun to feel I was attempting to create two parallel but independent stories.” As a result, Lopez found himself coming to a critical decision, “putting my cameras down on September 13, 1981, never to pick them up again.”
One can understand Lopez’s perception of distraction or disengagement, especially today as cameras are more universally present as smart phones in the pockets of most individuals. Who hasn’t seen a situation where a crowd of people—at a concert, a sporting event, a celebration, or a scenic site in a park—have separated themselves from the action in front of them with digital screens displaying miniature versions of the objects to which they should be devoting their attention? In fact, in a previous essay, “Photography and Memory,” I cited some studies that suggest memorializing events with pictures “actually diminishes our ability to recall our experiences, diverts our attention, and takes us out of the moment.” Indeed, we might “forget to feel the wind, listen to the sounds of birds in the trees, or smell the scent of flowers.”
Nevertheless, my history has proven to move in an opposite direction. As I mentioned in “Photography and Memory,” “whether patiently preparing to photograph a serene landscape setting or peering through my viewfinder at a sporting event surrounded by thousands of screaming fans, my attention to specifics in the atmosphere surrounding me magnifies, and I am able to isolate the moment for greater concentration. In fact, as I photograph the moment, I am more aware of the environment because I intend to save images that effectively reflect the circumstance and significance at the instant in which they were taken.”
Consequently, whenever I photograph colorful fall foliage while hiking through deep dune woods or I preserve the sun setting beyond Lake Michigan from my tripod’s location on a beach, I believe the patience required and the deliberation directed toward various aspects of my surroundings—as well as the contemplation or considerations that arise during the activity—actually enhance my awareness of specifics in the environment. Therefore, in the photographic process, I see to learn, and I am able to retain then recall all when transitioning to placing words on a page.
VII. Maintaining the Mystery of the Moment
“There is nothing in this world that does not have a decisive moment.”
—Cardinal de Retz
Much has been made in the history of photographic commentary about a seemingly simple but acute observation by Henri Cartier-Bresson concerning what he called The Decisive Moment, derived from a quotation of Cardinal de Retz on the opening pages and by the famous title of his celebrated book of photographs first published in America in 1952. (The French edition published at the same time carried a different title: Images on the Fly.) Feted as a master of various genres—including photojournalism, street photography, and fine art photography—in which he frequently captured candid portraits, his reputation might not easily extend to landscape photography. However, an expansive definition of Cartier-Bresson’s description of the decisive moment might apply to that form as well. Indeed, I have referenced the term in previous essays on landscape.
Some have suggested the iconic phrase, which emphasizes intuitive perception and reception of an instance captured in an image, represents an appropriate piece of advice to be followed by photographers of every type in all times. Recently, others have offered a contrary opinion that such an approach to photography may be outdated, especially in the digital age, and now as much a part of the past as a roll of Kodachrome film. After all, the continuous high-speed burst mode of motor drive on contemporary cameras, which I obviously have often used covering sporting events, allows one to “spray and pray” for an ideal image one hopes to be found when reviewing saved frames in the processing stage. In fact, in The Decisive Moment Cartier-Bresson warns against “shooting like a machine-gunner and burdening yourself with useless recordings which clutter your memory….”
Even during my decades as a creative writer I usually have found myself drawn to lyrical poetry rather than more narrative forms of literature. The stilled image in a poem offers further opportunities for speculation, interpretation, or a variation of perceptions by readers. However, as Cartier-Bresson notes, “the writer has time to reflect.” Authors can revise, rewrite, rearrange any element of a scene. The photographer cannot go back in time to shoot once more the fleeting instant evident in his or her image. Nevertheless, like a poem or a painting, a photograph offers a moment, perhaps mysterious or ambiguous, from which observers may surmise further context in place or time. This aspect of art, maintaining the mystery of the moment, intrigues me the most.
Maybe Cartier-Bresson also indirectly indicates my interest in landscape photography when he writes the following: “through the act of living, the discovery of oneself is made concurrently with the discovery of the world around us, which can mold us, but which can also be affected by us. A balance must be established between these two worlds—the one inside us and the one outside us. As the result of a constant reciprocal process, both these worlds come to form a single one. And it is this world that we must communicate.”
Although The Decisive Moment did not sell well upon its initial release, despite a limited printing, since then this book has achieved the highest stature among photographic texts and is revered by photographers for its writing as well as its famous images. I especially admire the perceptive, practical, and precise prose that connects so well with readers. Fortunately, after more than a half century, The Decisive Moment was reprinted in 2014 and accompanied by an introductory booklet by photography historian Clement Chéroux aptly titled “A Bible for Photographers.”
VIII. Film Photography: End of an Era
“I am sure the next step will be the electronic image, and I hope I shall live to see it. I trust that the creative eye will continue to function, whatever technological innovations may develop.”
—Ansel Adams
Canon recently announced concluding sales of its final remaining single lens reflex film camera, the EOS-1V, which actually had been removed from production eight years ago but had been sold from old stock in its inventory. A digital range film camera, this model had been instituted in 2000, shortly after Nikon had released the initial digital single lens reflex camera in 1999.
Canon also revealed cessation of repair service for the model will occur in 2025. The company had introduced its first film camera 82 years ago in 1936. Therefore, although a few brands still include film cameras in their offerings, this news report seems to represent an end of an era, especially for those of us who shoot with Canon equipment.
Although I always acknowledge that I do not consider myself a gear guy and I rarely write about such technical subjects, as I hike trails and interact with other photographers along the way, we sometimes discuss and compare camera bodies, lenses, filters, and other elements of gear. When involved in those conversations, particularly with the younger individuals I meet, I am reminded how many never photographed with film and are unaware of the challenges or rewards one encountered while capturing images in manual focus on rolls severely limiting possible numbers of exposures and with their fixed ASA film speed, followed by developing negatives in a darkroom.
My own recollections are shaded by memories of consciously counting shots on any outing to preserve an opportunity to take pictures throughout the trip and of cold rolls filling a shelf in the refrigerator, an effort to extend life of the film beyond its expiration date. As I have noted in previous writings, I also remember the darkroom conditions—including a costly, slow, and unpredictable process, contingent upon a lack of dust or leaks of light, as well as containing unpleasant chemical smells— all so delicate and to me often so frustrating.
Nevertheless, an education in film photography instilled an appreciation for the art form that I might not have otherwise obtained. My understanding of the tools and techniques inherent in works by a past landscape master like Ansel Adams increased my admiration for his skill, in both the exposure of film and the developing of prints, although Adams operated with a large format film camera. Indeed, I continue to enjoy witnessing the continued use of such large format film gear by photographers like Ben Horne or Nick Carver, who regularly share their experiences in online video journals.
Despite the various drawbacks obviously posed by the limitations intrinsic in film photography, valuable lessons learned through shooting with film would include the need to be more deliberate in composition and capture of images, as well as the placement of more importance on each frame in a roll of film, avoiding the digital “spray and pray” temptation. In fact, the absence of an electronic viewfinder screen to review scenes after each shot forces a more conscientious process upon the photographer. Moreover, with so much depending upon accuracy in every shot, the photographer must exercise greater care in focusing and lighting, attempting to get everything right in camera because the options for correction in developing are difficult or even impossible, especially when contrasted with the array of adjustments available in digital processing software.
Ansel Adams died in 1984 and never had the opportunity to experience the digital age of photography. Nevertheless, as Adams commented, no matter the technological advancements, the most significant aspect for any photographer must be “the creative eye.”
IX. Landscape Photography: Ethical Engagement in the Environment
“A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
—Aldo Leopold
Recently, a photo showing one of the beaches at Indiana Dunes strewn with trash—including beer bottles, cardboard boxes, plastic cups, and aluminum cans—left by visitors on Memorial Day was posted online by Dig the Dunes, a local group interested in promoting and protecting the Lake Michigan shoreline. The image was shared on Facebook over 2,000 times, and its depiction of disregard for the environment evoked hundreds of emotional responses, most expressing anger, across social media. Perhaps this outpouring of outrage by members of the community represents a positive effect from the isolated incident, since that one regrettable act actually instilled greater awareness and dedication among many to keeping the region clean of debris.
This situation also reminded me of an ethical approach to preserving the natural conditions of our surroundings practiced by landscape and nature photographers. A couple of statements addressing this issue can be found at the Nature Photographers’ Code of Conduct, presented by the Nature Photographers’ Network, and at landscape photographer Varina Patel’s web page, where she lists rules for engagement with the environment. Much of the guidelines can be summarized in one brief motto, “Leave No Trace,” which also happens to be the title of a document by the Center for Outdoor Ethics offering seven principles to follow during interaction with nature and wildlife.
Obviously, landscape photographers have a practical vested interest in maintaining the scenery they need as subject matter. However, as avid devotees to natural settings, they also appreciate the precarious position of nature, particularly in higher traffic locations like the Indiana Dunes, frequently visited by summer vacationers or those locals simply seeking weekend getaways. When capturing images in nature, ethical behavior insists that the area ought to be kept as it was when the photographer arrived, if not better. Not only should all materials brought to the spot be carried away, but any trash found on site (water bottles, food wrappers, etc.) should be removed if possible.
Moreover, a photographer must respect the original state of nature and prevent any adverse impact from one’s presence. Even if a thin limb or slim twig might impede the line of sight seen through a viewfinder, it has to remain in place. Additionally, caution should be displayed while walking across the terrain; for instance, being especially careful when stepping on sand in the Indiana Dunes where fragile foundational shoots of marram grass might be underfoot.
Lately, some landscape photographers focusing on more remote locales in national parks or wildlife refuges have engaged in a related debate concerning identification of specific spots where favorite photos are composed. Some suggest a wise course would be to conceal such information to avoid an overuse of the location. Indeed, an interesting ethical dilemma arises as various well-known individuals even admit to providing incorrect or misleading details concerning whereabouts of certain shots to followers of their photographic work, a philosophy that some criticize as an elitist attitude but which the photographers justify as a way to safeguard the purity of a sacred place.
X. Photography and Memory
“Photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event.”
—Henri Cartier-Bresson
A recent Vox article (“What Smartphone Photography Is Doing to Our Memories” by Brian Resnick) examines the influence of nearly universal access to cameras through smartphones on the ability to recollect experiences correctly. As I instruct students authoring memoirs or autobiographical nonfiction in my creative writing courses, whatever we remember arrives as an accumulation of various factors, resulting in some details that might be slightly in variance from actual events or derived from attempts to fill in gaps and supply context. In addition, our depictions of the past can be aided by others’ narratives or by moments preserved in photographs.
Resnick reports that almost 80% of Americans possess smartphones, “and many rely on them for memory support.” However, some studies suggest the process of memorializing everyday events with such pictures “actually diminishes our ability to recall our experiences, diverts our attention, and takes us out of the moment.” Frequently, we forget to feel the wind, listen to the sounds of birds in the trees, or smell the scent of flowers. Consequently, for many individuals an action thought to increase memory instead causes a lessening of accurate recollection.
Indeed, some researchers claim carrying a smartphone and depending upon it too much can cause a distraction and “cognitive offloading,” a situation where folks hope a device “will save a piece of information” for them, so “they’re less likely to remember it for themselves.” Moreover, when an image is captured on smartphone with a conscious knowledge it will be shared on social media—such as Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter—one sometimes views the instance from a third-person perspective, which leads to incomplete or distanced emotions compared to a more intimate first-person perspective.
Of course, for those capturing scenes in the more careful and considered conditions involved with dedicated amateur or professional photography rather than the casual use of a smartphone, the outcome can be exactly the opposite, an enhanced sense of memory. In an experiment conducted by Linda Henkel, a psychologist at Fairfield University, participants who more actively and deliberately framed the scenery, perhaps by using a zoom lens to focus more closely, found their memories improved.
In numerous experiences, whether patiently preparing to photograph a serene landscape setting or peering through my viewfinder at a sporting event surrounded by thousands of screaming fans, my attention to specifics in the atmosphere surrounding me magnifies, and I am able to isolate the moment for greater concentration. In fact, as I photograph the moment, I am more aware of the environment because I intend to save images that effectively reflect the circumstance and significance at the instant in which they were taken.
XI. Creation and Appropriation in Photography
“To photograph is to appropriate the thing photographed.”
—Susan Sontag
I find photography, like creative writing, to be a thrilling process of discovery, and this perspective provides one of the primary reasons I enjoy both activities. Just as I never know for sure what I want to express in words until I complete a composition, I’m often uncertain about the value a photo might contain until I do the review during post-processing on my computer. Even then, I frequently discover to my delight that a picture I originally deem ordinary will garner greater reactions from those with whom I share it. Perhaps this response by the photo’s audience can be seen as similar to the considerations proposed by proponents of reader-response theory in literature, which suggests determination of a literary work’s merit or meaning occurs through the reception by its readers.
Moreover, whenever I wander the landscape searching for settings to capture as images, especially during hikes through public parks, I am aware those locations I position within the frame of my viewfinder exist as spots in nature accessible to all. Consequently, the scenery may seem to be something less than unique and easily reproduced by others visiting the same place, particularly a landmark as familiar as Mt. Baldy at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, which I include as an accompanying image. However, I believe much of the interest in this photograph results from decisions evident in my individual presentation—chosen angle of approach, exposure, lighting, focus option, etc.
Indeed, I believe the way I produce an image, both as I take the shot and as I prepare a print, contributes to the treatment it receives when welcomed by observers. As in any art form, the inspiration and imagination employed during creation unite to offer a reproduction that is recognizable yet different—perhaps subtly but distinctly—from the source. As Susan Sontag suggested, the object photographed is appropriated by the photographer. Consequently, the camera serves as a tool of transition, changing the actual entity depicted on its sensor into an artistic representation.
Ansel Adams famously remarked: “You don’t take a photograph, you make it.” When selecting a lens or arranging the camera settings, choosing to use a polarizing filter or graduated density filter, electing a time of day, arriving during weather with sunny or cloudy skies, situating the tripod and adjusting its height, committing to cropping, dodging and burning, and finalizing the print size or paper quality, the photographer in every step envisions and constructs an image almost in the manner a painter might.
Although the photograph sometimes might appear to be a mere documentation of whatever vista an individual has witnessed during a hike, the captured image has its own identity. The photographer takes possession of this specific interpretation of his or her surroundings. Thus, each of the iconic images of El Capitan captured by Ansel Adams in various seasons and under diverse sunlight conditions exists as more than just a precise replica of the well-known tourist site. Likewise, I hope to discover my landscape photos present a personal vision of the environment I encounter.
XII. Adopting the Pace of Nature
“Think about the photo before and after, never during. The secret is to take your time. You mustn’t go too fast.”
—Henri Cartier Bresson
I must acknowledge that I am not inherently a patient person. Although I am sometimes told my public persona appears laid back and easygoing, my upbringing in New York City placed me in an environment that tended toward expectations of a quicker rate of movement and instant results. However, over the years I have transitioned to a more mellow approach during most everyday events, and not just because of my growing older or living away from a busy urban location.
Indeed, I believe I owe much of my increasingly patient personality to the influence of examples set by my wife and my son, both of whom have repeatedly exhibited patience or perseverance. Nevertheless, I know they remain amused at times that I express frustration when stopped and waiting for a train at a railroad crossing or when working awhile to correct the technological glitch in a computer program. I’m aware I also display my underlying impatience daily when continually grazing through television channels on my remote control.
However, I have found the photographic process, particularly when I’m engaged in landscape photography, additionally exists as one aspect that has contributed to my more patient behavior. I have learned from nature the benefit to a calm acceptance of delay or deliberation. Capturing images in natural settings requires preparation and pausing in place until the correct conditions present themselves. As I stand beside my tripod and watch the movement of clouds and shifting angle of sunlight, or I halt as a pair of passersby amble past my field of vision to clear the otherwise empty beach I am photographing, I am reminded of the advice once offered by Ralph Waldo Emerson: “…adopt the pace of Nature. Her secret is patience.”
I have adapted to the necessity involved in observing the development of a sunset sometimes for more than an hour, and then lingering a bit longer for the possibility of an afterglow even as the sun has disappeared beyond the horizon. Similarly, I am willing to accept occasions when the stunning sunset never materializes, despite my time spent passively attending to the setting before me, constantly ready to press the button on my shutter release.
Part of the irony in landscape photography arises with the contrast between the speed of the blade closing the aperture, maybe measured in hundredths of a second, and perhaps the hour or more engaged in anticipation. In fact, the habitual use of a tripod slows the procedure, and the extended time frame permits a photographer greater opportunity for contemplation of the image that will be captured within the camera frame.
XIII. Reflection on Representation and Explanation of Images
“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Journal: August 5, 1851
I have frequently indicated in commentaries accompanying my photographs that Henry David Thoreau’s writings are among the works influencing my philosophy and process of photography or personal appraisal of nature. Along with examples set by landscape painters, environmental authors, and fellow photographers, Thoreau’s perceptive insights into one’s experience with the natural world often have helped shape my attitude toward the interconnectedness between visual representation and interpretative explanation of images.
Throughout most of my publication history, I have been known as a poet who places an emphasis on vivid descriptions of locations with more rustic or seascape settings. Like Thoreau and other early romantic writers, especially those who focused on poetry—whether Wordsworth, Whitman, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, or Dickinson—I find myself following a guidance realized through nature’s example and implied in metaphoric language. As Wallace Stevens suggested in his twentieth-century romantic observation: “All our ideas come from the natural world.”
In an endeavor pairing prose and photography, I believe I bridge the verbal and the visual, applying words and phrases that help with my comprehension or appreciation of the incentive provided by imagery I encounter in the natural environment. Indeed, even as I create a visual composition for my photograph through the rectangular framing of scenery in front of me with the camera’s viewfinder, I am also always conceiving a vocabulary and narrative for composition of a prose caption to accompany the photo.
Consequently, the elements captured on the sensor of my camera might determine particulars mentioned in the description during my commentary, just as my desire to address a specific observation of nature through an impression expressed in sentences and paragraphs sometimes aids in selection of details to be included within the framework of the photograph. Both perspectives become integral, even dependent upon one another, in the act of apprehending and admiring nature’s offering for inspiration.
As Thoreau declared, determining what we “see” when we “look” around us, especially at settings noticed in nature, relies at times upon greater reflection, a thoughtful depth of understanding that supplements superficial two-dimensional depiction of scenery. Similarly, when photographic images complement language, uniting the two media frequently triggers greater interest and involvement among participants, further engaging everyone in the process of communication.
XIV. Captions and Captured Images
“…photographs can communicate more instantly and powerfully than words do, but if you want to communicate a complex concept clearly, you need words, too.”
—Galen Rowell, Outdoor Photographer: April, 2002
As I was reading a recent blog entry titled “The Value of Anonymous Places” by the excellent landscape photographer, Bruce Percy, whose work I admire very much, I came across his commentary about how to experience a photograph. He begins his post: “Photographs are much more intriguing if we aren’t told anything about them. No words, and no titles. Intriguing images have the capability to cast a spell upon us, and the beauty of that spell is that it’s a highly personal one. Through a lack of explanation, each and every one of us attaches our own personal thoughts and feelings about what we are looking at. Conversely, being told exactly what the picture is, or what we should get out of it, robs us of being able to attach our own emotions.”
Ansel Adams, our most famous and influential landscape photographer, held a similar point of view: “A true photograph need not be explained, nor can it be contained in words.” While I feel I understand this particular attitude, and I even share a bit of sympathy for its rationalization, I also appreciate those fine photographers who propose a photograph as an element in a narrative, which can be aided by language and rhetoric. The great Galen Rowell declared a necessity for the blending of scenery and story: “There’s no question that photographs can communicate more instantly and powerfully than words do, but if you want to communicate a complex concept clearly, you need words, too.”
Master photographer Brooks Jensen, long-time editor and publisher of LensWork, often emphasizes the roles of word and image in his work. One of Jensen’s books, The Creative Life in Photography: Essays on Photography, the Creative Process, and Personal Expression, promotes “storytelling” as a crucial element that might combine text and image the way items in pairings of “melody and lyrics, moving image and soundtrack, or music and dance” supplement one another. Jensen continues by commenting: “The more time I spend as a photographer (and especially as a publisher) the more I realize the irrevocable connection between image and story. This leads directly to the marriage between image and text.”
Perhaps I identify more closely with this thinking because I believe my experiences as an author and editor can complement my practice of photography. Additionally, I frequently define the purpose of my ongoing Indiana Dunes landscape project as perhaps primarily documentary and secondarily as art; although, my main motive for merging the visual with the verbal during the process would be with the hope that both documentary and art are present throughout my endeavor.
Indeed, in my previous essay, “Reflection on Representation and Explanation of Images,” I mention an approach I follow: “as I create a visual composition for my photograph through the rectangular framing of scenery in front of me with the camera’s viewfinder, I am also always conceiving a vocabulary and narrative for composition of a prose caption to accompany the photo.” I consciously use the word “caption” as the term for any explanation or information accompanying my imagery because it originates from the Latin capere for “capture,” which is the way photography is often perceived, as capturing an image.
XV. Romantic Images and Objective Observations
“Photography could…prompt us to revive, if not rejuvenate, the ancient and difficult problem of objectivity.”
—Paul Valéry, “The Centenary of Photography” (1939)
Although known nowadays mostly as a modern poet, Paul Valéry produced numerous essays on contemporary concerns and artistic developments, including commentary in which he spoke about the growth of photography in modern art or as a presence in everyday twentieth-century society. In “The Centenary of Photography,” a study originally published in 1939, Valéry addressed conflicting perceptions of photography as damaging or benefitting the act of authorship.
A popular view at the time intimated that attention to precise detail in a photograph could diminish the writer’s ability to be persuasive, since any writer “who depicts a landscape or a face, no matter how skillful he might be at his craft, will suggest as many different visions as he has readers.” However, Valéry argued “the proliferation of photographic images…could indirectly work to the advantage of Letters, Belles-Lettres that is….” He concluded that “literature would purify itself if it left to other modes of expression and production the tasks which they can perform far more effectively, and devoted itself to ends it alone can accomplish.”
Valéry seemed to think modern literature ought to distance itself from the romantic approach so prominent in nineteenth-century writing, which he believed emphasized an exaggerated articulation of scenic visual description, and move toward a more objective style, perhaps in the manner of Honoré de Balzac. He declared: “…with the advent of photography, and following in Balzac’s footsteps, realism asserted itself in our literature. The romantic vision of beings and objects gradually lost its magic.”
As I have mentioned in previous pieces, my practice of uniting word and image seeks to allow photos to show the landscape in its authentic magnificence, while my accompanying writing presents explanations or offers narratives that provide context for the captured image being displayed. In a manner, this process blends artistic exhibition with documentary commentary. Therefore, to some extent, I follow Valéry’s call for respect of the photograph as principal source of romantic description at the same time that my language attempts to supply more realistic reporting through empirical observation.
XVI. Exercising Selections
“Photographs bear witness to a human choice being exercised in a given situation”
—John Berger, “Understanding a Photograph”: The Look of Things, 1974
Almost all serious attempts at photography, especially as an art form, start with three features of the photographic process: shutter speed, aperture opening, and sensor sensitivity. No matter the content frozen within the frame of the viewfinder, this trio of elements primarily determines the final appearance of the image. Indeed, variations on this combination of choices could create pictures of the same scene but with a wide arrangement of depictions, each resulting in a very different impact upon the observer.
Of course, such technical selections occur only after the photographer has already located a subject, picked a perspective, and determined a moment in time to capture the image. As John Berger has written: “Photographs bear witness to a human choice being exercised in a given situation. A photograph is the result of the photographer’s decision that it is worth recording that this particular event or this particular object has been seen.”
Favoring one angle over another, as well as settling upon what should be omitted from the field of view, suggests a control over composition. Similarly, waiting for the right instance to snap the shutter release allows for command over such aspects as lighting or positioning of moving objects within the setting. Berger elucidates: “A photograph, whilst recording what has been seen, always and by its nature refers to what is not seen. It isolates, preserves and presents a moment taken from a continuum.” Consequently, though not always aware of it, viewers are impacted by those bits of information left out by the deliberate limitation caused by the photographer’s framing of a scene. Furthermore, a still photo represents a pause in the chronological order, which permits one to linger longer with an instantaneous impression.
Certainly, some options are ruled by the type of photography—portrait, sports, landscape, etc.—and the specific conditions—illumination, movement, viewpoint, etc.— of the surroundings (natural or artificial, outdoor or studio) during which the task at hand is undertaken. Moreover, additional courses of action occur during the darkroom developing or digital processing stage.
Perhaps as I am reminded of all the decisions that must be made to produce a photograph, I am also compelled to recall two well-known quotes by Ansel Adams. The first statement—“You don’t take a photograph, you make it”—leads to the logical conclusion summarized by the second: “The single most important component of a camera is the twelve inches behind it!”
Indiana Dunes 