How a Photographer is Like a Chef
People ask me tons of questions as a photographer.
Inquiring minds want to know lots of things, from “How do I look skinny in my photos?” (Check out every celebrity pose in the history of ever. Those guys have handlers for good reason. Also, being nice to your Photoshop-wielding photographer helps) to, “You can edit that zit out, right?” (yes, I can), and even, “How much did your camera cost?” (true story).
One that I get more frequently than most, though, centers around the proliferation of digital cameras these days. Format varies, but I hear, “How do you guys make money now? Like, now that EVERYONE has a nice camera?” in my sleep, practically. I’ve been lucky in that I’ve always had very supportive clients, who understand that when it comes to capturing memories, you get what you pay for – but plenty of other photographers face what seems to be a never-ending kickback on price.
“You want to charge how much?”
“You can just do a few, right? Isn’t that, like, cheaper?”
“But my neighbor’s cousin has a really nice camera too, and she says she’ll just charge me twenty dollars!”
…or, “That’s too much money. I’ll just do it myself.”
Let’s examine the DIY approach, shall we? Last weekend, I decided to try a little experiment. I had two small children in need of occupation (read: tiring), a highly intelligent teenager who’s always up for anything, and a free afternoon on my hands. So, around mid-day, we loaded up into the car, and headed out to our local park. When we arrived, I handed my *very nice* camera with *very* nice lens attached to my teenager, with instructions to do whatever he felt was necessary to get good photos of the two little ones. After I ran down the different available camera settings for him, his eyes glazed over just a bit and he quickly scrambled for the “Auto” button…which is what 99% of the population does with digital cameras anyway, right? Cameras are SMART these days! Go, technology!
My big guy took it so seriously, guys. He instructed, and he posed (and then wheedled and pleaded, because, c’mon, the subjects were 7 and 5, respectively). He circled for different angles, and got in close, and chased those kids all over creation. When all was said and done, he peered at the back of the camera and looked pretty pleased with himself. The full set of his images can be found here.
So then I took over. At the same time of day, in the same location, with the same tools available to me (with slightly sweatier and grumpier subjects), I took my own set of shots. This time, though, my camera was not set to Auto – before each click of the shutter, I analyzed the scene, posed the subject, and dialed in settings to get the best-looking shot I could. I avoided lighting situations which I knew would be problematic, I joked and cajoled (and, okay, eventually bribed) to get genuine expressions out of them (although it should be noted that as their mother, their tolerance for me only stretched so far). My (un-edited) images can be found here.
My teenager didn’t do anything wrong, per se, but he put the camera in the driver’s seat–with not a clue how to really work this ever-so-nice machine. Cameras have come a long way, but even the most sophisticated of cameras (and, for the record, the one used for this experiment is about as sophisticated as they come right now) only *so* smart.
Despite all of the buttons and dials and menus available, a machine can’t read a scene like a human can. Let’s look at the difference:
This photo taken by my teenager looks really dark, right? That’s because the camera, on auto, evaluated the whole scene when it was guessing at the necessary exposure. It saw all the bright light behind my son, and said, “Hey! Looks like we need to darken this mess down!” Unfortunately, that left my son, who was actually in shade, looking rather dark and gloomy. The framing of the photo is off, as well – there’s a lot of empty space around his cute little face, so he’s sort of swimming around in the photo (and where, exactly, are his arms? And what’s that black thing over on the left?)
Here’s my photo, in the same area. My camera settings were such that the important part of the photo (his face) was properly exposed. The background is uncluttered, allowing the focus to be on him, not on all of the things around him (just, you know, ignore the clothing choices for me, okay? There were only so many battles that were to be won this day).
So now let’s take the camera out into “better” light. That genius of a camera must have just gotten confused in all that shade before, right? Shade’s HARD. Let’s snag some sun:
This is why we photographers harp on shooting during times of the day when the sun is not super bright. Auto mode did a better job of exposure here, but see those dark circles under his eyes? That’s going to happen on every photo when the sun is acting like a spotlight, directly overhead. His shirt is also pretty neon, given all of the glare, and we’ve got leafy, branch-y things sprouting from behind him, which makes the background pretty distracting.
Now for mine. Same spot, but I moved my son into a patch of flat shade, which removed the shadows from under his eyes and toned down his shirt. I also adjusted my camera settings so that the background behind him went all blurry (remember “bokeh”?) – this kept the focus on him, instead of making the viewer wonder what exactly was hiding in those suspicious bushes. (Also: CATCHLIGHTS!)
Here’s another example of how Auto got it wrong, and where it pretty much always will. Because cameras aren’t sentient beings, it doesn’t know how many subjects are in the photo, so it focused on my younger son, in front – and as a result, my older son behind him is slightly blurry (click on the photo to embiggen further).
Also, AGAIN with the dark…
Okay, I cheated a bit with this one – I wasn’t able to get a shot of the little boys together on the same day as the others, because by the time my teenager was done getting his shots, and I got a (very few) of my own of my little guy, he was a bit overwhelmed and pretty much done with the whole thing. He took a sensory break with his big brother, while I went along my merry little way harassing my middle child. This recent photo (including the day’s assistant photographer!) illustrates how a knowledgeable professional should be able to get a photo with multiple subjects all in focus, while still getting a nice pretty bokeh-y background. That’s something that’s always going to be hard for a camera on Auto (see: non-sentient being).
So, listen–digital photography is a beautiful thing. We’re able to record so much more of our daily lives now thanks to the modern marvel of technology, but as a result of all that innovation in such a short period of time, I often think that we’ve lost sight of the power of a really good, well-done photograph. In the rush to grab a snap right here, right now, with whatever is on hand, and however we can get it, we make sacrifices to get mediocre (or even bad) shots to get anything at all–and, worse, we don’t live that moment in the way that we should, because we’re too busy hunting for buttons and filters. We end up with a million not-great photographs cluttering our phones and hard drives–unorganized and impossible to find–instead of a more reasonable number of really good images that do our memories justice.
That’s where a good photographer comes in, friend. Our jobs are to know how to work these wonderful, powerful cameras of ours to squeeze every last bit of potential out of them; in order to tell the story of your memories in such a way that your children (and your children’s children) will be able to treasure them for years to come. It’s what we do–in the same way that a chef at a five star restaurant has a responsibility to his craft to create culinary masterpieces, so too should your photographer be *so good* at taking and editing your images that you will notice a difference between their work and your neighbor’s-cousin-with-a-nice-camera.
Yes, everybody’s got a DSLR these days. Know what else everybody has?
An oven.
In point of fact, *I* have an oven – but I am by no means a chef. When I want a really nice meal, we leave that little frozen-pizza-making machine of mine behind and go find a great restaurant with a very knowledgeable, well-trained chef in charge of the kitchen. Yes, it’s a more expensive meal…but is it worth it? YES.
An investment in a good photographer is an investment in the preservation of your memories.
Any professional worth their salt shouldn’t just take photographs – they should tell your story, and tell it well.
*(Image courtesy of Megan Eidson, of Megan Eidson Photography, http://www.meganeidsonphotography.com)
*(Image courtesy of Marissa Ann Photography, www.MarissaAnnPhoto.com)
(My kid. Exuding joy.)
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