Another compositon question

[Boomn4x4]

This may be tought to answer, but at what point... or, how do you know when.... you are no longer mimicing the composition of what you have learned and start to understand composition itself.

One thing that keeps sticking in my mind is a photograph Bitter Jewler posted... I beleive it was in a thread about taking photos of something 10' from you. It was a window sill, and it was an incredible picture. Such a simple thing, no more that 10' from almost anyone at any given time, and it was caputred to draw so much interest. When I got home from work that day, I duplicated the same shot on several of my window sills... and they all looked just as good. Long story short, I am now capable of taking GREAT window sill pictures.... but that isn't *me* (those astricks are for you erose90210).

How do I go from taking what I read in books, see on the Internet, and pick up out of magazines and apply my own twist to it?

 

[white]

Mimic the compositions you like until it becomes second nature. That's all anyone does.

Also might help to see what others have done before you. Here is a good index of photographers, and the stories are well-written: Sunday Salon.

Hard to give you more of an answer because I don't know what your photography goals are. I ... try to do fine art -- that is where my interests are -- and I sort personal issues out by photographing them. Like a journal.

Like this, too.

Don't obsess. Just find what you like and absorb it. Pretty soon it all runs together and your "style" emerges.

Garry Winogrand's kinda like the Cartier-Bresson of New York. Does it really matter? No. His work still kicks ass.

 

[Derosa]

I think what you are asking is, "how do I develop my own style." My own opinion is that the first requirement is that all of the technical stuff we newbies are thinking about, every time we take a photo, fades into the background. You know, like when you drive a car...you don't think about the actual act of driving the car like you did when you were first learning. So, once the mechanics are natural and second-nature, one begins to see the world a bit differently...then, over time, the "experts" perspective, interests, artistic abilities become prominent. Once this is recognized, the artist emphasizes and exploits it. Thus, a style is constructed.

This is off the top of my head, but I think it sounds plausible.

 

[Rob1n]

You will only ever mimic until you discover what it is you want to say about a subject and then work out how you choose to do it. Most photographers work backwards, they use photography to try and find an opinion, rather than using photography to display there opinion. But it's like writing a poem you need learn language to do it, so you need to learn composition and exposure for photography. But that only helps if you have something to say. Before you take a photograph think about what do all the elements mean to you, why are you taking the image. This will help you move to understanding what composition is. Artist write about composition in much more detail. Sorry I do go on, don't I? Boring myself here...

 

[Stradawhovious]

This holds true for most everything else, so I would assume it holds true for photography.

Technique is learned. This can be read from books, or learned from other people.

Style is developed. For the VAST majority it's not as easy as technique. It's comprised of molding technique to fit you, rather than molding yourself to fit technique.

It would be easy if you had never seen a photograph before. You had a pictureless book to teach you all the technical aspects of taking photographs, and you were the only person, ever, to take a photograph. You would have your own style the moment you picked up the camera.

The problem is that there are MILLIONS of people taking photographs out there, and some of them are pretty damned good. Its really easy to just simply copy the shots and styles that you see everywhere else. It's also really difficult to be original. There are only so many ways to photograph a flower or water droplet before they are repeted. Thats what happens when you enter the game late.

I will relate this to my own experience with music. I, at one point in time, was a professional Tuba player.

(Yeah, go ahead and laugh. Everyone does.)

I had many people to look up to. Roger Bobo, Sam Pilafian, Tom Abbs, Harver Phillips etc. etc. etc.

When I got good enough with the technique end of things, I was able to mimick the people I liked.

When I got good enough at mimicking the people I liked, I was able to really pick apart their style, and eliminate what I didn't like about it.

When I elimnated what I didn't like, I had to replace it with my own style. Little by little this is how my style was created. Now, I will never go as far as to say I was better than any of the aforementioned virtuosos, nor will I say that what I "eliminated" from their style wasn't superior to what I replaced it with. what I will say is that what I ended up with when the dust settled was my own style.

It took about a decade.

There are a lot of people that are able to bypass the school of developing a style the hard way, unfortunately it's a 1,000:1 ratio with the majority being those who can't.

The real trick is to not get stuck in a cycle of copying style, but rather get in a cycle of creating it.

I'm sure someone will come along shortly to tell you I'm full of ****....
But that's Ok..... They're probably right.

 

[Rob1n]

A wise man, a much better explanation of what I was trying to say.

 

[Dao]

Agree. Look at Toyota. They first made cars by copying others. Look at them now.

 

[Glycerol Sound]

The way I see it, everyone starts copying someone else in one way or another. But you'll never ever be able to nail anyone else's style head on because it is their own. It is through the imperfections in your imitations, as well as through other influences such as furthering your knowledge about the craft or drawing from other styles, that you will begin to cultivate your own style.