
As photographers, we have a tendency to get a bit on the self-important side. For example, we often scoff at soccer moms with cell phones. We also tend to classify cameras as “amateur” or “professional” while losing sight of the fact that it is we who are amateurs or professionals.


One of the most significant aspects of professional photography is having our audience in mind at all times, whether the audience is readers in a publication, attendees at an art expo, visitors to our home, viewers of web sites, or just us trying to explore ourselves through imagery.
With our audience in mind, the purpose of our photography is almost always to illicit an emotional response. Maybe, as is sometimes the case in my work, our goal is to bring the feelings of triumph or tragedy to the reader. Maybe, as in the case of a wedding photographer, our goal is to bring joyful and intimate moments of the event to the viewer.
In either case, and many more, the central idea is use our cameras to translate moments into images, which then bring those moments to the audience.

What about beauty? Flowers. Sunsets. Canyons. Forests. Essentially, beautiful photographs work because they elicit an emotional response in the viewer. A snowboarder flying off a cliff edge elicits excitement. Sunlight filtering through a tree elicits memories of childhood. Grey-black clouds of a thunderstorm illicit feelings of foreboding.
I thought about these ideas recently as my intermediate/advanced class went on our walk to the pond at the Pontotoc Technology Center. Ostensibly intended to guide them from the nuts-and-bolts in the beginner classes to putting those tools to work, invariably we discover much more to photograph, often in the beauty of nature. When we do, it has a way of feeding itself, such that I can stand back and act as advisor, and let my students grow and explore their imaging potential.

This entry is why I keep coming to your blog over and over again. This is exactly what I want to read and informs me so much, not so much on the technical side, as to all the other reasons why I have grown to love and want to do photography.