Today it is raining, and I suspect there are little opporturnities for photography, so here is another photo from yesterday. It was only afterward, viewing this photo on screen that I realized what kind of compositions would have been possible with these three big stones in snow. But so it goes.
When I started Light Scrape some months ago - Sunday July 13th, 2008 - I was not expecting much feedback. I had started storing some of my photos on Flickr.com, but then I wanted to write blog-type commentary on the photos as well.
Of course, I haven't received much feedback in terms of quantity, but much more than I expected in terms of quality. It seems that photography is a topic where a kind of patience and communality is abundant, even towards a beginner like myself.
Also, most bloggers on photography are helpful towards others, so I often feel a humble sense of gratitude. It is not only a matter of sharing tips and tricks, but also encouragement of various types. An example of this is seen at Digital Photography School in the popular posting Never Give Up.
Some years ago I used to blog about using the Mac, and then I got involved in quite interesting and encouraging discussions. Perhaps because Mac users were then a neglected minority among other computer users. (That situation had dramatically changed since then.)
I feel that the photography community is more open, more supportive, and most of all - more patient and tolerant with different viewpoints. Mac users were more like the Nikon/Canon/Olympus/... camera enthusiasts type of community, not like those who actually take photos. (Perhaps I am a bit unfair here, sorry.)
In any case, even though my photography is developing really slowly, despite (or because) of the big amount of photos I take daily, I have got a feeling of support from the other photographers, despite the very different viewpoints and approaches to photography. Or perhaps because of the differences. And I guess you have to develop a patient attitude to be able to stick with the process of developing your skills in photography.
Update: While doing some housework I thought on the word "stranger", which in Finnish is "vieras". It so happens that this word has a dual meaning - both "stranger" and "guest". You can play with this, in sentences like "the stranger is a guest", "the guest is a stranger" ("vieras on vieras"). But I feel that perhaps I should have written "guests" instead of "strangers" into the title, referring to the readers and commenters of blogs.
Thinking further on this, it is interesting that the Finnish language has such two meanings for one word, guest/stranger. Perhaps this arises from the time when we were not yet living in the cities, when guests and strangers were not necessarily distinct categories. Nowadays the old style of Finnish hospitality is disappearing, I feel - the reason may be urbanization, or the busy lifestyle of today.
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4 comments:
Some times ago I read an article about grasshoppers marking their area by means of emitted sounds. Each one in his range of 50 square cm. That's a community!
In our species case things also involve the differences between each of us. But on this side I am bit pessimistic, it is quite difficult (and rare) to find a group willing to accept different and some times dissonant points of view.
Personally I like that even if it is not so easy to practice.
Sometimes it is said that the worst fights happen with those whose opinions are closest to each other. Perhaps there is enough room in photograpy for us to have different enough approaches and thus avoid bad fights.
But I have observed some bitter rivalry between photographers here in Finland, among those who have achieved some kind of recognition. Fortunately that is a relatively rare thing, as far as I know.
Well I live in country in which every resource is controlled by some ideological group. Staying away requires an income from a different source.
Think that to get out requires a higher level approach (don't you think that there is little sense to still classify photography along the nationality ?). But here I am getting idealistic. By now people that seems to think, more or less, the same are scattered around the world.
@mauro: That is a really pessimistic view. Perhaps I'm blind to reality, but for me it seems that there is still possibilities for a society which is not controlled by ideology. At least here in Finland I think this is possible - perhaps to a limited degree, but still.
This is a bit of digression away from photography. Actually - is there ideological photography?
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