It may seem surprising that imagination comes into play when recording real scenes and events that we can’t (or choose not to) control, but it almost always does. Even within the constraints of real and uncontrolled events, the photographer has options about what subject to photograph, what angle to do it from, how close or how far, how to frame the subject, when to trigger the shutter, where in the frame to focus, what aperture to use (and, thereby, how to render the depth of field), how much exposure to give the picture, whether to use filters, whether to modify the ambient light with flash, and so on. The photographer makes her/his particular decisions from amidst the vast search space of all the possible variables of these choices, based on her/his imagination of how s/he wants the picture to look.
One element of this is imagining your subject and your subject’s surroundings spatially. If the direction of the light falling on the subject looks this way from this angle, then how will it look from that angle? Should I photograph the subject from here, and get x in the distant background directly behind my subject, or should I photograph the subject from there, and get y behind my subject, instead? Should I move in closer, with a shorter focal length lens, to include a wider swath of the subject’s surroundings, or should I move farther away and use a longer focal length, to narrow the swath of the subject’s surroundings?
Another element of this is imagining how your camera (and film, if shooting film) will translate the subject, (at least partly based upon the decisions you make). It will take your three dimensional view and render it two dimensionally. It will likely restrict the dynamic range of the scene’s light more than the way you see. It will render certain shades of purple as blue, and it will likely blow out very intense reds, rendering them without full detail. It will introduce various artifacts of the photographic process, such as barrel distortion or pincushion distortion, chromatic aberration, birefringence, grain or noise, and such. It is a process of imagination (based upon experience with your camera gear) to conceive how the scene before you will be rendered as a picture, and conceive how you’d like to integrate the camera’s translation into your choices – and thereby, into your photographic vision.
Perhaps the most pertinent element of imagination in photography is seeing what is, and conceiving what will be (or, what could be) – conceiving what the scene will look like when the sun shifts and the shadows move, conceiving what the scene will look like when the tide flows in, or when the leaves fall, when the fog settles, or the storm clears, conceiving what the scene will look like in black and white, conceiving what the scene will look like when motion-blurred with a long exposure, conceiving what will happen when two animals coming toward each other meet, or whatever else.
Ambition comes in, in conjunction with imagining what could be. Within the possibilities before you, envision whatever it may be that you consider ideal. Conceive your vision of photographic perfection out of the scene and the variables before you, and then create a strategy of where and when to place yourself, how to focus, how to expose – how to get the shot. It takes ambition to make the most of this step – it takes ambition to think of, and pursue, the most fantastic possibilities available to you.
Don’t just settle for what you see. Be imaginative. Be ambitious.
Imagine big, and then capture it.
Anna’s Hummingbird (Calypte anna) in Flight, Front View
All pictures and text are © Mike Spinak, unless otherwise noted. All pictures shown are available for purchase as fine art prints, and are available for licensed stock use. Telephone: (831) 325-6917.
This picture has had a small stick digitally removed from the upper left.
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