Lady Vervaine
Polaroid Thoughts
These are just some notes to self on my Pola explorations so far; a kind of working memo, to remind myself of what I've learned to this point. I wouldn't recommend reading them, unless you're obsessed with Polaroids!
1) Polaroids seem to do best with clear subjects and simple compositions. I keep forgetting this, and trying to shoot big views, with lots of details, over multiple planes, like I would with my digital SLR - but this seldom works with a Pola. Really, what they like is a close-up on something small, filling the frame.
2) But they also do best with a sense of the mysterious. They can take ordinary things and make them look magical. But this can go wrong; a simple object can look kind of silly on its own in a square frame. So what is it that makes that sense of mystery & magic?
3) Increasingly, I'm coming to feel that it's all about the light. (And in this respect, Polas are no different to any other camera I've used!) There are certain kinds of light that they respond really well to, and certain kinds they don't. This doesn't mean they can't handle darkness; if you catch it in the right way, they can make it lovely & velvety. But they get easily confused if you have too many different things going on.
4) Also, colour. A Polaroid is a total colour whore. Never forget it!
5) All this means that I'm gravitating towards subjects that are brightly coloured, and shooting them in bright light, and framing them as simply as I can. This is making me produce very different photographs to the ones I take with a digital.
6) The ones I like most are the night ones. I wonder why?
PS - thanks to davidteter for getting me started with these questions!
Polaroid Thoughts
These are just some notes to self on my Pola explorations so far; a kind of working memo, to remind myself of what I've learned to this point. I wouldn't recommend reading them, unless you're obsessed with Polaroids!
1) Polaroids seem to do best with clear subjects and simple compositions. I keep forgetting this, and trying to shoot big views, with lots of details, over multiple planes, like I would with my digital SLR - but this seldom works with a Pola. Really, what they like is a close-up on something small, filling the frame.
2) But they also do best with a sense of the mysterious. They can take ordinary things and make them look magical. But this can go wrong; a simple object can look kind of silly on its own in a square frame. So what is it that makes that sense of mystery & magic?
3) Increasingly, I'm coming to feel that it's all about the light. (And in this respect, Polas are no different to any other camera I've used!) There are certain kinds of light that they respond really well to, and certain kinds they don't. This doesn't mean they can't handle darkness; if you catch it in the right way, they can make it lovely & velvety. But they get easily confused if you have too many different things going on.
4) Also, colour. A Polaroid is a total colour whore. Never forget it!
5) All this means that I'm gravitating towards subjects that are brightly coloured, and shooting them in bright light, and framing them as simply as I can. This is making me produce very different photographs to the ones I take with a digital.
6) The ones I like most are the night ones. I wonder why?
PS - thanks to davidteter for getting me started with these questions!