Practicing Chinese Opera
This clip shows a woman rehearsing a Chinese opera with her colleagues, who are playing traditional instruments. This, and my recollection of the other old folks practicing their art in the park that day, made for a fascinating scene.
I wish I had a tripod.
I wish I could have been closer.
I wish I were invisible.
With these attributes, I could have gotten a better clip instead of the shaky, stolen snippet you see here.
This clip highlights a problem I face when recording my journeys. If I want good shots, I need to be a paparazzo; I need to be in people's faces. But I am a foreign visitor in this country, and I try to remain respectful of people’s space and privacy. I know many Chinese do not appreciate having a 'laowai' (老外) take their picture as they go about their daily business – I can see it in their faces. They find the act an embarrassing intrusion into their lives. I would not appreciate having such photos taken of me back home, either.
But China is so damned interesting, and I really need that photo.
Lately, I've become much more brazen with the camera. (See examples of people selling goods to us in the local markets or repairing our bikes, and examples of me going where I am obviously not supposed to be.) My recent camera jockeying not only embarrasses my subjects, it embarrasses my family, too.
Part of me believes that a good journalist or photographer can capture a situation without disrupting it, but the physicist in me who studied quantum mechanics knows that this cannot be so: in observing the event, we change the event.
My thinking now: In for a penny, in for a pound.
And what if I had a hidden camera in place of my eyeball that silently and secretly recorded everything I saw? Isn’t this what my brain and eyes currently do anyway? Why does photographing a subject change the subject’s perception of the act of recording? Is the reaction caused by the knowledge that the ‘memory’ of the observation can be shared ‘verbatim’ (there’s a mixed-metaphor) with others forever? Throw posting those observations into The Big Data Cloud in the Sky, and the question becomes even more complicated. Those subjects in the park: would they be upset if they knew that their conduct in a public place had been recorded in a public data space? If so, why? (I should be able to answer that question myself, but I can’t come up with a logical answer.)
But enough of philosophy; let’s wait and see what happens.
Once I click the shutter and leave the scene, the moment is over and I am away. While the recollection of my presence may be remembered for years (some ^&%$+*! ‘laowai’ snuck up on me when I was picking my nose and took my picture), I myself am quickly dissociated from the event.
Do I get better pictures or not?
(So, what do you think? Paparazzo or sociopath?)
Practicing Chinese Opera
This clip shows a woman rehearsing a Chinese opera with her colleagues, who are playing traditional instruments. This, and my recollection of the other old folks practicing their art in the park that day, made for a fascinating scene.
I wish I had a tripod.
I wish I could have been closer.
I wish I were invisible.
With these attributes, I could have gotten a better clip instead of the shaky, stolen snippet you see here.
This clip highlights a problem I face when recording my journeys. If I want good shots, I need to be a paparazzo; I need to be in people's faces. But I am a foreign visitor in this country, and I try to remain respectful of people’s space and privacy. I know many Chinese do not appreciate having a 'laowai' (老外) take their picture as they go about their daily business – I can see it in their faces. They find the act an embarrassing intrusion into their lives. I would not appreciate having such photos taken of me back home, either.
But China is so damned interesting, and I really need that photo.
Lately, I've become much more brazen with the camera. (See examples of people selling goods to us in the local markets or repairing our bikes, and examples of me going where I am obviously not supposed to be.) My recent camera jockeying not only embarrasses my subjects, it embarrasses my family, too.
Part of me believes that a good journalist or photographer can capture a situation without disrupting it, but the physicist in me who studied quantum mechanics knows that this cannot be so: in observing the event, we change the event.
My thinking now: In for a penny, in for a pound.
And what if I had a hidden camera in place of my eyeball that silently and secretly recorded everything I saw? Isn’t this what my brain and eyes currently do anyway? Why does photographing a subject change the subject’s perception of the act of recording? Is the reaction caused by the knowledge that the ‘memory’ of the observation can be shared ‘verbatim’ (there’s a mixed-metaphor) with others forever? Throw posting those observations into The Big Data Cloud in the Sky, and the question becomes even more complicated. Those subjects in the park: would they be upset if they knew that their conduct in a public place had been recorded in a public data space? If so, why? (I should be able to answer that question myself, but I can’t come up with a logical answer.)
But enough of philosophy; let’s wait and see what happens.
Once I click the shutter and leave the scene, the moment is over and I am away. While the recollection of my presence may be remembered for years (some ^&%$+*! ‘laowai’ snuck up on me when I was picking my nose and took my picture), I myself am quickly dissociated from the event.
Do I get better pictures or not?
(So, what do you think? Paparazzo or sociopath?)