Mark VanDyke Photography
Clean, Clear & Simple
The United States Air Force Memorial
Arlington County, Northern Virginia
Accessed via Columbia Pike
Sometimes I get carried away with trying to line up landscape photographs that showcase my imagined skill. It's often, however, the cleanest, clearest, and simplist photos that give me the most satisfaction. Much like writing, if you hide behind lots of technical terms, jargon and concepts, the message is lost in translation. The best writers and speakers in my personal opinion are always those that can take complicated ideas and translate them into conversational and well flowing verse that is both relatable and easy to understand. In photography, I think many of my favorite photographers have similar abilities--to generate the feeling of a landscape or moment without over-the-top gimics; to capture and/or enhance natural colors and patterns in ways that translate powerfully; to create photographs with depth that appear as if you could get lost in the scene itself. I think sometimes instead of going out at the exact right time of day and/or ensuring that my composition has strong, contrasting elements in all the right areas and/or worrying about if others have taken the same photograph--sometimes these things just need to be tucked into a nice tidy box and filed away for another day. Sometimes I think that I just need to detach the camera from the tripod and remote and all the other goodies I've accumulated over time and just walk around. I'm not saying that planning is not absolutely critical in landscape photography--knowing the weather conditions, scouting out locations, having the appropriate gear, understanding compositional logic and so forth is critical and will remain so. But, when it comes time to capture the picture, be it during golden light with bags of gear for a shot that you've planned for three years or in the middle of the afternoon at an impromtu location that caught your eye, the photograph is still about the simple (yet so difficult!) art of translating the emotion of the place--using compositional elements, light, gear, etc.--to capture a feeling that is translated, maybe easily, maybe more subtly, but translated nonetheless, through the elements of your photograph and to your viewer. Sometimes with so much technical jargon to remember, it is easy for me to lose the bottom-line goal of photography, which in my mind, has little to do with mega-pixels, thirds, and clean frames. Just some rambling thoughts for Flickr Friday...
Clean, Clear & Simple
The United States Air Force Memorial
Arlington County, Northern Virginia
Accessed via Columbia Pike
Sometimes I get carried away with trying to line up landscape photographs that showcase my imagined skill. It's often, however, the cleanest, clearest, and simplist photos that give me the most satisfaction. Much like writing, if you hide behind lots of technical terms, jargon and concepts, the message is lost in translation. The best writers and speakers in my personal opinion are always those that can take complicated ideas and translate them into conversational and well flowing verse that is both relatable and easy to understand. In photography, I think many of my favorite photographers have similar abilities--to generate the feeling of a landscape or moment without over-the-top gimics; to capture and/or enhance natural colors and patterns in ways that translate powerfully; to create photographs with depth that appear as if you could get lost in the scene itself. I think sometimes instead of going out at the exact right time of day and/or ensuring that my composition has strong, contrasting elements in all the right areas and/or worrying about if others have taken the same photograph--sometimes these things just need to be tucked into a nice tidy box and filed away for another day. Sometimes I think that I just need to detach the camera from the tripod and remote and all the other goodies I've accumulated over time and just walk around. I'm not saying that planning is not absolutely critical in landscape photography--knowing the weather conditions, scouting out locations, having the appropriate gear, understanding compositional logic and so forth is critical and will remain so. But, when it comes time to capture the picture, be it during golden light with bags of gear for a shot that you've planned for three years or in the middle of the afternoon at an impromtu location that caught your eye, the photograph is still about the simple (yet so difficult!) art of translating the emotion of the place--using compositional elements, light, gear, etc.--to capture a feeling that is translated, maybe easily, maybe more subtly, but translated nonetheless, through the elements of your photograph and to your viewer. Sometimes with so much technical jargon to remember, it is easy for me to lose the bottom-line goal of photography, which in my mind, has little to do with mega-pixels, thirds, and clean frames. Just some rambling thoughts for Flickr Friday...