Both Alfred Stieglitz and Ansel Adams spoke about the emulsion of the mind being a part of photography. Yet I can’t find a long-sought quote, likely from one of them, that I vaguely remember.
Hence a paraphrase that’s lingered in the back of my mind for decades:
Capture an image on the emulsion of the mind in addition to, if not instead of, the emulsion of the camera.
One may be out, camera in hand, looking for the perfect shot. But instead of staying behind the camera, squinting through a tiny viewfinder, first capture the scene on the emulsion of your mind.
Don’t stay behind the camera when a vast mountain range fills your horizon. Put the camera aside and be awed by the grandeur, the immensity, the inexpressible feeling that cannot be captured in a photo. Commit it all to the emulsion of your mind. Inhale rain-sweetened air, watch clouds sail by like giant ships or wispy mares tails; note the futility of virga failing to reach the ground. Watch the nodding of the trees. Listen to the rustling grass, the hawk overhead, the whispering creek nearby. Feel the ground underfoot, the gravely grit of a mountain trail or the solid thud of compacted plain. Embed it all in your senses before you minify it with a lens.
At any special event, in any notable place, or in places not special at all, absorb the whole before you raise your camera. Be a part of the scene before you step out of it to become a photographer. Be a participant, not merely an observer. Experience what makes the scene special before you try to preserve it with a camera.
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Header: “Breathless Beauty — Pano” © Erik Stensland. Reprinted with permission.
Some truly wonderful images, Colorado ! – and I can only agree with the photographers’ thinking; for my own photographer, my beloved husband, was of exactly the same mind ! 🙂