Week 3: Photographers On Film
Photography is a free market, that is a fact.
From its earliest incarnation as the Daguerreotype and subsequent gifting to the world by the French in August 1839, to the easily obtainable and standard functionality of phone apps it was destined to become a global tool for those who sought to exploit it. Practitioners would consume it for a variety of purposes and it would infiltrate most elements of everyday life in the 170+ years of its evolution.
My personal journey with photography has been one of experimentation and reclassification. My first camera was an analogue SLR, and as like many I tended to move on with technology as new models and functionality became available. Film soon became expensive and digital offered an instant appraisal of my work, and the ability to make more mistakes at no cost. These were photo’s initially of family life and growing up, with the occasional venture something more artistic. To be honest I wasn’t very good and for some reason I can’t remember I decided to study Photography with the City & Guilds of London. It was at this point I became a little more subjective and critical of the processes, and open to the possibilities of where it could take me. I wasn’t working in the photography industry and soon the skills I had learnt. and the enthusiasm for taking pictures started to fade. I had reached the end of my ‘first age of photography’.
Fast forward to 2016 and what I call the ‘second age of photography’ for me. I had purchased an iPhone and of course the phone app was a tantalising prospect for someone who has once craved picture making.
I started taking shots of quite ordinary subjects, and editing the hell out of them with apps like SNAPSEED (which I do still use occasionally to this day). This was still for fun, and I was completely detached from the Photographic industry just out there trying to be creative and not really thinking too hard about process and contextuality. My work started to adopt a quite dark and non-conformist approach to ‘iPhonography’ and within the space of a year I was approached by Black & White Photography magazine. They were (are) a contemporary publication which at the time were championing phone photography with regular articles and competitions. I was whisked up to London for an eight page feature/interview and I had finally arrived in the world of fine art photography, albeit through the lens of a piece of cheap telecommunication.
Black & White Photography magazine Issue.192 (August 2016)
(Click on the images below to read full article).
By the time this piece had come out my ‘smart phone’ images were doing quite well in competition alongside more traditional digital approaches in photography. There were more interviews and pieces in the local press which seemed to treat me as a kind of ‘novelty’ photographer, and in conversation with others plying their trade with more conventional kit it was clear that my technique and approach was seen as a lesser art, and although not part of the rising the UGC community I was certainly conspicuous of my credibility. I started to question myself and how long I could sustain the practice, after all - everyone was taking pictures on their devices and editing apps were multiplying by the day. For me I could sense the journey would become short lived.
As I began the downward spiral, away from the validation and enjoyment of this genre of photography I found myself attending The Photography Show in 2017 as a speaker on the Social & Mobile stage, extolling the virtues of this format. It was an uncomfortable process even though the reception was positive and audiences large. Moving around the show at my leisure and observing those in the more traditional comforts of digital DSLR I felt time was running out. After a few more smartphone competition endorsements, I had had enough and decided it was time to move on and try something new.
So looking back now, do I see the validity and importance of smartphone photography, as it develops and spreads like a wildfire across the world, without any doubt 100% yes. I found the piece in this weeks material on the work of DAMON WINTERS Hipstamatic images quite thought provoking. I can appreciate the informality of taking pictures on a small concealable device, especially in the theatre of war. This intimate methodology, regardless of the practicality of size, seems quite appropriate, and the quality of the image seems only secondary to the content. As the piece in POYNTER states quite correctly, editing in an iPhone app is no differant to the use of Photoshop. The degrading of the image quality is a byproduct, but then I don’t think image quality is the primary objective of the photographer. It’s more a sense of situation rather than a metadata field trip.
When I was using my phone to take photographs, the secrecy and discreetness were a strong factor in its success of subject matter. There is also a voyeuristic element which cannot be denied, and although this can be abused particularly in a sexual context, it also can be used effectively to reduce intimidation. After all the person you photograph will be doing the same to someone else at some time. These are not images that could be taken with a standard camera and so the disguise of a phone, elevates photography to a previously owned privilege of cold war intelligence operatives, using devices like the Minox and Soviet Tokya 58-M which would be concealed in a hand sized disguise such as a cigarette packet. We now have the facility to shoot anything and everything within eyesight, so long as we have a phone.
The question of do I see the rise of UGC as a challenge to my work is an interesting one, and one that is quite relevant to my current practice.
For the last five years (in my third age of photography) I have worked on and off in the music industry, mainly shooting live concerts for musicians and on occasion capturing backstage documentary footage on tour. This has all been digital on my Canon 6D and I feel comfortable using this in intimate situations with the artists as I have their consent to do so. I could not have used a smart phone and app as the quality would not have been sufficient for the desired use of the images.
Figure 1: TIPPING, Clare Teal (BBC radio presenter and singer) photographed in 2020 in Bath in rehearsals.
Figure 2: (left) TIPPING, 2019, TOM WILLIAMS & Band.
Figure 3: (centre) TIPPING, 2019, PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING.
Figure 4: (right) TIPPING, 2019, TOM SPEIGHT.
As a live music photographer I am always very aware of those using smartphones in the audience to immortalise and preserve the moment. I like this image of Kate Nash which I took in 2017 as it shows the intimacy and joy of photographing your idol, without actually looking at them. The fan has her heroine right in front of her, yet chooses to view the moment through her phone so that those glorious seconds can be shared with others, rather than capitalise on the once in a lifetime moment of one to one eye contact.
Figure 5: TIPPING, 2017, Kate Nash performing to fans at Exeter Phoenix.
As a music photographer you assume a position of authority and assumed superiority over the audience. The privilege of having an association and/or access to someone famous does not come without its detractors. The audience will often resent your presence between them and the artist, and security show distrust normally associated with a criminal or racial presence in their premises. Sometimes even the artist will show abuse, but often this just leads to a better shot as a representation of the Rock’n’Roll formula. And often it’s just a case of people not liking having their picture taken, or at least pretending not to because let’s be honest, everyone wants to be famous, don’t they !?
Figure 6: (left) TIPPING, 2018, front row fans of The LIBERTINES
Figure 7: (right) TIPPING, 2019, The SNUTS
