In Trying To Capture The Moment, Do We Risk Missing It Altogether?
from the watch-the-moment,-not-the-screen-of-your-camera dept
Earlier this year, in writing about a musician complaining about fans with mobile phones in the audience, we noted that he seemed to be overreacting, but did raise some interesting points about whether people get so focused on documenting an event that they miss experiencing it. Now a columnist at the Toronto Globe & Mail, Ivor Tossell, makes a similar point in worrying about the effort he goes through to capture "events" like beautiful sunsets, when he's not even sure what to do with the photos afterwards. While much of the column focuses on the question of whether or not these digital momentos will last at all, an equally reasonable question is how many special moments are "lost" in the effort of trying to capture them with recording equipment.
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Filed Under: cameras, experience, missing the moment, photos
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There's no question about it.
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Perception
silhouette with the setting sun behind them, or
crossing a shallow creek in shades of indigo just
before darkness falls. Fields of grain, the stalks
nodding their heavy golden heads to a gentle autumn
breeze. A nest of cardinals in the shrubbery just
beyond my kitchen window. So many beautiful sights
but no camera of if there is a camera it's as Ima
Fish says... often the results just do not look as cool.
I don't know what parts of this are perception and
reality. To me the real art of photography isn't
taking a photo of what the subject actually is but
how it is perceived. This may sound esoteric but
it's not.
That said, I take my best photos with the crown graphic
4x5 camera, because it's a slow process. With a digital
camera (or 35mm) I tend to spray and pray hoping for a
good photo to pop up. Slowing down also allows more time
to enjoy the experience. Funny, I can't explain it but I
spend more time composing and less time fiddling with
equipment with the more cumbersome camera. I need to
exercise more discipline with the digital camera.
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Magic gets lost
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Not new...
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Photos are memory triggers!
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I have had the same thought
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Re:
*blink*
*tear*
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Absolutely
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Not for me...
Same goes for my travel photos. Thanks to some my photos I can still smell the air, hear the wind, remember conversations that were going on while I took the shot or, better yet, remember things I didn't take a picture of. I don't think I would have that if I hadn't taken the time to get a few shots.
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I took a picture of the guests that were witnessing the wedding. I literally have a shot of everyone standing there with cameras up to their faces.
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Weddings
Even if they're skilled enough to pull it off, preparing for shots, running around, taking shots, constantly looking for better angles, setting up equipment, taking down equipment, and so on pretty much means that the best friend or favorite uncle has missed the entire occasion. Worse, everyone else, including the bride and groom, have missed having you there as well.
Look folks, at such an event the pro has his job and you have yours. His is to document the event, yours is participate in the celebration.
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Less? More!
And as for scenery, I find the enjoyment that I get out of reliving the memories of traveling far outweighs the effort involved in taking the picture.
But, as with everything else, you have to take pictures or "capture them with recording equipment" in moderation. Watching the entirety of your child's play or sporting event through an LCD? Not so good. But some snapshots here and there or some short video clips? That's the balance that I find works for me. (BTW, rather than being a flaw in the design, I find that the short length of the videos that are available on nice digital cameras is a boon. No one wants to watch hours of your little Timmy, most likely not even you.)
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Totally Agree
If the moment is special enough, I will remember it. Even still, it's much more important to live the special moments than to try to memorialize it.
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Re: Totally Agree
So, you assume that because you feel like you're missing out on experiences if you try to capture them, then everyone else on the planet must feel the same way or experience the world like you do? Have you stopped to consider there might be people out there who enjoy taking pictures? People who feel that part of experiencing something is recording it so that they can bring up the memory later? Or people that enjoy the art/science of photography? Just because someone is different from you, it doesn't make them an idiot.
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Re: Re: Totally Agree
so yeah, try harder not to be an ass.
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Definitely a problem
I have this thing called memory that automatically records everything I see. Rarely can a photo evoke anywhere close the same experience as the original sight, but it can sometimes gut a particularly potent memory. The Grand Canyon is a good example. No picture can portray the way it feels to be staring nearly a mile straight down a completely naturally formed ravine wall. But we couldn't resist trying. Now, we have some pictures that make it difficult to remember what it really looked like because what I remember now is the picture.
I am not totally anti-photos. I just think that they have become way too big a part of experiencing a "special occasion." I think it would be interesting to take a camera-less vacation one year, and to go to somewhere particularly beautiful. Somehow, I don't think I will have any harder a time remembering it.
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Re: Definitely a problem
I will add that my experience is clearly not true for everyone. Those who love photography and take joy in the sheer act of composing a picture may well have a better time taking pictures than not.
I think the problem is when people feel obligated to take pictures or, like my wife, feel guilty for forgetting the camera at a special event.
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video tourists
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Try telling this to my wife...
Let us assume this moment we're trying to capture is still occuring...
"Look at me and smile!"
The moment isn't even captured, it's killed.
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Photos are for people with poor memories...........
I have a cellphone camera that I rarely use (except for capturing my friends in embarrassing state and blackmailing them for a beer later :))
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Moderation, Moderation, Moderation!
What I lost completely (and what I'm trying to regain) was that "sixth sense" that impels people to reach for the camera to get a little piece of choice moments -- an impulse that is very useful if properly controlled.
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However, it takes a few seconds to take a pic, and the other 5-10-200 minutes to enjoy the atmosphere.
On our trip to the Palo Duro Canyon, we have a couple hundred pics, however, it was a blast taking a few minutes of time out to enjoy the canyon. It was blazing hot, so we didn't get to spend as much time "on the ground" (aka out of the vehicle), but we were able to go back to the pics and see what we missed the first time (because the sweat was covering our eyes at the time...lol).
I think you can do both. We pulled over at this one spot in the canyon, I snapped some photos, and we proceeded to start a mini landslide (unintentional, of course) while we were mucking around.
We were able to show the video to my sister, and she was able to look it over, just like she had been standing there.
I do admit there are some people that go too far, esp if you don't take a few minutes to savor the moment.
Part of the fun of the trip is sitting down after you get home and everyone huddled over the computer saying "Hey, I didn't know you took that!" or "Hey, I didn't see that!" or "Where was that from?". It opens a whole new dimension of the trip...
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See Both Sides
Yet the camera can also be a barrier between a person and the scene, and can blind people to what's going on outside the LCD.
There certainly is a time and a place for professionals. I marvel at people taking pictures of landscapes in terrible light with lousy cameras, when there is a rack of beautiful professional photos available in the postcard rack or online. If you don't have a loved one in there, what's the point? You're no Ansel Adams, all due respect.
But my main disdain of amateur photogs is the doofuses who click REC on their camcorders and take extremely long, real-time footage of their tourism. I've seen people on tour buses and walking the Vegas strip, just holding their cameras all the way. I've seen people walking Bourbon St. in N.O., recording their entire night in real time. Who the @#$@# ever looks at that video? Don't they realize how boring that footage is?
Having video or pictures of a memory can really evoke past moments lived -- but you have to make sure you also lived those moments, or you might as well just watch somebody else's video on YouTube.
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Re: See Both Sides
I think it's not that they think they can make the best photo ever taken of that landscape, but 1) it's a record of what *I* saw, rather than some pro I don't know (yes, I know the camera never sees exactly what the human eye does), and 2) if it's digital, you immediately have it in digital format to do anything you want with, and it's free. A postcard is good for sending; a big print is good for hanging up; not much else. It all has its place, including amateur landscapes.
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Re: Perception
I once had the good fortune to experience a night-time launch of the space shuttle from about as close as you can get. During the countdown I checked and re-checked the camera, worrying about getting the shot. In the final seconds of the countdown, with everything ready to go, I just decided that I didn't want to watch this event through a viewfinder. I stepped back from the camera and just immersed myself in the moment, and to this day I'm glad I did. I noticed all sorts of things I never would have seen otherwise, and that I have never seen anyone else capture on film.
It's good to get some photos, but take a few moments out to just take in the experience of whatever it is you are shooting.
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Smile, Ummm, Wait a Moment... Smile!
My 2 cents: Why do people who have a hard time posing for still shots stop moving when you shoot video?
I'm sure I'm not the only one who can't smile well during a posed "smile at the camera" shot. Whenever possible, I pretend that I don't know the camera is there, and the "candid" pix look a lot better that way.
Parents and their children miss a lot when the only view that the parents ever have of big events are rectangular (no matter how hi-res) and the kids never get to look in their parents eyes!
An eye behind a camera is as inanimate as camera itself.
Henry M
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missing the moment may be missing the point
There's an old saying that the real value of an idea is how you feel about it when you're sober again.
Isn't it possible -- if not likely -- that when you try to "capture" a moment, you're forced into simple objectivity? If you don't give it the same emotional value then, that suggests emotional value isn't terribly valuable.
Look, if you want to get drunk or high or immersed in feeling otherwise, that's your business. But don't run around acting like your buzz is the secret of the universe.
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