Photographing To Feed The Soul

Beyond taking pictures, make photographs that express and elicit emotion

Being house-bound, this is an excellent time to develop or exercise the creative “eye.” Modern cameras and smartphones in all price ranges have tremendous technological potential — but when I look around and on the internet, they’re mostly being used to produce images that capture or document what’s in front of them. Even professional and fine art photographers are mostly documenting what they see. I enjoy these images and appreciate what it takes to produce them, but my preference has always been to photograph expressively.

Expressionism

Artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, tired of accurately representing their subjects on canvas, turned to express their feelings by painting distortions, exaggerations and fantasies that were dramatic, sometimes violent. Always emotional. Examples of the “expressionism movement” in painting include Edvard Munch’s The Scream and Franz Marc’s The Large Blue Horses.

Many fine art photographers in the late 20th century picked up on that approach, but photo historians don’t consider expressionism a “movement” in photography because masters working in “Straight Photography” (Imogen Cunningham, Edward Weston, Ansel Adams) and “Modern Photography” (Chuck Kimmerle, Ruth Bernard, Paul Caponigro) varied their styles.

Documentary and expressive approaches

Photographic documentation involves the recording and presentation of subjects as they are. To find interesting or spectacular locations, travel was required and for many professionals, hardships had to be endured. Documentary photographs excel at providing information about the visible world, revealing what the photographer saw from his or her point-of-view at a particular time and place.

Expressive photography is less about recording information and more about revealing the photographer’s feeling about a subject and eliciting an emotional response in the viewer. To those ends, subject matter can be found anywhere. One of my teachers at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) said, “A creative person can photograph in a phone booth with an Instamatic and come away with a masterpiece.”

As opposed to the hunter-gatherer approach of documentarians, the expressive photographer’s challenge is to see in ways that differ from everyday reality, to image the ordinary as extraordinary. This is not to say that documentary photographs can’t also be expressive. They can be. Master photographers such as Mitch Dobrowner and Julia Anna Gospodarou have demonstrated that both approaches can be integrated and inspiring.

Because expressive photography is largely about the light and what it’s doing, I offer the following little exercise in black and white to begin “seeing” beyond looking. Time and equipment is minimal.

Equipment & material

• Camera or smartphone. Consult the manual on how to photograph in black and white.
• Tripod or phone support. You need your hands free to adjust the subject, camera and light.
• A plain black cloth; nothing with a print or pattern, about 4 ft. in one dimension.

Light source

Use a penlight and have a way to support it; another person could even hold it in place. As a specular “point-source,” this light is ideal for creating shadows with sharp edges. And being the only light to use here, it produces high contrast.

Penlights differ widely in color. That’s another reason for shooting in black and white, but the main reason is to take the impact of color out of the equation. An aesthetic eye is best developed by first becoming sensitive to what the light is doing, how it’s affecting the aesthetic qualities of form, brightness, contrast, gradation and texture.

Location and subject

At night, turn off all the lights in your kitchen; make it as dark as possible. Shine the penlight on whatever is there, ideally something smaller than 8-inches in diameter and without printed words or images. You might take an item from a cabinet or the refrigerator. Cut fruits and vegetables are ideal.

Instead of pointing the light from the front as you would a flashlight, direct it to the sides, behind, above and below the subject. As you move the light around, change your point-of-view as well. Resist the impulse to name the object. Just see it as a form that has texture. And watch what happens to the shadow as you move the light. You might want to look at several objects this way to create fascinating forms and textures. When one of them stands out, that’s your subject.

The setup

Stretch a black cloth on a flat surface. Eliminate or hide any seams or buttons, anything that could distract from the subject matter. With the object placed, move the penlight around it again. Notice how light from the side emphasizes texture. To reduce it, light the subject from the front and above. At some point, as you change your position and the light relative to the subject, your soul will prompt a Yes! or Wow! When that happens, fix the camera and the light so they stay in place.

To compose the shot in the camera, turn the penlight off and the room light on. Go in close with the camera or phone. Exclude any distracting elements in the foreground and background. When that’s done, turn on the penlight, turn off the room light and shoot.

Edit and print

Sometime later, select the image you like best. What you have is a potential photograph. You could print it as is, but that won’t be as satisfying as it would be with some editing. If you have the technology, crop the image as desired, eliminate spots, lighten or darken the whole or its parts, increase or decrease the overall contrast and sharpen.

When you’re satisfied with the adjustments, make a print. Because this is a “photograph,” not a snapshot, I recommend a letter-size (8.5 x 11) print. Critically important, if you care about making images to grow your aesthetic eye and feed your soul, do not let anyone see it! Not yet. At this stage, the only evaluation that matters is your own.

Aesthetic evaluation

Sit alone where you won’t be disturbed. Have the photograph in front of you. A notepad is not necessary, but a good idea if you want to continue with expressive photography. Close your eyes for a full minute or more; you want nothing else of importance on your mind.

When you open them, look at the photograph and address the following questions. There are no right or wrong answers. What you’re going for here, is a recognition of what worked — which of the aesthetic qualities (contrast, gradation, texture, simplicity, geometry, etc.) gave you a jolt of joy? Souls feed on joy, so this is an opportunity to discover your aesthetic preferences. They’re different for everyone and can differ in us from time to time.

Ask yourself —

• Why did I choose this subject?
• What about the “ground” that the subject is sitting on? Does that work?
• Does the background work? Or distract? What would have been better?
• What is the light doing, relative to brightness, contrast, form, texture?
• What about the shadow? Does it contribute or distract?
• What aesthetic quality makes the image work?
• How do I feel about the image overall?
• What would I do differently? Consider a re-shoot or re-edit to improve it.

Feedback from others

Now share the photograph with others, ideally people who don’t know you. They’ll be especially objective if someone other than yourself asks about it. Considering those you know, pay attention to their immediate response. In a matter of seconds, are they curious about you or the subject matter? Did they react with a Wow! or other emotional response? When the latter happens, you know your photograph qualifies as “expressive.” More importantly, did the responses you got make you feel good about yourself? Encouraged? Joyful? If so — repeat. Your soul is asking for more.

Beyond expression

Within the images we create to express, there’s a message from the universe about life — if we’re open to receiving it. I consider it feedback from the soul.

Again, in a quiet place and a meditative state, look at your photograph. In what way is it a reflection of — or metaphor for — how things are? What was your subject’s journey? How did it get to you? Why did it appeal to you? Where did it come from? What was its origin? Questioning along these lines amounts to “contemplation,” focusing the attention on a point — in this case, a photograph — and holding it there long enough to explore its deeper meaning. One of the great benefits of photography is that it employs the light without — from sunlight to penlights — to illuminate and awaken the light within — Self (soul) awareness.

For further demonstrations visit David L. Smith Contemplative Photography.