The first time I felt an intense and almost physical pleasure from looking at a photograph was when I saw the following image by Czech photographer Josef Koudelka. Everything is here - the perfect light, the perfect composition, absence of distracting details, and of course the perfect decisive moment. It's all here folks. Behold the power of photography:
My love of photography, like for many of us, began with love of old school journalistic style photography. I even named my son after Henri Cartier-Bresson ;) Even now in my fashion and portrait work, I always seek out the illusive decisive moment - the perfect movement or facial expression, a gust of wind, a car driving by to create the perfect composition just at the right time, etc. Ultimately that's what photography is about for me - capturing the fleeting perfect moment that lasts for a fraction of a second never to be repeated again. Understanding of the technical side of photography facilitates the capture of this moment, but cannot create it. I think that ultimately that's what separates a great image from a crappy image. Crappy images exist outside of time - they can be easily recreated and rarely tell us anything about the subject other than what the subject looks like. Great image can be made only once - once that fraction of the second has passed, everything is down the drain - the light has changed, the perfect cloud formation has changed, the facial expression has changed, the model got distracted, etc. Which explains my style of work with people - I only give the most basic directions to my subjects and typically shoot hundreds of frames (if not thousands) out of fear of missing something great. That is of course my very subjective opinion and personal style of work. I have seen beautiful images that were meticulously pre-meditated, planned, and carefully constructed. But I don't recall a single one of those affecting me as strongly as Koudelka's 'snapshot' of a dog at the decisive moment.
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