Today I just wanted to post a few images from my recent edits.
I will be heading back to Hokkaido next week, and will be spending a month in Japan. I have a few research projects on the go…..
Winter Sun over snow field, Hokkaido January 2023
Optimal Conditions
I’m about half-way through editing the images I shot in Hokkaido last January. The new portfolio is really a collection of old-friends but shot in the most optimal conditions I have experienced so far.
I have no problem repeating locations every year, if the conditions show me another view of a tree or location I know well. With the photograph above, I found this location with my guide around 2016. It is on private land (as is most of Hokkaido - go there on your own and you will be shooting from the roadside at best). We always ask for permission to enter land, and with this location, it is government owned. We have to walk in on snow shows to get the best views and some years that I come here, there is not always so much snow here. But last year we had quite a lot of snow across the entirety of Hokkaido.
So I really don’t mind going back and shooting compositions or views that I have done before. Particularly if I feel I’m getting a more optimal view of the location.
I think this is perhaps a reaction to the ‘I’ve been there and done it’ kind of thing. Places are always worth going back to many times. Once for me is often never enough. But I accept that when you have finite resources, finite time, perhaps it’s of more interest to go to somewhere new each time. I just think for my own development as a photographer, growing into a landscape / culture over many visits is just a much more rewarding experience, and provides a deeper connection.
Hokkaido January 2023
I have a backlog of images from the past few years to attend to. I’ve only just got round to working on my images from last year’s Hokkaido tour. We had some of the most favourable conditions to date on any of the tours we’ve done, and this one particular location worked so beautifully. Literally the trees were floating in the air at times, but somehow today, I don’t feel like illustrating that. I much prefer to just show you a slightly mauve sunset shot of my favourite tree in Hokkaido.
I rarely worry about having a backlog of images. I’ve found that I can let images sit around for a year or two before I edit them (I have a very nice portfolio of images from Senja that were taken in 2020, and each time I look at the films I am very excited about what I captured. But I think there needs to be a right time to edit them).
And so this week is Hokkaido week. I also have lots of nice images from Lencois Maranhenses in Brazil to edit too, but they are going to have to wait.
Mood or Circumstance? Or both?
Reviewing my Harris images from November 2022 and November 2023, I am struck by the contrast between the two.
Harris images from November 2022:
And the images below are from 2023:
One could ask why they are so different? And I think they are different for a number of reasons:
1 The weather and lighting conditions were quite different between the two portfolios. I was particularly aware that we had softer light this past November compared to my visit in 2022. It was also much less stormy this past November and I remember feeling that there was more sunlight. The weather was more reminiscent of summer. The seasons were later this year being an el-niño year.
2 Because the lighting conditions were softer this year, I found that even when I did try to edit the work to feel more dramatic, or use darker tones and contrasts, I felt as though I was working against the true nature of the subject. I had difficulty working on my most recent set because of this and had to go back and start again.
3 Personal mood. I am aware that if I chose to edit the same set of images at a different time, I may approach them differently. Some times I find my edits are bold while other times I find that I tend to go more soft and airy with the work. I have found these fluctuations in my other destinations that I go to. My Lencois Maranhenses Brazil imagery for instance is often soft and airy, but last year I found that I produced a more dramatic series of images. This is definitely due to my own mood of where I am with my ‘art’ but also down to what the weather provided for me.
Comparison is the thief of Joy
I have often thought this statement to be true. Comparing oneself to others is not a healthy approach. So too is comparing one’s own work to another’s. There is also the un-constructive view of comparing one’s own work to other work you have produced. To evaluate yourself against previous successes is also fraught with unhealthy views. In a way, one must learn to ‘let go’, and accept that one’s work will vary, one’s own focus will fluctuate and to be quite blunt: sometimes the work will be better or worse for no other reason than that is just what it is.
Learning to live with one’s own inner inconsistencies is perhaps the answer. Or simply accepting that the work you produce today is nothing more than what you did today, and is no reflection on whether you are getting better or worse in your work. If you have difficulty with some work, then either park it and come back to it later, or if you are finding that it’s impossible to find the right approach, then just produce it anyway, so you can get it out of the way to allow for something else to enter your life.
I have often thought about ‘writer’s block’. That situation where the artist or writer finds dissatisfaction with everything they do. The best remedy is to take a more cavalier approach to what you do and just get through the period of what you don’t like. Even if you think the work is sub-standard, I think the only solution is to produce it, so it is now out of the way, and keep looking ahead.
The White City
It is my view, that the majority of the world has not been photographed (there is still much to do), and for those few places that have been photographed, they have, for the most part, not been photographed to their full potential.
So when someone tells me ‘Iceland has been done’, or ‘Yosemite has been done’, or even for that matter ‘Venice has been done’, I think they are missing the point.
These places may have been photographed a lot, but have they been photographed to their full potential? I think not. Do we see individuality in the majority of the photos of these known places? I do not think so.
I write this with the positive view that there is always a new take on some place, and to assume that all the best places in the world have now been photographed simply isn’t true (consider that most photographs happen within 200 feet of a car, then you can appreciate that we’ve only really scratched the surface).
And that is where I think we are at now. Perhaps doing something ‘new’ in a tried and tested place is to set the bar too high (it would be quite an achievement to show a view that others have not seen).
But this should not deter us from at least attempting to produce the best work we can. Because if we try to be as good as we can be, we may hopefully be able to impart a sense of our own identity upon the work we produce.
Even if it’s just a tiny bit.
Puna de Atacama
Just to let you know that if you’ve been thinking of coming to the Puna de Atacama with me this March, that bookings will close on the 5th of January.
We need to finalise the rooms for the tour after this point.
So if you’re thinking of coming, either drop me a line to discuss, or book before 5th of January.
I scrapped everything.....
For the very first time, I am scrapping a whole pile of new work when I am at an advanced stage of the edits.
Perhaps a bit of the winter blues has kicked in as my mood is not so good right now. I have noticed that when I am tired, my edits go downhill dramatically and I cannot ‘see’ what to do, or where to go with the work. The results tend to become unfocussed and poor when I am like this. Often it is sleep and some rest is always the cure.
I have decided to write this post today, with really two aims in mind: one is to draw a line under what I’m currently doing and shelve it. The other is really to illustrate that we all suffer from indecision, lack of inspiration at times, and lack of focus. Despite my mood telling me the work has no value, my heart tells me that this is really a case of taking a step back, resting, and doing something else for a while. The images will still be there, ready to go, when I do feel my mojo has returned.
So I think I will show you all my Harris images from last year.
Iceland Erruption
I find this guy the best, regarding the recent volcanic eruption in Iceland.
Beyond known boundaries
I learned a lot by shooting and editing this image.
Shot on a very bright blue sky day, I only made it because my tour group wanted to do it. When I came home I found that I could push this outside of the 'sunny blue sky day' in the edit.
I realised that one of the skills I must learn is to be able to 'see' what's possible in the edit, whilst looking at the literal. And the only way to do that is to gain experience in editing, and to push your edits as far as you can, to find out where the boundaries are.
Forest Shadow, Hokkaido, 2018
For instance: I would ordinarily skip a sunny blue sky afternoon, and write it off as a no-go for me. I now know that I can work with this kind of light, and push beyond it sometimes within the edit to convey something else entirely.
Having that kind of knowledge to my disposal is vital. Knowing how much latitude you have to work with allows you to choose your source material better.
So this was one major learning event for me. I now know I can shoot in blue-sky sunny days and sometimes get something useful out of the edit session. Even though the original shot may show very little potential…..
On a different note, I’d also like to say that I have also learned that when I think I am finished with an image, sometimes I realise later on that I was only half-way there:
I think the main ‘feature’ of this image is the gradual tonal shift in the shadow - brighter towards the edge, and darker towards the centre. This helps pull the eye back into the middle of the frame and away from the edge of the forest. This was the final thing that I applied to the edit : it was not immediately apparent when I had first thought I had finished work on the photo, and only came to me after living with the image for a week or so.
On being real
I just came across ‘the soft white underbelly’ YouTube channel. Interviews are absolutely fantastic such as this one with Richard whom is a DMT user with a criminal past. I found the questioning, the subject matter, how it was filmed, and also the portrait of Richard that Mark made mid-interview really special.
I have now subscribed. I like hearing real people’s real stories. We get so little of that now on TV. I have sometimes ventured back to some old Dick Cavett shows to listen to Dick interview Orson Wells (highly recommended) and George Harrison. They are real interviews, not infomercials.
I’m done with contrived content. I much prefer hearing real stories from real people.