A camera to a photographer is like brushes to a painter, or chisels to a sculptor. All are an artist’s tools. But tools an artist does not make. You still need talent. I’ve been thinking about learning how to play the guitar. However, just buying a guitar will not make me a great guitarist, just as buying a typewriter does not make me a best-selling author. The same goes for being a good photographer. Buying a camera doesn’t make you the next Ansel Adams or Annie Leibovitz, just as buying the best camera does not make you a better photographer. You have to have talent, imagination, and an eye for composition in order to create captivating art. Without some kind of talent, you will always end up with paintings, sculpture, or photographs that resemble, well, crap. I’d wager that Pablo Picasso could have painted “Guernica” with Q-tips, balled up wads of tissue paper, and toothpicks instead of actual paint brushes. The same goes for photographers, who can make a great photograph with film, a cylindrical oatmeal box with a tiny hole, and talent. If you have talent, you can use any camera to capture your vision.
The photo of my old F-150 above was shot in 2006 using a Fujifilm MX-1700 Zoom. It’s not your typical dealership picture of a vehicle. It’s a more interesting view of an ordinary item that’s not normally seen from that angle. The MX-1700 was a 1.5 megapixel point and shoot camera introduced way back in 1999. It was the camera I used for a decade to take pictures of everything. Pictures of weather, items to sell on eBay, holiday moments, pet parrots, events held by car club and service organizations; all were shot with my little Fuji. It was all I had. Granted, I didn’t practice my hobby as much with a P&S as I did when I had my Nikon F3HP in the 1980s or now that I have a Nikon D90. But no matter what camera I’m using, I always try to use my imagination to take the best shot possible.
Another shot taken with my Fuji is the image of the foggy parking lot. Instead of just snapping the picture outside my vehicle, I climbed up a set of stairs and made the capture from a breezeway overlooking the parking lot. The third image is a drastic angle view of Coit Tower in San Francisco that I shot in 2003 with a borrowed 2 megapixel Sony MVC-CD1000. I moved out of the parking and closer to the tower, where I found this view through an opening in the trees. All three images were made with point and shoot cameras, and show how imagination can turn a would-be ordinary snapshot into a quasi-dramatic photograph without the need for expensive cameras. Better gear wouldn’t have made the images any better, only talent, learning, and practice will make you better at creating.
I have four years of “formal” schooling in photography; two in high school, and two in college. When I was in high school, we not only learned the technical aspects of producing photographs, but also the artistic aspects. The entire art department in my high school was like that. The instructors weren’t just teachers pulling a paycheck. I feel they were passionate artists that enjoyed teaching their craft. In my photography classes, I remember a couple of quotes that I’ll never forget. “Everyone with a camera can take pictures. Not everyone with a camera can make photographs.” The other is a quote from Ansel Adams, who said, “Twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop.” Nothing could be further from the truth. My D90 has over 5,800 shutter clicks, and of those I consider only 15 or 20 photographs to be my best. When you do the math, 99.9% of everything I’ve shot over the past couple years — with over $2,500 worth of gear — is crap, in my opinion.
When I was in college, I had instructors tell me to look around. Don’t focus on what first draws your eye. Take a few steps back, take a few steps closer, look up. You’d be surprised how many people never look up. These lessons, along with my imagination and whatever camera I had at the time, has sure helped me to make the photographs I’ve made… and I can only hope to be half as good as the masters of photography before me.
The point of all this bloviating is to punctuate the fact that any camera will help you record what you’re seeing, but you need talent and imagination to see what you want to record. If your hobby is photography, and you're shopping for a new camera, don't buy a camera that's beyond what you really need. Start out small, learn your camera, learn to make visually pleasing photos. And remember, megapixels don't make better photographs... YOU DO!
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