help me. I am writing a college essay for admissions and I am trying to use a metaphor of photography to my life experience. I am trying to find something profound to say and a story to say.
I know a while ago (anywhere from a month to 10 weeks ago) someone posted an article about a photographer who had cancer and he used to take photos in his house, and as he got stronger he would get further and further out from the house. His pictures were quite eerie and were quite surrealistic. If you could help me i would really appreciate it.
o no, no, no. You guys completely misunderstood my intentions. I just want to see something as a source of inspiration to set a guide, i would never copy verbatim. I really just want to see his underlying philosophy. Does anyone remember what im talking about?
I have got months and months to write out my essay, its not like its just on a whim what to throw down now. Its a matter of getting a direction.
Yes, well, I can remember my own university applications, though they never asked for essays. Here's what help I can give, based on several decades earning a living with camera and keyboard. One or two bits may appear harsh, but they are as important as the other bits, so don't stop reading in disgust.
Profundity often works better when it is handled lightly. It is all too easy, otherwise, to come across as pompous.
Unless you are a very good writer, an attempt to draw parallels between a cancer sufferer and yourself will be at best bathos and at worst in extremely poor taste. And, at the risk of appearing rude, you're not a very good writer. 'A story to say' instead of 'to tell'; a resolute avoidance of capital letters, even for 'I'; a disregard for the common apostrophe; none of this bodes well. NEVER describe yourself as intelligent ('detering a young intelligent college student like myself'), even if you are: leave that for others to decide. Don't insult those in a position to help you, especially in a patronizing reference to their age: 'wow you forty year olds are quite grumpy, i think its time for a nap or bed time depending where you are in the world.'
If you can't remember the story behind the cancer-suffering photographer, it can't really have meant much to you. You're remembering it as a striking image, not as a logical or philosophical argument. I'd strongly advise you to avoid that theme.
How long does the essay have to be? Some ideas are easier to develop than others. I write a lot of short pieces -- a bit under 800 words for my weekly
Amateur Photographer column, <200 words for the
Short Schrift on the title page of my web-site (replaced every week or ten days), 1000 words for
Land Rover World (monthly) -- and the ideas come from an endless variety of sources: the difference between screw caps and corks on whisky bottles (corks are seen as more up-market), the parallels between True Believers in film and digital and True Believers in religion, the possibility that a £240,000 a year ($375,000) for the head of the Audit Commission might attract a
worse candidate than £120,000, and so forth. Take a look at some of the Short Schrifts to see how a idea can be developed. May are lightweight, equipment-oriented pieces, but a few have some serious ideas behind them:
http://www.rogerandfrances.com/short/z short schrift archive.html
Above all, stop trying. Let ideas come to you, arising from a natural curiosity about the world. Don't chase them: it frightens them away, and they can run faster than you. Read voraciously. Study history. Look hard at politics, with an eye open for telling lines and ideas: Marx, for example, "Every class acts in its own class interest." If an idea is not working, let it go: don't try to hold to to it. Ideas are like buses: there's always another one along later.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
R.
