Do you have a style?

Only if you want to be a personalitiless producer of scattered photos, only if you want your photos to be nothing but photos.

If you want to make a personal statement with your photography you will find your unified personal vision... and when you follow this vision a "style" will necessarily emerge.

Even hack wedding photographers do better if they develop some sort of credible style!

The only time a style is a handicap is when you attempt to force some style that is not your own.

Pitxu said:
Having a style can mostly be a handicap, limiting, a trap even.

"Oh yeah, your the guy who does them ****** photos."
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I think everyone must have a style. I certainly do - aside from my use of a particular lens and format - which I notice when I see that two pictures that I took some time apart, in widely separated places, fit together in a way that makes me want to show them side-by-side.

Cheers, Paul.
 
I think much too much is made of this thing "style".
Somebody quoted Picasso earlier...Picasso sometimes worked with three or four different "styles" at the same time.

I suppose its something for photographers to think about, since what they do, of all mediums is dependant on reality, therefor a recognisable personal "look" is much less apparent in this particular medium than any other.

Listen, put three HCB picture's next to three Robert Doineau's and ask your neighbour if he can pick a style. He will raise his eyebrows nervously and say; "Black and white?"

Which is to say not that there isnt such a thing...you can conciously invent and work in a style or you can create a body of work that will exhibit a style that was unconcious. Either is perfectly valid. Its a particular language for understanding the pictures.

Cubism in painting is a good example. You dont unconciously suddenly start painting cubist paintings one saturday morning - the language was thought of before the pictures were made, so hence the style was consiously adopted.

Renoir changed his light fluttery style late in life to a more robust and drawing related style of painting - again he did it perfectly conciously after his reaction to viewing the Italian masters of the Rennaissance.

And again, the "impressionist" style that him and his mates invented (and then all abandoned except for Monet) came from a shorthand approach to painting - that was leapt on and explored perfectly deliberately, which has particular rules of its own, nutted out by the artists between themselves.

Sure, you could split heairs further and say that the impressionist style was a movement, rather, and within that you have renoirs light touch, Monets scrabbled poplar trees and Degas, deliberatly fashioned dancers, all of them individual styles of impressionism, but the point here is that comes becasue paintings is like handwriting. Photography is not like handwriting.
The point is that the impressionist "style" has rules and was conciously constructed.

You want a style? Dammit go and make one then. Theres nothing stopping you. Different projects may have different styles. We have Ernst Haas with his swirly bullfights and so forth...

Style may or may not be technique related. If yours is and you really love them fisheye lenses (or whatever) so what as well, everything is up fro grabs as long as it works - remembering of all things that photography paradoxically to my mind is the most limited of mediums for artistic expression by its very nature, and yet also extremely powerful within its narrow scope - both because it reflects reality.

An unconcious style will be apparent if you think about what you are doing with your photography a lot, if you take it seriously. Other consious styles may be created by your thinking.

Too much is made of this thing style as if its a desireable will o the whisp that many are chasing. Go and make one then. At least you may get some interesting photographs out of the attempt.

Here endeth the Highway lecture on style. You may join me for tea in the lobby.
 
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I think it depends on what is meant by style. If by style we mean a manner of representation that controls the photographer's conceptions and pre-conceptions of a shot, then I am not sure I have a style. I have an idea of what I am trying to achieve. I think I am too close to my own work to determine whether there is a style evident -- or even whether I have an emerging style. For me I try to focus more on getting my images composed the way I have them in my mind's eye and just leave the stylistic questions to others to discern.
 
I think style should be unintentional and an extension of the photographer's individual vision - that is if he is an individual and not just another duffer with a camera and strong herd instincts.

Style could be faked like photographing a certain subject with one type of composition and color - like blue sky and clouds which could be distinct yet to some pretty boring with all that blue... Any type of forced style usually backfired pretty badly. It might impress the amateurs and members of "mutual appreciation clubs", which usually what photography communities are, but on a serious level it won't even stand a chance.

For example how many photos of people in galleries we've seen but if you check the magnum website there is a feature by Costa Manos of photos inside an art gallery and you immediately know that these pictures are taken by a master and the style is natural and flawless.
 
This is my style. (For what its worth.)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/80702381@N00/sets/72157610362797162/

Mainly shot however with SLRs I took most of these to document my home city (Adelaide) and my life there.

I believe in the Capa adage --- "If your photos are no good, you are not close enough!" My aim was to create a composite of shots - mainly detail that taken together tell a bigger story about my home town, a bit like the way indivdual pieces of a jigsaw puzzle go together to make a bigger picture.The Flickr way of setting out thumbnails suits this well, I think. However I am not sure that this style altogether suits a rangefinder although I do not think that many of these are shot with anything longer than 135mm.

Incidentally. If you look at these photos and reflect on them I hope you understand the deeper purpose that's part of my style. There are two levels of photography I think. The first (and the first challenge for any photographer) is to capture the image accurately. The second (which to some extent is considerably harder) is to capture the feel. This is definitely what I am going for and what, I believe any photographer worth his or her salt is striving for.

cheers

Having said that, I am still evolving and to some extent searching for my style. I have no doubt that in one year or two I will be shooting something different.

Merry Xmas and Happy Chanukah to all.
 
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Chriscrawfordphoto said:
I have a style that people recognize when they see my work in galleries and exhibits. It comes from having worked on several very long term projects over a period of years (two of my projects have each taken over a decade and are still in progress). I think the reason many photographers never develop a style is that they are snappers, not artists with something to say. I've noticed over the years that photography as a hobby attracts people who own expensive cameras and never produce anything with them. There's also those who do take a lot of photos, many of them quite good, but they photograph in a disorganized way that reflects the fact that they are not interested in anything specific. Instead they constantly search for the 'pretty picture', and they might end up with many good images but as a whole their body of work does not show a as the life's work of an artist with a vision or a message.
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Actually this rings a bell with me. I know I have not developed a style, and part of that is that I have too many cameras and lenses, all begging to be "used", so I'll go out and simply burn film or pixels for the sake of using the gear. I should ditch 90% of my gear and spend more time finding out what I care about photographing, and making opportunities for that. At this stage I'm leaning towards landscape photography in the environments I actually care about.

The two people in this community who immediately came to mind were BudGreen and Todd.Hanz. I think they have have a recognisable style in their photography, or at least in what I've seen of their photography. And you can easily see that they are both photographing the things they care about.
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
I have a style that people recognize when they see my work in galleries and exhibits. It comes from having worked on several very long term projects over a period of years (two of my projects have each taken over a decade and are still in progress). I think the reason many photographers never develop a style is that they are snappers, not artists with something to say. I've noticed over the years that photography as a hobby attracts people who own expensive cameras and never produce anything with them. There's also those who do take a lot of photos, many of them quite good, but they photograph in a disorganized way that reflects the fact that they are not interested in anything specific. Instead they constantly search for the 'pretty picture', and they might end up with many good images but as a whole their body of work does not show a as the life's work of an artist with a vision or a message.
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In my opinion this is a rather 2-dimensional mindsetting.

I think everyone has some kind of style. The simplest form of style is restriction to the genres one normaly photographs.
 
I'm beginning to think that style develops when we start looking at the subject as being more important than why we depict it, or what equipment we use to depict it. The style matures as we become totally at ease with that type of photography, our subjects, our equipment, and no longer have to give concious thought to what we're doing. Other people start commenting favorably about our style when we've finally reached that blissful point here we no longer give a damned what they think.
 
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Al Kaplan said:
I'm beginning to think that style develops when we start looking at the subject as being more important than why we depict it, or what equipment we use to depict it. The style matures as we become totally at ease with that type of photography, our subjects, our equipment, and no longe have to give concious thought to what we're doing. Other people start commenting favorably about our style when we've finally reached that blissful point here we no longer give a damned what they think.
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By George ... I think you've got it! I hope everyone was listening Al! :p
 
Style is important as it is the manifestation of the personality and vision of the photographer. It is the way the photographer sees the world and will forever be embossed on their work. Sometimes it is subtle (or an image is in keeping with that style but not necessarily identifiable because of it) and sometimes blindingly obvious. I agree with Roger that to try and consciously develop a style is to miss the point. To try to 'make your images consistent in style' is surely to prevent a true style indicative of uninhibited and personal vision as well as experience. As for my style, I try not to think about it because doing so achieves inhibition and artificial constraints/stylistic imposition and that is not what I am aiming for. Style is the consistent feel to the way things end up looking when all is said and done and you are happy, not how you start out....

I think I do have one, but it has taken time and I can place it little further than the product of 'the way I see then do things'. It is not all about inspiration and the deepest philosophy. I am strongly opposed to the notion of 'selling through style' and have a particular revulsion for the often seen long and pretentious diatribes on websites or in some books. Those who have something individual don't need to explain what can be seen in the images. This is a good thread, but to me, 'trying to develop a style' is about as productive as shooting everything at f1.2 because you have a new Nocton or whatever. My style started to come when I stopped caring what others thought, what the greats had already done and got out and made a LOT of terrible images. Then they got better and I started taking fewer images and doing a lot more walking away. I just enjoy myself and satisfy my needs without consideration for anything else. Spending a lot of time enjoying photo books helps, not to imitate, but to gain inspiration and intensify the hunger borne of reveling in great photography! To hold others' images too close is to walk outside with the photographic equivalent of a cookie cutter in your head.
 
DougFord said:
IMO style or developing a ‘consistency of vision’ is important for those with commercial aspirations.
Hobbyists get fooled into thinking that developing a 'style' is somehow important, creatively speaking; it’s not.
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I disagree. It is important for fine artists too. Try getting a gallery to represent you if your work doesn't present itself as a body of work rather than a collection of unrelated pretty pictures. I actually think, as someone who does both fine art and a little bit of commercial work, that style is less important for commercial work. You do what your clients tell you too, not what your style is.
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
I disagree. It is important for fine artists too. Try getting a gallery to represent you if your work doesn't present itself as a body of work rather than a collection of unrelated pretty pictures. I actually think, as someone who does both fine art and a little bit of commercial work, that style is less important for commercial work. You do what your clients tell you too, not what your style is.
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Agreed. Most fine art photographers have an identifiable style and it bonds the work to the photographer. I also agree with your previous post which I think ruffled a few feathers. Sure, a person does not need to have a style, just as they don't need to take photos at all, but unless a style develops, images will forever form a nondescript soup and stand separate from the person who made them. I personally like to feel that the work and the photographer are part of the same thing. Projects are a great way to let style develop (note not 'develop a style') because they encourage consistency and cohesiveness. Even when a person then goes and shoots a totally different sort of project, it is amazing how there can be style common between the two bodies of work. I think some have failed to realize that a style is not at all limiting - how can it be when you can go and shoot whatever inspires you? The style comes from it being YOU that takes the photo and there is nothing more limiting than that! Style is the first lens through which light passes perhaps; the product of vision, perception and understanding. I don't know where this notion that style means narrow/parochial comes from. A person can have many styles, depending on what they are doing, but they can still be identifiable as originating from the photographer and a product of their 'way'.
 
I've enjoyed reading this thread much more than I usually do "philosophy"- related photography threads, which typically degenerate into disagreements over "what is art."

I tend to think that photography differs from other visual arts primarily because of the degree of control (or lack thereof) provided by the limitations of the process. I know that's not something people want to hear, especially those of us who've spent years mastering the arcane darkroom crafts, or the newer PC lightroom crafts. But developing a style in painting is much different from a style in photography.

Our biggest technical decisions (and where personal interpretation can play a part) relate to the placement of the four edges of the frame -- the when and the where -- and the rest is of lesser importance to non-photographers, who don't obsess about formats and depth of focus and bokeh and monochrome vs color, etc, like we do. We think that stuff is so important, but in the aggregate it isn't. So it seems to me that our biggest decisions in photography are about what we are passionate about, the work that we want to apply photography toward documenting.

To gain a true "style", or perhaps "body of work" is a better term of art, we need to get out of the little box of the photography world and go into the real world and apply our art to something we're passionately interested in. Thus, many times what we call "style" is nothing more than a set of technical choices applied to a particular family of subject matter. Hence the formation of "genres", like "street photography", which is really just a solution set applying a particular type of tool (compact camera) to a problem (documenting anonymous subjects in public.)

I think great photographers who developed what we're refering to here as "style" actually developed a keen interest in some subject and worked with that for years. Hence it's not style in the painterly term, but more of a focused application of the techniques of photography to a consistent body of work.

~Joe
 
Doug, maybe we have different definitions, but for me the very point of art is that it's not made with commercial intentions. On the other hand, maybe I'm just old-fashioned.

Cheers, Paul.
 
phc said:
Doug, maybe we have different definitions, but for me the very point of art is that it's not made with commercial intentions. On the other hand, maybe I'm just old-fashioned.

Cheers, Paul.
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Exactly. and if artists cannot sell their work, then how are they supposed to eat? Contrary to popular belief, artists cannot live on air alone.
 
They cook hamburgers. Or teach. Or practice commercial art, which is created to satisfy a commercial requirement.

Cheers, Paul.
 
I would argue that with the most successful artists or fine art photographers do what they must from creative perspective and that the financial considerations are secondary, assuming ends can be met. I don't think many think of their living first and then their art. I rather think it is the other way round or the two become inseparable and cannot be defined independently. We all know artists must eat, but those who set out pandering to a particular market surely don't end up at the top of the heap a century later. Would Weston and Adams have done what they did were they made their creativity subordinate to financial aspirations. I suspect they made doing what they loved/had to do work for them as best they could i.e their work was not compromised much if at all. It might also not be a leap to suppose that had they made darned sure they 'made it' as a commercial photographer much of their finest work simply would not have happened. Perhaps this is why so many so clearly separate their personal and commercial work. Who remembers Adams' commercial work vs. his personal work (which ended up being commercially viable much later on)? I think most would agree that he can be found as an artist and a personality in his personal work. I guess there is a reason why so many greats half starve - they are committed to their vision and screw the financial consequences. When they die their kids get rich ;)
 
Death does enhance the value of an artist's work, but I don't think that's as true with an artist who was completely unknown before his/her death. Not many people get discovered after their death. If there's already a market for the artist's work then the fact that there won't be any more forthcoming certainly affects the value of the now limited supply.
 
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