Why are we doing all this?

[TEZillman]

I'm 44 and first started taking pictures with my older sister's brownie scout camera. I, of course, unscrewed the brownie scout plate on the front and turned it around. I took pictures then with 620 black and white film. That was an eternity ago.

I got rather introspective about my picture taking about a year ago and realized that I use photography the way that others use a journal or diary. It's a personal thing that I mostly keep to myself. I find that a photo I took at some point in the past will bring back the moment in a way that nothing else does, even moments that do not mean a great deal in life.

I still enjoy my old stereo system and listening to records I bought 25-30 years ago I have a pretty good collection of CDs too. I also am into woodworking an have a barn full of old woodworking tools and enough wood to last the rest of my life, even if I live to be a hundred

 

[tamerlin]

I got started six or seven years ago when I got my first Canon Elph. The Digital Rebel finally allowed me to get into digital photraphy with an SLR camera, and I got to like using it, with one exception: it's big... not very conducive to bicycle photography.

So, I hunted around and ended up with a Leica m7, and an XPanII, and I couldn't be happier with either... well, at least that will be the case when I get the three more lenses I want (90mm, 30mm XPan, and maybe a 135mm Leica).

For a living, I write software. It used to be interesting, but nowadays you end up choosing between writing interesting software and making a living. :bang:

So I use photography as both a creative outlet and as an excuse to get away from the #*@*#$# *#$*@#$ # computer. 🙂

 

[vha]

Lifestyle . .

Lifestyle . .

For my part photography is a part of my lifestyle.

I´m 29, been working with photography since 97, and the last 5 years with developing , copying (frontier), sales, digital editing of old photos and so on, everything that has to be done with photo, and old cameras and weird stuff as speciality field .. . . since i´v been trying stop collecting cameras for the last 12 years but not succeeded yet ..

Been having my own camera since I was 10 and got finally enough savings to buy a SLR when I was 14, and was even more luckily to got the F401s traded for a FM some years later. Then the fun stuff began. Studied multimedia (Mac) and planned to work with TV, as a cameraman, studied then Informatics and started working part time in a typical camera store on the corner, and since I had gone all the way form 14 year old annoying kid who developed his own prints and know it all , read all the magazines and catalogues,I know how to treat them (you have to bee one to know one) , and during the years learned how to behave, i learned more and more after a while, and found out , this is nice, getting paid for doing something i like, and actually have the chance to argue with the geeks . . (and throwing stone in a glass house is fun 😉 ) and since summer of 99 i´v been working with it full time. Worked as a photographers assistant as well, been carrying , learning, dropping a Mamiya 645 TL PRO with a 55mm form the roof of a 16 floor building . . and so on. Then realised that i didn´t need all the gear i had, was writing a list for insurance use, and when the value was almost double that i though it would be i was a bit ashamed. Sold a lot, went travelling, got back, bought some more, sold the rest and kept my G2 with some lenses. Now i´m working with voluntary work in Argentina for 1 year in total. Suddenly out of nowhere i ended up with a M6 in march this year and is happy with that, maybe a 50mm some day in January .. , and all stuff valued under 200 usd does not count on the list , right ? 😉 , if i don´t spend it on more travelling then . .

So why ? , it feels right, and a is a part of who i am , 28mm, XP-2 and a Rangefinder.

vha.

- - -

Edit : and now i remember the camea-brand , a nice summer day and a German tourist walks in with a Werra Matic, and she does not speak English, nor I german, wanted a new film (Agfa) and the camera reloaded .. and she was a bit surprised when i loaded it without a grin . . 🙂
Sometimes you know, sometimes your just lucky 😉

Think i´ll have to get one a day.

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I think my girlfriend would like to know why it is that I do anything that I do in the first place; if I knew, I would tell her. It's just something that I like a lot. As a "computer guy" with unmet artistic needs throughout my schooling and at work, I think it satisfies many (obvious) of those needs while marrying the "gadget" and scientific factors perfectly. Many people who take pictures don't think about the "scientific" part of the imaging process; I do, and I like to see the end results aesthetically (one example: bokeh). Again, why? Why does Hydrogen only have one electron? (don't let's get started with ions and isotopes)

 

[GeneW]

I've always liked things with dials and knobs and I've always liked electronics, so maybe that's why I like older film cameras AND digital cameras ...

Gene

 

[FrankS]

I'm 48. By nature I'm a visual person, a good listener and an observer of human interaction. Photography allows me to record things I observe, for my own pleasure and sometimes for the pleasure of others. Why photography? Because I can't paint well.

 

[TPPhotog]

Can't sing, can't dance but can use a camera (a little) .......... and I enjoy it 😉

 

[rover]

39, a watcher, trying to show what I see. I am not very artistic, but I do think I see things in my surroundings. Things I like, things I don't, things of interest me.

I am not a late comer to photography. My father shared my passions through his support and urgings when I was a kid. If I wanted to do something, he was sure to learn about it and give me a chance to try it out. Though I didn't take to photography by way of becoming very talented in it, it has been a strong interest since before I was in high school.

When I graduated from college one of my first big purchases was a camera. She served me well taking thousands and thousands of exposures. All snap shots, documentation of what I was doing. I always felt though that I was seeing something different that what I was capturing.

When my son was born what I was seeing was what I was feeling. I set out to capture things that are so much more important. I now focus much more on what I am doing. I am paying attention to how and with what I am doing it. I am learning to capture what I see, making photographs with meaning to me. I hope to give voice to those thousand words that I cannot speak in each image.

 

[egpj]

OK, I'll bite into this thread. I am 36 years old and as of almost two months ago...unemployed. Was working on a contract for the U.S. State Department when the prime contractor decided they did not need the Sub-contractor anymore. I got squeezed out due to non-compete clause and could not keep my old job. Aerial photography is the profession and I ahve had a long winding road that has lead me into that profession. I started out in the military and then progressed through a couple of related groups till I landed in the aerial photography thing. By the way guys, you can make pretty good coin in the field of Aerial Imaging if you are known to be good. We are talking 6 figures here. But the steady work is few and far between.

Some of my other likes are music (have about 300 CD's on my iPod), a good novel (does not matter what genre), Puttering about the kitchen (I got the entire All-clad line and the whustoff knives as well Stephanie), I like collecting watches and that really was a new thing that I discovered. So far I have the Breitlig Emergency and a Rolex Sea Dweller. Before the job thing cramped my style I was preparing for the Breitling Cosmonaut. A beautiful timepiece!

hmmm.... why do I do the photography thing. I think for me it is a case of being able to capture something beautiful for all time. You think about it, once you click the shutter that is it! The image is recorded and then you have to bring it forth by developing the image almost like some sort of birth. Every step must be done just right or that labor will be for naught. Then when you make the print and someone looks at it and says "that is beautiful!" Crack cocaine must feel like that. That warmth that someone else shared your vision and could look into it and be drawn into the scene. WOW! I kind of wish that I could make a living at this. But then that would be kind of like taking something holy or some profound truth and whispering it into a pigs ear. Saint Theresa once said "I would not tell you everything, even if I could, for there are certain things which lose their fragrance in the open air, certain thoughts so intimate that they cannot be translated into earthly language without at once losing their deep and heavenly meaning." That is pretty deep and that is the kind of depth I like to see in a photo. Photography can be an intimate thing but then it can also be a mindless capture. I guess it depends on the eye of the photographer and where he is in his craft.

Crap, I really meandered on that one! After that I do not even know if I answered the question. :bang:

 

[FrankS]

Quoting Mother Theresa, now that's a hard act to follow! (Beautiful.)

But I got to thinking about "why?" and I got to this: Most people long to express themselves creatively, and I can be more eloquent with photography than with words, dance, or song.

 

[egpj]

Well Frank, it was actually Saint Therese of Lisieux. I am just full of spelling errors today, I also misspelt Wusthof. Oh well, I still meant every misspelt word! 😛

 

[Jason_K]

My father got me interested in photography when I was about 10-years-old. Two years later I got his old Yashica 35, which I still have. Now I am 35, a father of two and a full-time photojournalist. My wife bought me a rangefinder for Christmas after I started feeling nostalgic for black and white film. I found this site, along came GAS, a fixation for FSU cameras and the desire to get that Yashica working again.

 

[nwcanonman]

I am ........... therefore I photograph ~ ; - )

 

[parks5920]

I like it nwcanonman, short.........sweet!

 

[David Doler]

Time marches on. No time like the present. Time to go. I'm outta time. What time is it. Time, time, time. When I take a picture, I stop time. When I look at a picture, I'm a time traveler. A camera makes me the most powerful person on earth. Only a photographer and Superman can stop time.