Now and again I hear the phrase: ‘but isn’t it easy? –surely you just have to click a button’ and in many ways to a certain extent this is true. I was met with a similar question after proposing Photography as one of my Art GCSE options to my grandfather who said this but in a slightly more lengthy and opinionated way. Perhaps he associates this option with “taking the easy way out” and eventually he accepted that his influence on my options would have little impact from an armchair at the bottom of Africa, so he left me to explore this by myself. I began my art course in September 2014 and 4 months since then have explored and learnt more than I had in my previous year of amateur photography and numerous different photography books. It was only after I had spent the whole of the first term experimenting with dropping paint into water (which is more interesting than it sounds) and had some time to reflect over the Christmas break about the year when I realised the lengths that I had actually gone to get the shots. It was these thoughts that really made me wonder why I had consider my four periods of art a week as ‘good’ lessons and finally after some further thought I came to the realisation that it was because I was enjoying the work, finding it to be the right distance between challenging and interesting so as to keep my attention and push me to always improve on what I had previously done.
However, I didn’t quite realise the lengths that I had actually gone to get the shots and what could have possibly be wrong with any of my photos. Of course I had been aware of the numerous Saturday nights that I had been awake in my kitchen experimenting with different lights, colours, camera settings, paint to water ratios and several of other variables that had consumed the previous twelve or so weeks.
Although, it wasn’t the countless hours that surprised me but the return that I got, only producing ten passable edited photos that could be used for my final piece out of in excess of over four thousand images. It was also the first time that I had received any type of negative feedback towards my photos causing me to wonder how I had got so many photos so wrong. After this came to light, I came to the conclusion that this subject was not easy by any means, I had originally taken this purely out of genuine interest and knew what the perception of that of someone who only saw this as a simple subject, but it was at this time that I realised just the art of photography and how this could be a subject – (paint and water) – that I could continue to improve and change for years to come. The complexity and “never-ending-ness” of this process has intrigued me and helped me strive for better shots.
I opened an Instagram account fairly recently having looked upon the app with the apprehension of someone who wasn’t sure of the reception that posting some of my miscellaneous landscape/ athletically pleasing photos would get. Any apprehensions that I previously had cultured evaporated away as I found not only like-minded people but a whole community of people who just loved to take photos and gave support in the form of a like. Through this, my confidence in photography has improved with new ideas arising every single day inspired by people like myself. I truly feel that this community is one of the most supportive and open-minded communities out there and in this I can always find a place where I can experiment with new shots, meet different people and most of all enjoy myself.
Matt Richardson, Year 10, Halliford School
