Richard, you have made me look good. Thank you for reaching out! I am full of humbility (and yes that is a word, because I have used for years and I like it!).
Reading this, I realise I’ve never really understood the whole “shooting on film versus digital” debate, or the idea that film is inherently superior. For me it has always been about the image itself, not about the particular material that fixes the light falling through a lens.
That open-mindedness does not extend to the print, though. The preferred physical form of a photograph is something one should not take lightly. I still print every single image I suspect I might get serious about in the long run. It’s a tactile thing: I need to hold it in my hands and experience it with light reflected off it, not shining through it. I need to see it hanging on a wall or lying on a table among other prints; I have to live with it for a while before I can decide whether the image is going to be a keeper.
Somehow, in my mind, if you are going to call an image a photograph, it needs to exist in the real world on a physical carrier, no matter whether it was born on film or as a bunch of ones and zeros. (I’ll spare you the poppy metaphor I was briefly tempted to end on.)
The comment about the people walking through life with their phones in front of them made me think about how much things have changed and yet stayed the same. In the 18th century, people on their Grand Tour of Europe would stand with their backs to the most beautiful landscapes just so they could look at them through a Claude glass — a small, tinted mirror that softened the scene and made it feel more “picturesque”. Today, the smartphone seems to have become a modern version of that peculiar device.
Richard, you have made me look good. Thank you for reaching out! I am full of humbility (and yes that is a word, because I have used for years and I like it!).
nobody does substack like soren! his knowledge about photography, moments in history is priceless.
Reading this, I realise I’ve never really understood the whole “shooting on film versus digital” debate, or the idea that film is inherently superior. For me it has always been about the image itself, not about the particular material that fixes the light falling through a lens.
That open-mindedness does not extend to the print, though. The preferred physical form of a photograph is something one should not take lightly. I still print every single image I suspect I might get serious about in the long run. It’s a tactile thing: I need to hold it in my hands and experience it with light reflected off it, not shining through it. I need to see it hanging on a wall or lying on a table among other prints; I have to live with it for a while before I can decide whether the image is going to be a keeper.
Somehow, in my mind, if you are going to call an image a photograph, it needs to exist in the real world on a physical carrier, no matter whether it was born on film or as a bunch of ones and zeros. (I’ll spare you the poppy metaphor I was briefly tempted to end on.)
The comment about the people walking through life with their phones in front of them made me think about how much things have changed and yet stayed the same. In the 18th century, people on their Grand Tour of Europe would stand with their backs to the most beautiful landscapes just so they could look at them through a Claude glass — a small, tinted mirror that softened the scene and made it feel more “picturesque”. Today, the smartphone seems to have become a modern version of that peculiar device.
I found a new photographer to follow!
What a great interview!
I really enjoyed reading this interview! Soren is always a wealth of knowledge and talent!