11. March 2015 · Comments Off on Details – Learnings from a workshop · Categories: Mental Process, patience, Philosophy, processing photos, Uncategorized

The Courthouse from main streat

The details are not the details. They make the design. Charles Eames

 

Success is the sum of details.   Harvey S. Firestone

Now this is a laugh!  Me with ADHD, the big picture guy writing about details!  But maybe that is why this is an important note for me.  Four months ago, I took Charlie Cramer workshop on printing.  Now I love printing photos, and I already knew most of the techniques that Charlie taught. What I didn’t recognize until recently, was what it was that I did learn.  Paying attention to details.  In lots of different ways, the message was pay attention to details, not just the big picture; the big picture takes care of itself if the details are observed.

I was reviewing some photos of the southwest that I had previously posted on my site.  Wander through the galleries and see if you can detect the details that have not been attended to ! In reviewing the photos, I was appalled at the poor quality that I had posted before.  I haven’t updated all of the photos yet, it takes time…. Details I noticed that had escaped me the first time around.

  • Spots, particularly in the sky
  • Halos
  • Shadows too blocked up
  • Horizons not quite flat
  • Unsharpened photos
  • Not cropped well
  • Photos too dark

It is amazing the improvement in quality in the photos from paying attention to the series of details that are available.  It wasn’t as if any of these things was new at all, but was new was instilling the eye to be able recognize the series of details that needed attending too!

One of my photographer sons says over and over, when I talk with him (sons are like that, probably learned some place LoL) is that we have to become ‘engaged with the picture’ but I think I might answer back, pay attention to the details, the picture will take of itself..

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