In part one of a stunning new four part series, renowned landscape photographer Colin Prior shares some of his personal vision of photography and explores the impact of the digital revolution.

I recently read in the New Scientist magazine about a camera that shoots first and focuses later. The camera developed by a scientist at Stanford University, enhances blurred shots by storing information on the same light levels when the scene is photographed. Software refocuses part of the image after it is taken – the result is a perfectly focused photograph, regardless of the photographer’s ability!

The BBC interviewed me the week before about digital photography. Did I think it makes it easier for an amateur to take better pictures? In my opinion digital photography enables everyone to take better exposed and focused photographs. However, the concepts that are being photographed are still a bit fuzzy.

Despite the huge technological advances, the basic nature of photography remains unchanged since its invention - after all, if this new technology had really empowered photographers to take enlightened imagery, I’d be looking for a new job. To the novice and even the accomplished photographer, it is the nature of photography that often gets blurred. Essentially, there are two elements necessary to achieve consistently competent imagery. The first is craft and the second is art: and one cannot survive without the other.

Ansel Adams was the perfect practitioner of both these disciplines. He was a highly accomplished technician and many of his pioneering darkroom and printing skills are practised to this day. He was also a great artist and his powers of visualisation and his ability to transform graphics and textures of a scene before him into the two dimensional world of the monochromic print became legendary. The first challenge then is to master the craft and there is much to learn, not just in the photographic sense but also about computers and specialist software like PhotoShop. Whether you are working digitally or on film, the ground rules, which govern the physics of photography remain unchanged. Only, film and chemistry have been replaced with a digital sensor.

Focal length, depth of field, the effects of applying different shutter speeds and apertures to a subject, must be clearly understood. If you want to learn what’s beyond the Programme mode on your camera, you will need to learn and understand the same basic principles as your grandfather. My advice to anyone who wants to improve their photographic skills is to take loads of pictures, collect other people’s photographs which inspire you and read around the subject as much as possible. There are many excellent books on photography available in libraries and bookshops. And if you’re a climbing photographer then don’t miss Ian Parnell’s excellent “No Nonsense Photography Guide” which you can find on www.planetfear.com.
Once you’ve established a level of competence with the basics, you’ll find it easier to develop your own way of seeing the world and will be well on your way to evolving your own style. Concepts like pre-visualisation, where an image held in the mind’s eye can successfully be transformed onto a sensor or film, will become second nature.

Despite all the latest advances in digital technology, the basic principles of ‘seeing’ have not changed. Whether an image is being recorded on film or directly by a sensor, the key is in being able to understand the differences between the way a camera sees the world and the way our eyes do. Learning to decode the mysterious language of imaging will enable you to predict the results with some certainty before you release the shutter. Conceptual ideas and themes can be explored and then transformed via the camera into working concepts. It’s a bit like the difference between a novice piano player and a concert pianist. The novice, who hasn’t yet mastered the craft, presses the keys and concentrates on hitting the right notes and accurately replicating the music. The maestro has the ability to introduce his persona into the piece and make his very own interpretation of the music. His passion will stir your emotions.

The upside of all this is that digital capture has made it easier and cheaper to learn. You can review your images immediately and for free. Using the LCD you can hone your compositional skills making changes in real time. I cannot begin to think about the number of duplicated bracketed images, which I have shot over the years to ensure that I had captured the perfect exposure. The process was both wasteful and expensive but essential to achieving the end result using transparency film. If you have the time, you can explore the effects of using different shutter speeds and aperture combinations of a moving subject like water. Whether shooting rivers, lakes or waterfalls, the combination of the speed of the moving water and the shutter speed will determine the most aesthetically pleasing result.

Last year in Alaska, I was photographing some amazing fall reflections on a lake. The morning was overcast and the light soft and I managed to find a corner of the lake where the reflection was not being affected by the wind. Through the 300mm lens I could see patterns emerging between the pinks and greens of the foliage that were reminiscent of Monet’s impressionistic paintings of water lilies. The wind was variable and at one stage it started to drizzle which disturbed the surface of the water. I set the camera at ISO 400 and decided to experiment with shutter speed and aperture combinations and shot a total of about sixty images using a variety of compositions of basically the same scene. I was keen to see what the effects had been on the reflection and to establish which of those had created the most aesthetically pleasing rendition of the reflections.

Surprisingly, the strongest images were those shot at 1/60th at f11. Had I been working with my normal 50 ISO transparency film, my shutter speed would have been three stops slower at 1/8th at f11 which would not have held sufficient definition in the reflections and failed to fulfil my visualisation of the scene. I refer to this image as my ‘Monet’. Similarly with my ‘Van Gogh’, I again recognised in the spectral reflections in the lake surface, a palette of colours I associate with the artist and attempted to create my own impressionistic image in his style, again experimenting with shutter speeds.

This is a good example of how the combination of experience and technology can be fused together to open up new creative ideas and approaches. Had I been working on film, it is unlikely I would have succeeded in recreating the images, which I had imagined. As Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote in the Little Prince, “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

« Back