ned
Commitment is necessary for the quality of my story telling. My journey is to learn what commitment is to me. This is my truth, and the very depth of me not believing or understanding what to believe in anymore. Recognizing this has been the source of my rebuilding.
I try to become simpler when I’m faced with this question.
Simplicity doesn’t always imply quality. Simplicity butts heads with both price and quality, and is heavily influenced by propaganda. Sometimes there’s not even a trade off, there’s just a marketing campaign! How can I know what I’m buying when there’s a frenzy of hype, features, and urgency?
However, being a simple man, I don’t want to have to buy the same thing twice and I want to avoid having too much garbage. Quality.
For the last five years I shot on a camera that, by the specs, isn’t as good as most point-and-shoot cameras today. Most photographers wouldn’t even use it as a second camera. Every time I pulled it out of it’s case to shoot with it, I couldn’t help but feel like I was holding a secret. I learned that my quality is only defined by a very small part the tools I hold in my hand.
My quality is a very large part related to the commitment I’ve made.
I believe that being aware of the quirks and capacity of my tools is paramount to doing my art. Knowing the uniqueness of my tools helps me isolate the uniqueness in my work to apply my marksmanship. Not the other way around. Not if I want to be creative and step outside of the mold. Photographer Hiroshi Nonami exemplifies this by taking some of the most astounding photographic pieces of art with lenses that he’s grown mold on. Shooting with moldy lenses! Unheard of.
Thinking like this helps me realize that it’s not my equipment, it’s the way that I think that defines my truth and establishes my commitment to quality. Only I know the truth of both my tools and of my commitment. This is my story.