01

Is It Good?

AS ONE WHO MAKES PICTURES FOR A LIVING and teaches others to do so, I have long been preoccupied with what should be, one might think, a simple question: What makes a good photograph?

To hear popular photographic culture speak their answers to this question, we could be forgiven for thinking it is merely a matter of meeting a particular technical standard. When we first learn this craft, it’s miracle enough that we can bring our skills to bear on the creation of a photograph that is focused and well-exposed. That becomes our first standard, and often, though expressed with more sophistication, our last. Our thoughts lean toward, “If only I could wrap my head around the complexities of the technique, or the understanding required to operate the camera in my hands, I will at last create a good photograph.” I think we can do better.

I am not downplaying the need for that initial skill set, nor the pride that comes when we finally find our images focused and well-exposed more often than not. I am suggesting, however, that those skills are merely the price of admission; they are the foundation we build in order to move forward in this craft. Mastery of craft is necessary, but insufficient; it does not necessarily create a good photograph. And, to some extent, it must be acknowledged that good photographs can be made by anyone, by any means, depending on what “good” means to us.

Ask others what a good photograph is and you’ll hear a variety of answers: A good photograph tells a story. A good photograph shows you something in a new way. A good photograph makes you feel something or ask questions or . . . Well, which one is it? Is it all of them? Must every image be evaluated in the same way?

Is there a more helpful question than “Is it good?” Might it instead be possible to reframe the question entirely?

I think it is, and I think this reframing is important. Because while the question “Is this a good photograph?” is next to impossible to answer objectively, it’s undeniable that the drive to make photographs that are good, or strong, or that connect with us and our audience, is what pushes us to explore this craft and challenge ourselves both as artists and practitioners of craft. It is the connection to the human that is at the heart of this book.

This connection is important because it is we humans who decide why a photograph is made at all. It is we who read an image and respond to it on a dizzying number of levels. Was the photograph made to show you something specific, such as what a Blue-winged Teal looks like? Was it made to retain a memory of some fleeting moment? Was it made to tell a specific story, convey a certain feeling, or raise certain questions? Was it made to anger, arouse, or amuse?

I think it’s time we photographers asked ourselves what it is we hope to accomplish with our work. And, in fact, it might be time to stop talking about “good” photographs entirely and find a better thing to pursue with our craft.

This book is, in part, an exploration of the search for that better thing, and before you roll your eyes at me, I ask you to trust me as I make this promise to you: this exploration will be deeply pragmatic. I have about as much interest in debating what art is as I do in arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. What I want to discuss is this: What makes a photograph that pleases us as its creator, and has any chance of creating a desired experience for others who will read that photograph?

To backtrack a little, when we ask about one of our photographs, “Is it good?” I wonder what we mean. It seems logical that at the very least we could revert to those first technical standards and ask, “Is it sharp? Is it well-exposed?” But what if sharpness is not the point? What if the best expression of this particular subject or moment is pure movement and blur, pure impression or abstraction? Asking if it is sharp is no more meaningful than asking if it is blue, unless sharp or blue is the point entirely.

And when we talk about exposure, we must admit that to be under- or overexposed means to be “under” or “over” relative to . . . what? The meter on the camera? The camera has no idea what you want to accomplish with your photograph. The best it can tell you is how much light there is. Whether you want to expose for your shadows and allow parts of the image to go blinding white or expose for the highlights and allow the shadows to become black holes free from any detail is a matter of taste and intent. There is no room for what we “should” do in art, and frankly, less room for it in the craft and the technique than we like to imagine.

Every decision we make as photographers is relative not to what we ought to do (as outlined in your camera user manual or by your local camera club) but to what we desire to accomplish. This is where we get the first clue as to how we might start answering the question, “Is it good?” Perhaps we should first ask, “Does it accomplish what I hoped it would?”

If you are starting out and you create a sharp, well-exposed photograph, when before you had nothing but frustration, and you show me that photograph, I would have to be a monster to tell you it wasn’t good. Is it good in the same way Ansel Adams might have meant good when looking at his own work? Is it good the way I think the work of Josef Koudelka is good? Probably not. But I think that has little to do with the work of Adams or Koudelka, or even you, and more to do with the standard against which we measure things. Sometimes the good photograph, at least in terms of our craft, is the one that represents growth, new mastery of technique, or next steps taken. In that instance, to strive for more and to skip the necessary lessons of the craft would sabotage the process of mastery. Sometimes the good photograph is the one that signals forward progress and is measurable only to you.

Humour me a moment and let me suggest that the language we use to talk about photographs is underdeveloped, and maybe, just maybe, the engines of popular photography culture (mostly the camera manufacturers because that’s where the biggest money is) have a vested interest in keeping us talking about a “good” photograph in purely technical terms. Why? Because a target that never stops moving is a target we will continue to spend money to pursue. If the new standard of sharpness becomes the new standard of what is good, it’s reasonable to believe we can spend our way to “goodness,” which is absurd. A Leica does not a better photograph make.