Not a one-eyed view

My contention is that photography can be "art", though it usually isn't. Sadly the worst offenders are often photographs that are called "fine-art". David Hockney is quite right that the vast amount of photographs are not art, cameras (as normally used) cannot "see", and most people are utterly confused by the distinctions - many times deliberately so by people with commercial interests in selling us rubbish.

So this blog attempts to present my best, finished, photographs in a way that you can assess for yourself to make up your mind what you think. The pictures here are all accurate reproductions of finished prints - not scans of the negatives that gave them or any other cheat like that. It is a companion blog to http://cameramods.blogspot.com/ which tries to explain how I made my images and how to modify cameras and processes to get closer to "art".

This is not the place to waste too much time talking about what I mean by "art" in photography. I will try and summarise it quickly here, but it is (to me) exactly the same as with most visual art (painting, drawing, etc).

• One must look carefully and represent the object as it is, always with careful assessment, and it never suffices to just accept what your equipment "says" it "sees". Careful looking is vital and fresh and unusual ways of looking are helpful, several different ways in one image if possible. Cutesy or clichéd subjects are very much unhelpful.
• One must continuously assess all aspects of the image, from the subject to the media, and (making conscious and deliberate choices) change or modify it at all levels to improve the textures, details, quality. Often this means (paradoxically) making the photograph "bad" but always in an interesting way, adding new work or materials rather than subtracting, to improve quality.

When this process is finished, the picture is finished. It is very difficult to finish a picture, and a factory churning out a lot of "finished art" is unlikely to be producing good work.