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coigach
11th July 2010, 01:02 PM
Hello all,

Thought it would be interesting to ask a question about the relationship between writing (non-photography!) and your photography. I've always been very influenced by writing in my approach to photography, perhaps more than anything else.

The following books and witers have helped me consider my approach to my landscape photography, particularly because they build up 'layers' of perception about specific places over a lifetime. All of these writers have a very particular geographic context, and over the course of a lifetime their work has added to the meanings of the places they write and care about. All stress the relationship between people and place, the cultural history and context of landscape.

-‘The Poems of Norman MacCaig’
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Poems-Norman...9884799&sr=1-2

-‘Aotromachd – Lightness and other poems’ by Meg Bateman
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lightness-Ot...9884616&sr=1-8

-‘On the Other Side of Sorrow – Nature and People in the Scottish Highlands’, by James Hunter
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Other-Side-Sorrow-Scottish-Highlands/dp/1851587659/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1278852995&sr=1-5

-‘Connemmara – Listening to the Wind’ by Tim Robinson
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Connemara-Li...9883930&sr=1-1

Anybody else have any books / writers that have influenced their photography?

Cheers,
Gavin

JKaranka
12th July 2010, 03:17 PM
On the Road and The Subterraneans by Kerouac. I think that The Subterraneans definitively depressed me as showing on writing a beat and natural stream of consciousness that photography would have a very hard time trying to rival. How do you suggest something that involves the collaboration of the reader to be understood with every photograph as he does with every line?

KevinP
15th July 2010, 07:08 AM
An interesting subject, but for me the written word is too far removed from the process of seeing to be any influence on my photography. When I read it's to acquire information rather than emotions. I guess this is one of the reasons I'm am engineer and not an artist, so my photography reflects my literal nature and why I'm so bad at photographing people.

Trevor Crone
15th July 2010, 07:44 AM
I find my photography has been more influenced in a direct way by photographic books rather than just the written word. However I do find certain music influences my 'photographic mood'.

Richard L
16th July 2010, 11:03 AM
I've done a lot of reading about the first world war and other grizzly human events, and I think it's made me appreciate my freedom and liberty in these current times, and I suppose rubbed off into photography (even though street/candid/anything to do with children or property photography is more hazardous now)

vincent
19th July 2010, 07:25 PM
Gavin,
I have found the book 'Anam Cara' by John O'Donoghue most influential in my approach to landscape photography and the strange thing is that the book does not mention photography .

DuncanC
21st July 2010, 04:56 PM
Hmmm, a difficult one. I always used to read books, mainly photography books, in order to understand how a successful photographer managed to get such a good shot. Not that I would then go out and copy it, but to understand the thinking and planning process behind certain lighting and subject considerations.

As I then started to work more in the realms of photojournalism, I was forced to write captions and they only started being good when I not just read others' work, but by literally talking to the authors of the national newspapers' staffers, i.e. Matt Cardy (now with Getty) and Julian Simmonds (Daily Telegraph).
Learning by doing and practice over practice...
Now I write more than I read, lots more and I use my notebook more than my camera.
Odd, innit?