This post briefly explains my thoughts on the question:

What is photography?

(I don't mean the literal definition - painting with light)

Photography is the art of seeing.

For a long time, I used to wonder what the differences were between average and great photographers.  I used to question assumptions like:

Do great photographers use the best cameras?

Are great photographers born with a special skill?

What does it take to be a great photographer?

It took a long time to figure out the answers to all 3 of these questions:

No, No & Seeing what others don't - by being you.

Example

It is one thing to look at a well known subject such as Ayers Rock and say "wow, that is an amazing landscape - I think I'll take a photo of that."  But what is much more challenging and rewarding is looking at that same landscape through your eyes, with your perspective, using your experiences, with your composition, in your way, with your camera and in your style.  You may have noticed the key word here is YOU.  You are the best asset you have.

Proof

If you give 50 people a camera, put them in a room and tell them to take 100 photos each, you will get 5,000 unique images, each one totally different from the last.  In photographing the famous mountain in Switzerland, The Eiger, I had viewed many images of the mountain by great photographers in doing my research....  however I got there and did my own thing:

Aerial view of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau ridge-crest, Bernese Alps, Switzerland

(click to see larger preview)

Seeing what others don't

Photography has always, and will always, be about capturing light and knowing what works and doesn't work from a technical point of view.  However, it is easy to learn to be technically perfect and capture sharp images.  What is difficult, and takes a long time to learn, is learning to see.  This is what photographers really do, and good photographers have developed an advanced level of seeing.  Great photographers take this further and have an advanced level of seeing, combined with their own unique style.

This is why great photographs

(or any great work of art)

can almost never be duplicated.

I remember reading about a bunch of photographers who tried to recreate Ansel Adams' Moonrise over Hernandez image.  They made celestial calculations of the moon and sun calendar of the day and time Ansel made the photograph, and then used GPSs to calculate the same position he photographed it, with the same camera and the same lens.  Needless to say, they failed to recreate the image along with the other hundreds of thousands who have tried to copy great photographers.  Their time, effort and money would have been much better spent learning to see.

I hope this has been helpful.  If you would like to hear my thoughts on any subject in particular, write to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Best regards

Chris