A glance at the Art of Photography

Capturing that perfect image is an art form in itself. The thirst for likes and clicks these days in many ways forces people to take countless more photos than they actually need. Getting it right has never been more important.An essence on perfection has always clouded over professional photography but with the insurgence of social media, you can see this aspect slowly seeping through to amateur photography as well. Its been said many times that a picture is worth a thousand words but its true. The beauty of images is the stories they hold. One can look at an image and come up with a totally random scenario in their head without ever knowing the true backstory. Our imagination plays a massive part in this by connecting us with the Photographs we see and love.

It got me thinking...

While in deep thought about this, I was browsing through my twitter likes and saw I had many photos on my likes tab which were uniquely interesting. The first one that caught my attention was taken from a twitter handle who typically puts up abstract space photos with no context of who took them or why they exist. I love the idea of that. No backstory to dwell on which set my imagination wild. I particularly love this image as it entrenched my brain into deep philosophical wonder.

What lies beyond our atmosphere? Are we going to be forever confined to this one sole rock in space or will we grow to out live Earth and travel to other savoury worlds? The layers upon layers this image has, broadens its appeal to me. The noticeable contrast from the clouds to the outer layer of the atmosphere to then poignant darkness filling the top edges of the photo. Between our world and the void you see the crescent of our Moon faded into the image. Masterful Photography.

After scouring through plenty of my astronomical images, I stumbled upon a photo I liked back in 2015 of a WWF ad. A different type of Photography, one that is designed with definite meaning behind it. An image put out there to exact a certain emotive feeling within us. It worked on me. I connected to the image. The message of the image is pretty clear. Without even using bold text or a standout font, the does a great job of grabbing an audience.

Highlighting the effects of deforestation in South America dramatically, WWF try's to inform its populace of what needs to be done. Very impactful. The subtleties of having the person grabbing paper towels is quite striking also. Often when I go to the public restrooms I tend to use more paper towels than I need so its bringing that awareness to the forefront is very clever. We do forget that a lot of our used paper tends to come from these rain forests that are rapidly getting destroyed at an alarming rate. We lose the habitats that come with them, further disrupting the animal food chain.

Touchdown Patriots!

The next image is again different to the other two we've looked at. This time I picked out an image of my favourite Sportsman, Tom Brady. We can gather that this image was taken while he was present on the football field playing his respected sport American Football. I have liked a lot of photos with Brady included but what attracted me to this photo was the true shot of raw emotion on his face.

Without knowing at what point in the game this was taken we can see how amped up he is. Now watching Brady for many years, I'm going to say this is pre-snap (before the ball is thrown) and Brady is bellowing out his signal calls to his fellow players. I know this because of my prior knowledge of him but I feel one of the great details about this image is you don't need to know who Brady is or what he plays. You can spring up your own conclusions just by this image.

Purely looking at the photo excluding any of my biases I would say he looks angry or frustrated. Glancing more at the photo, he evens looks like he's celebrating. Acknowledging these footnotes, you start to formulate an idea of how Tom Brady might acted. What's his personality like? Is he a leader? What's his position within the team? And thus you're in the rabbit hole of deep thought. Its remarkable how fast we process information like this. Within ten seconds of looking at an image we already have concluded how we feel, whether we like or dislike whats displayed or what the message is. Again Sports Photography is a whole new level.Some sports most defining moments have been captured entirely through still imagery. When I view Sport images I almost act as if the photo is moving in my head. Trying to predict what happens next. Its really quite intriguing to think of what would happen next.

A double edged sword

The final image I wanted to share my thoughts on is another picture of Tom Brady but this time off the football field. This time we're seeing a totally different side of him but judging how you felt about him from the last image I doubt this one came as a surprise. I'm confident that many of you saw him as a passionate individual bursting with emotion.

Obviously making an obscene gesture like the one shown is not a nice act to commit but unlike the other photos I do indeed know the story behind this photo. In short, Brady was making his way to the taxi stops after a night at the theatre in Downtown New York. While trying to reach his taxi, he was being hassled by cars on the road. These people were later revealed to be rival fans hurling insults at Tom through their car windows.

Of course Tom should of shown self-discipline at this point but unfortunately didn't and proceed to make his feelings known to them by raising his middle finger.I personally don't have a problem with it. I'm a believer of, if someone is giving you grief, give it back to them. Viewing this image, I ask myself the question, Is this how I want my Idol to act? Straight answer is no but when you're Tom Brady and you're under this microscope constantly, he can't be excused all the time when he lapses in self control. In a way that's makes me respect him more. He's human just like me and you. The final point I want to bring forth is this image comes under the umbrella of Tabloid sensationalism. I wont lie, I love my dose of dramatised news imagery but when it involves one of my hero's I object. Why you ask? Well we never like to see our hero's at there worst. We always see them through a perfect lens. The same goes for me and Brady.

Getting to the end of my twitter page I found I liked a wide range of Photography. Picking my four images was tricky but each photo chosen had a story to be told. It made for some interesting food for thought..Go and see what surprises your twitter likes hold right now.

#Lookingatdifferentphotographs #ComparingPhotos #Tombradymiddlefingerphoto #WWFpapertowelad #dissectingdifferenttypesofPhotography #twitterlikes