Photography | The Photographer Blog | Blogging

© 2010 Wazari Wazir | The Photographer Blog | Blogging

I wanted to write about blogging here especially for photographers, I know photographers are better at telling their stories visually, through picture rather than through written words, that’s the job of journalist or writers but I think sometimes a picture alone  doesn’t tell the story clearly or precisely. Sometimes the picture may look so easy to take, it’s look like just about anyone who have a camera can take that picture but most people doesn’t know the difficulties that the photographers face in order to get the picture.

I’ve met a lot of great photographers, usually when on assignment where we have a free time  to sit and chat at coffee shop, I can hear all kind of great stories, but so sad that not many people be able to hear that great story because the photographers doesn’t have a blog or they do have a blog but just post a picture and simple caption without any in depth story about getting the shots.

I know that I’m not in the position to tell what other people have to do or what photographers should do, everybody have their own life but wouldn’t it be better if the experience be shared together in with blog. We can reach million of people with our blog but we can only reach few people on day to day basis or face to face interaction.

Nowadays there is a growing interest in photography, be it locally or internationally. People like to share their pictures with friends, relatives and maybe to connect with their lost friends through social media like Facebook. Also there is growing interest in serious hobbyist in photography, where they want they want their picture to be more than average. This new generation of photographers are hungry for knowledge, eager to learn but the sad thing is not many local and experience photographers here in Malaysia share their knowledge openly in the public. I’m not saying they are none at all but very few, very hard to find their blog or website. Most website or photography blog here in Malaysia especially belong to newbie, new generation because maybe they are born in this new era where even before they were born into this world their mother already posted a picture of herself pregnant on the internet, Facebook for an example.

On the other hand most experience photographers who were born during black and white film era or before the introduction of digital camera find it hard to catch up with this new media or technology. Most of them don’t know how to make a website, don’t know how to set up a blog even though they wanted badly to share their experience but they just don’t know how to do it or how to do it right.

In the end the new photographers just share their experience and knowledge among their peers. I know that it is easy to take a picture than to write a story, otherwise why we become a photographer in the first place but wouldn’t it be better if we can share our experience getting that particular shots.

The reason why I set up my blog is because I wanted to keep my passion high, I want to share my pictures and my experience. People always say that sharing is caring. Not every photographers have the opportunity to be where we have been. Not many photographers have the opportunity to be on top of Mount Everest for an example, not many photographers have been to Papua New Guinea or to war zone like Palestine or Afghanistan for an example. It’s true that we can see the picture of war zone on the internet but it is very hard to find a photographers story getting that shot. What’s it look like working there, what’s the real situation, what we should know that the media doesn’t want us to know. How we prepare our camera equipment, how we transfer our files, about food, accommodation and all other great story that will make our picture more interesting to look at if we know “what’s going on behind the picture.”

I can write a long article about this subject but the point is, sometimes a picture alone doesn’t tell the whole story. Sometimes people are more interested to know how we manage to get the picture, the difficulties that the photographer face in order to get the job done. I’ve attend one of Steve McCurry workshop here in Kuala Lumpur, in one of his presentation he show us a picture of a boy running through a narrow alley in Blue City at Jodhpur India, he describe the picture as “The Unguarded Moment”. He tell us that he wait almost two hours just to get the right subject enter the blue alley. For me the story is more interesting than the picture itself. It is the story about the patience of the photographer to get the shot that he want make it interesting. A picture with a written words are more interesting than just a picture alone.