Mike Johnston writes TOP The Online Photographer an excellent blog I'm certain many of us are familiar with. (yes I know but "with which many of us are familiar" sounds pretentious now doesn't it.)
Discussing the subject of photography as art, or different from art, he touches on an area I know I've wrestled with, do words enhance photographs? If a picture is worth a thousand words then how many more could it need? Yet, how many of us appreciate a caption? I know personally I like having a bit of the photographer's personal voice added to an image...I always look for a caption. Or is the mystery worth something more?
It would be interesting to hear other's opinions.
Speaking of opinions, I have followed TOP for years and enjoy it very much. I do recognize that some of my "life" opinions are rather different from Mike's. Comments in the past have started a stream of personal e-mails between us voicing that disagreement. Regardless I value his opinions and expect that if we ever did meet I would like him very much.
well I often like to couch images in some sort of context. I printed this one for my mum while I was in Japan. Even though I know she didn't know Japanese I entitled it with a little story written on the paper in silver pen explaining the name, the meaning and why I liked it.
ReplyDeletehttp://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=7004568
Being a 4x5 sourced image I had printed it to 50cm wide and posted it to her.
So yes, I think many shots deserve a title. Not all maybe
I often view an image and wonder what the artist had in mind when snapping the shutter. In those instances certainly a caption would be appreciated. While it is true that most images speak for themselves, IMHO I don't think a caption would be distracting.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite photo teacher and Mentor at the San Francisco Art Institute was/is Jack Fulton. He actually taught a class called Words and Pictures. He always said that words can elevate a good photo but they can't help a mediocre one. I believe he's right.
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