Wednesday, July 6, 2011

I'm a DP, not a photographer.

In the next couple weeks I will be removing all of the stills from my portfolio website but before I do it I wanted to take some time and explain my reasoning here:

For years I've argued that I'm a new kind of "photographer" in that I can create stills and video simultaneously. I stressed to clients that this created a clear connection between the two mediums not typical with photographers that employ DP's and film crews. I still believe in that hybridity but am realizing more and more that there is a growing disconnect in my work.

I love photographs when they document real moments and I love motion because it provides the opportunity to fictionalize mood, behavior, and light. These are 2 completely different processes yielding 2 completely different results and telling everyone I value them identically just isn't true.

Furthermore, I've discovered when I'm a "photographer shooting motion" there are budgetary constraints which I don't see changing. This hurts the quality of the work and while I'd like to believe I can fit the cost structure of a photographer into a proper motion shoot, it ain't happening: video is astronomically more expensive when done right.

I've only now begun to realize that I don't need to market myself as a photographer with a video portfolio to get jobs, they are there for the taking regardless, and I think it's time I stop worrying so much about the way I market myself and instead on the quality of the images I create within the medium I prefer. Here we go...


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