My dad was the one who began teaching me photography. He taught me about exposure, he taught me about film photography, and he taught me some really basic points about composition. My very first camera, even before my first DSLR (my “nice” camera), was a canon PowerShot S30. It was a point and shoot that we bought in 2003, and I was using it in 2006 to photograph a friend’s band. After every show, I would come back and show my dad how good my photos were. And every time he would point out something I could do better. Naturally the first thing I would do was say, “Well my camera isn’t capable of that.” I would blame the camera. My dad would ask me, “Have you read the user’s manual?” Of course not. That crap is boring. As time passed, my images got a little better, I started asking questions, and I started learning. After my dad saw my interest and my commitment, he bought me my first DSLR. My images still sucked, but I had the capability to make them better. Of course, I still shot on auto. I had a nice camera. Why were my photos still lousy?
This is a common conversation, and a common perception among photographers and non-photographers alike. A guest at a wedding might say, “That’s a really nice camera. I bet it takes great pictures.” I usually respond by saying, “Yeah, it’s a workhorse and it does its job well!” The short response is that yes, its a nice camera and it is built for high quality imagery, but its only about 25% camera quality. The rest is in my head. A camera is simply a tool, and a tool is only as good as it’s user.
25% HARDWARE
The biggest difference I noticed between the little point and shoot and my first DSLR was the ability to better control the exposure. I shot it on auto for about the first month or two and then learned how to shoot on manual. Even then, a lot of my images were still poor quality. The great thing is that I had equipment that I could learn everything on that I would need to learn for my career. Training and learning on the equipment I planned to use in my career was really good for me. However, it wasn’t until I was serious about learning that my dad bought my DSLR. I took a lot of bad images with my new DSLR. Below you can see a progression from 2006 to 2018 with non-human subjects. The first two are on the Canon PowerShot The rest are on a DSLR.
75% SKILL
As you can see from these images, they get progressively better and more diverse (various lighting, subjects and detail). Lighting, composition and editing all improve drastically over that 12 years. The first and last were taken from a car. The two sunset ones were taken around the same time of day. All but the first two were taken with a DSLR, the last three with a different DSLR body. The third image and the fifth from last were shot on the same camera. While its difficult to compare different kinds of photography, my work gets better over time.
If you look at the quality from the first image and compare it to the last, its not hard to see a difference in the quality itself. The first image is small and low resolution, perhaps a little bit of digital noise. The final image is hi-res and much larger (although I did take the first few images off of Facebook since I don’t have them on my computer). Not only did I learn how to edit, but I learned about outputting images for print or publishing. I have established a workflow. This means that start to finish, every step contributes to a quality image and a happy client.
Another factor in the quality of my work is that I’ve spent 5 years (after the first 5 years of refining the basics) developing my style. Through lots of trial and error, and making a lot of bad work and even more bad edits, I’ve learned what I like. In addition, I’ve developed my brand and learned how to incorporate my company values of genuineness and honesty into my work and establish a consistent aesthetic between design and photography. This makes my work consistent regardless of discipline and makes it serve my brand.
A tremendous amount of time and work goes into creating good images for a creative business. Assuming that a nice camera makes professional images is an innocent assumption, but one that needs to be corrected. A business doesn’t come in the box with the camera, and neither does skill or education. It’s not something that you can simply buy and just have. You can pay for mentoring, you can pay for classes, but in the end you have to do the work, and be disciplined to learn. If your camera is going to be the one making professional images, you have to teach it everything it needs to know.
And just for kicks, here’s proof that a “nice” camera can take a terrible image. This is my cat and this was taken on a 5D Mark III.