The rational photographer

It's been something I've been thinking about for a while: my mental process when working, specifically for photography. My thinking has been prompted by several blogs I've read describing a sort of unconscious or emotional approach to the whole business. This post has finally happened thanks to Paul Butzi (again).

My thinking is far too rational to get lost in some unconscious "flow". Almost every shot, every experiment I try is logically thought out. Often this works just at the edge of conscious thought and can be hard to verbalise or explain but it is there.

Over the years I've often had cause to think on how I think. People often comment that I don't think like others, in that my mental processes seem to work differently than most. Not better, just different. I also think fast, churning lots of options in a short space of time. My brain is constantly evaluating the world around me, considering evidence, thinking of the options and possibilities. Good attributes for a scientific worker, not typical of the artistically inclined.

And so it seems to be with photography. I carefully evaluate everything, considering what I see, how I see it, how I want to represent it. It's a background mental process that seems to be constantly working. On the outside, it may be hard to tell - when it's going well the whole thing can take the blink of an eye. If you saw me plonk down my tripod and crank out the shots, at times it might seem unconsidered. And just because it takes you some time to work through a process doesn't mean it takes me the same amount of time.

Why do I not think this is some sort of instinctive approach? Because this thinking and outcome works just the way it does, for me, in scientific or mathematical work. Often I can "see" the answer but can then consciously step through the logic to get there. It is similar with my photography. See, analyse, devise, execute, test the variables. I don't always get it right and I then actively learn from the mistakes: make improvements, get new ideas, discover new things by accident. As my English teacher once said of me: efficiently analytical but lacking in empathy. It's the way I am so I work with what I've got.

This may be hard to understand: it's certainly tricky to describe. For the emotional crowd it is likely hard to relate to, just as I find the more emotional approach very hard to relate to my own experience. There was a point in time when I tried to explain others' process in terms of my own experience but I realised that was specious. That just becomes denial through ignorance. So I try hard to understand my own thinking and how others think and work. What I learn from other photographers seems to help with my understanding of others in general.