People ask me how I got started in photography. I didn’t “start” photography at all. It came and took me. Here’s how it happened.
Simple things and seemingly innocuous events that happen to a child can have far-reaching effects that take decades to evolve. Things that don’t seem so at the time can change the tenor of an entire lifetime. A ten year old boy, not much different from any other child, has his life redirected by one simple gift, an act of kindness and generosity so profound he is speechless when it happens. His grandfather is a newspaperman. A man who uses the most marvelous innovation in camera technology since film was invented. He owns and uses one of the new Polaroid Land cameras for his work. It shoots black and white film that develops outside the camera right after the photo is taken. A film pack hold less than a dozen shots. The film packs are expensive in the economy of the time. Then, Polaroid’s Dr. Land reveals his newest invention: a camera and film combination that takes color photos that develop right on the spot. The newspaperman decides he must have this new camera. The old (not really old at all) black and white Polaroid, now suddenly obsolete, is presented to me as a gift: an extraordinary gift for a ten year old boy. The film packs, however, are expensive even for a person with a job and a ten year old boy’s allowance doesn’t go far. Saving for weeks to buy a film pack, the act of making even a single picture must be carefully thought out. The light has to be just right, the focus impeccable, extraneous things in the frame must be carefully removed, the objects arranged just so. The boy is learning composition without even knowing what the word means. He is learning the magic and the mystery of exposure and the way even a simple light like a flashlight can change the entire look of a photo. He is catapulted into an entirely new way of seeing the world. The wonder of it all holds him spellbound. Then, the camera breaks. His photographic odyssey is abruptly put on hold. Years pass. There is no money for the frivolity of a camera. But, the die is cast. The magic of the photograph holds him, or rather, me.
It has never let me go.
I pursued photography in fits and starts off and on for many years. I used cheap cameras mostly. But the fascination with the craft never changed. Time passed. Career choice turned out to be a good one. There was a little extra money. All the while digital photography was being developed. The first inkling of its power was seen in the development of CCDs, charge coupled devices, used in astrophotography. They were finicky things that had to be bathed in liquid nitrogen to make a decent image. From them, slowly, digital cameras began to appear. Prices dropped. Film sales tapered off. The fledgling digital age exploded.
Right time, right place, right set of events. Without them I might never have taken a single picture. But I doubt it.
PP
