Alison Cain, West Wittering beach

Shoot with Saffi Karina, shot in the middle of the day in bright sunshine, on a beach, just like you aren't supposed to do!

Portrait in West Sussex

From a portrait session last month. To book your session contact me through my website www.tobiaskey.com

Simplicity

Recently I'm feeling that I want to simplify my work. Although I love digital and the flexibility it brings to the shooting and post production process, I feel that I'm incrementally becoming less of a photographer and more of a photo illustrator, tampering with everything in an infinitely malleable digital file. Indeed, it seems the industry is going this way and never really asking the question "Should we do this?". With advent of the photoshop or internet model who will remain stubbornly plain in real life unless someone invents glasses that do 8 hours of retouching on everything you see, I'm simplifying what I do and trying to get by with film, a scanner with some contrast control and dodging and burning. Above is a picture of Lara unretouched and naturally beautiful.

New Treatments of old work

Just reworking some pictures for my new portfolio. It's amazing how time away from your old work lets you edit it better when you return.

Film to Digital and Back Again

I Read an interesting blog post by Mark Tucker on the subject:

http://marktucker.wordpress.com/2009/01/19/overheard/#comments

Co-incidentally I did a shoot yesterday that was my first all film shoot with no digital as a back up or exposure reference. What I found most amazing is that without really feeling like I was holding back I shot only four rolls of 6x7 (40 shots) wheras with digital I probably would have shot 300 or 400 frames. I also found myself directing the shoot a lot more rather than shooting through the OK pictures hoping to get to the good ones. Strange how the equipment you use totally changes your shooting methods without any real conscious effort on my part.

I'll post the results soon.

Good Taste - The most important photographic skill?

Like most photographers, I'm often asked for advice by up and comers, and it's usually technical. They want to know all the details about what equipment I use, what software, you know the usual thing. What I'm starting to think is that most beginners would do better to buy a cheap manual SLR camera, and then spend what they save on the camera buying books of photographer's work and if they live in the right place, going to galleries.

Why do I think this? Because the technical side of photography has never been easier and will keep on getting easier as digital technology develops. The basic skill of creating a well exposed, in focus, professionally acceptable but creatively dull image will decrease in commercial value as the gap between competant amateur and low end professional all but vanishes.

It will become less and less time consuming to learn 'technique' and mastering the technicalities of photography will at a basic level, have no commercial value.

So as a new photographer, what skills can you develop to ensure a career in this precarious business?

The answer is as simple as it is daunting - creativity.

That's why I suggest you get yourself down the library, buy books and go to every gallery show you can, because learning the history of photography and absorbing the work of others is the first step to being more creative.

And creativity is something you can't buy with a credit card at your local camera shop.