Photos can serve as a reminder of where we are at that exact moment in our lives. We look back at photos and can be instantly taken back in time. When photos are taken intentionally, they can evoke strong emotion. We remember how we felt and what we were thinking.
I recently came across a blog that I had started many years ago when our kids were young. The blog was my way of documenting our life at a time when I felt like Facebook was becoming too unfocussed, overwhelming, and filled with ads. Instead of Facebook, I used to post on that personal blog (shared mostly with our out of town family) about our daily adventures and travel. Generally, the photos were taken with my camera and not my phone, although phones these days take much higher quality photos than they used to. Still, I am glad that I took the photos with my camera.
Today photos are snapped with our easily accessible phones resulting in hundreds of gigabytes of unintentional, meaningless photos on our camera rolls that are blurry, poorly lit, and not composed well. Frankly, there isn’t a lot of emotion in a photo with red-eye and out of focus. Between photos of receipts and items at Costco, there might be a decent one of a kid half smiling, although it is probably blurry because I was running late for something.
As a result, scrolling through photos on my camera roll just doesn't have the same impact that looking through the photos on my old blog has. Photos tell a story and can be more than just documenting the fact that we were ‘there’ at that moment. When we look back at photos, we should feel the pull of emotion.
As a photographer, my aim is to be intentional with my photos so that they tell a story. I want to freeze time and capture what you are feeling and thinking at that exact moment. I want clients to go back and look at photos ten years from now and feel that emotional attachment. I think about lighting, composition, and mood when I take photos and that all results in a photo that is incomparable with your phone photos. And don’t even get me started on trying to take sports photos with your phone. It just doesn’t work.
