You say tomato, I say look – Squirrel!
King of distraction, renegade of randomness
Most people seem to move meaningfully through life with intention, purpose and perhaps even a sense of progress – even if challenges and life in general makes that momentum difficult to maintain. For most people distraction gets in the way, interrupts, is an anomaly that sticks out. I’m coming to understand that distraction is not the exception for me, it’s the default. I am in fact, Dug the dog from the film “Up”, with the best of intentions but inevitably taking rapid 90 degree turns when a ‘squirrel’ appears1.
In my photography that’s not necessarily a bad thing, interested in a small detail one moment, and a cityscape the next. It helps me just ‘get on with it’ and press the button, avoiding procrastination and waiting for the ‘perfect moment’, which I’ve talked about in this post. Another reason to always take my camera with me everywhere…
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I’m also quite a slow photographer, which is probably a good thing otherwise I’d end up with a lot more useless shots – and virtually no hard drive space. For a while back in my film days I only used a Yaschica Mat 124g twin lens reflex camera, which took 12 shots per film, and that suited me (loved that camera, maybe I need to dig it out again).
A series in retrospect
The downside of this ‘distraction bias’ is that a distinctive series of photos, a focused reflection on a subject or a cohesive cluster of images is really difficult to achieve. I might in fact have to only do that retrospectively, when I look back over a period of time, maybe a location I’ve gone back to, and found a common theme.
I did this last year with a collection of images I took on my walk to work, trying to place them along the path I took to and from (my previous) office. It was surprisingly satisfying and did give new value to images I had previously disregarded.
As I’ve mentioned before in this ‘stack, often the hardest bit is starting, so maybe what I often think of as a burden, is actually a sort of ‘gift of taking random initiative’. It may not give me the focus to build a story in a linear way, but it does give me the opportunity to find more images that become part of a different story later.
Spotting stuff
I’m not sure if this is related, but I am interested in lots of different type of image and subject which keeps me interested, fueled up so long as there is lots going on around me. Distraction becomes a productivity hack rather than a bug in the program. I try not to ‘chimp’ (check images on the screen straight after taking them) to keep me in the flow and just keep ‘looking’ for the next shot. Plus my choice of camera, the FujiFilm XPro-3, deliberately discourages using the screen by a series of design decisions, from showing a pseudo ‘film roll’ image on the back screen, to making the actual screen awkward to access.
My attention tends to jump between compositions focused on the subject - usually people - to colour, form and texture, cultural messaging like signs and posters, and sometimes just odd or amusing contractions. I do sometimes try to focus on a theme or mood, which can help me focus a little, but never lasts quite as long as I want it to before the next squirrel appears.
Incoming! The Inflection Project
has just let me know she’s got her response almost ready to my initial image a few weeks ago. I can’t wait to see. The project, a relay race of artist interpretation, will slowly (we hope) build a narrative that neither of us can control or predict, and stimulate new ideas for both of us. The fact that we’re mixing mediums adds to the unpredictability and increases the directions we can go in. It’s all up for grabs! I’ll post a link to Karen’s image in the comments as soon as it’s in.
My initial image, the first in the series, you can see here.
More meanderings and musings next week! Thanks for reading.
Keep curious
James
Some more January images…
I’m actually writing this as a distraction to something else I should be doing right now. oops.