Leave the gray card at home and just shoot! Experiment with your photography.
Taken from wikipedia:
“A gray card is a middle gray reference, typically used together with a reflective light meter, as a way to produce consistent image exposure and/or color in film and photography.”
We all want the correct exposure, we all want the correct f-stop and shutter speed, we all want the correct white balance, but my question to you is…. Why?…. Why do you want to be like everyone else?
By writing this article, my hope is that it inspires you to start experimenting and break those rules. If we all strive for what the technical world calls “correct”, then how will you ever develop your own unique style and start to differentiate yourself from other photographers.
Before I go on, I just want to state that I do think it’s important to understand your camera and all the technical aspects of photography, but if you think too much like a human instruction manual, then you will never leave that frame of mind and never experience all avenues that photography has to offer.
There are a million photographers out there, all shooting the way their teacher taught them in school. He/she is probably an amazing photographer and developed a style and talent that led them to a teaching position and now they are passing on their expertise to others. Amazing! I have a special place in my heart for good teachers who care about giving back to the students. So the time comes for an ad agency to hire a photographer for an upcoming campaign and its open to everyone in that class including the teacher. Of course the teacher will get hired because they are the most experienced and have the best track record of good work, as well as all the students work looks identical to the teacher, so why not hire the professional??………… or wait…. what about that student that decided to leave his gray card at home… decided that.. “hmmmm… lets try something different”… This is where I’m trying to go with this article. Learn and understand the technical elements and then modify and experiment with them. I believe that 95% of the time, the photographer who did something other than the norm, will get hired. Companies invest lots of money into advertising and they want it to stand out and this is why they will hire you. They are paying you for your creativity, not because you know how to calculate the perfect exposure……. and who says what the perfect exposure is anyways.
Lets take an example that I did. Look at that goofy looking picture above. Yes, that’s a self portrait I did of myself for my birthday. [insert too much time on your hands joke here]. Look at the exposure. That backdrop is white…. does it look white in the photo? No. It’s gray. Points off for me for not adjusting the white balance. See how there is a red color cast on the pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey game? Sure, its being reflected off the red balloon. Again, points off for me. Technical experts can go on and on about the things wrong with this photo…. but you know what??? Who Cares!!!!! For most of you that know me, you’ll know that the term ‘who cares’ is huge in my vocabulary. If you start caring about what other people think, then the whole art side of photography is gone. When people start to bash and hate on your work, you know you’re doing something right. They care enough to take time out of their day to state a negative opinion. To me, that’s insanely flattering. If you’re hired by a company to do a job, then thats the only opinion you should care about. With most photography jobs, there’s usually only one or two people that have to like the photo. In this case, it was me. With that being said…. amongst everything wrong with this photo, it was probably one of my most talked about images at the time. It served its purpose. People didn’t care about exposures, and either did I. Who knows how this photo would have turned out if I spent all my time making sure it was technically correct.
There’s a time and place for everything. A time and place when you should care about exposures and getting things technically sound but don’t let it trap you in a style of shooting. Who knows, maybe you’re a F-stop away from taking a photo that will take you to the next level but you were always too scared to try it because that’s not how you were taught. Be that mad scientist and learn something new. Experiment! Experiment! Experiment!
I challenge you to take out your camera this weekend, and do something different. Shoot a totally different way. Pump up your ISO, shoot at a slower shutter speed, don’t use flash, use flash, play around with depth of fields. You might come back, look at your photos, and think: “What was Jay talking about? 85% of my photos came out horrible”. I won’t lie, that’s most likely what will happen but instead of saying that, why not say “wow, I tried something completely different and 15% of my photos came out amazing”. Think positively and look at it as a successful failure. Sure 85% came out bad, but those 15% taught you something entirely new about photography and its up to you how you want to use that 15%. Now you are on a path to experimenting and developing your own unique style.
If you do attempt this challenge, let me know how it went. There’s no need to show photos if you don’t want. This is more for learning experimental techniques than creating portfolio pieces.
My advice for the day: Don’t be afraid to try new things.
Well written brother. I can relate. I can send you a hand full of emails from school profs that have told me i shoot wrong for one reason or another. or that I told a student how i did something that looks cool but it was wrong use of lighting etc. but when it comes down to it I pay my bills taking pictures the wrong way. I know about 20+ photography grads and of all of them 2 have work in their field after finishing their program. I have fun with what I do and its a bonus that it can fund my life. I know your in the same boat, and If your shooting by the book and thinking of it as a task rather than a cool experience your in the industry for the wrong reason. I would be taking my camera out to shoot every day even if it wasn’t for hire.
Thanks Steve. You’re one photographer that definitely tries new things and I think that’s why so many people dig your work. Keep it up.
Follow-up article: A shot in the dark: How removing the lens cap can cramp your style.nnOK maybe it’s obvious that there are some things you can’t ignore, like having your battery charged, or the lens cap off, but there has to be a balance, even with things that are more flexible. Mastery doesn’t come from feeling inconvenienced by learning.nnStill, this article’s point is well taken regarding originality in style and composition, I just don’t think exposure is the best example to use. While it’s easy to be overly pedantic on exposure precision, and obsessing on it can cripple creativity, having consistently blown out highlights or shadows can really suck. nnCertainly you don’t want to miss an awesome shot because you were fumbling with dials, but you don’t want to ruin the same awesome shot either for lack of any effort to at least dial it into a reasonable range and lose those glowing highlights that were the magical focus of the shot. Developing good exposure skills can become an automatic habit, sort of like muscle memory in sports, and just like an elite athlete, you won’t even be thinking about it when the fundamentals have been practiced enough to be second nature. nnAnd then of course, there’s that whole auto-exposure thing that manual purists avoid. If the shooting situation doesn’t permit time to set up your shots, by all means, use it, bracket, whatever! After all, the n00b tools are there to help you!
Thanks for the comment Brian. I agree with everything you have said. The main idea of the article was to challenge the reader to experiment with techniques they are normally not accustomed to.nnThe phrase “leave your gray card at home” is used only as a symbol to represent the idea that sometimes you should leave those “by the book” techniques at home and experiment with something new.nnThanks again for reading.
I agree with you Brian. Over time, I’ve just learned enough about my camera to walk into a situation and quickly go ‘alright this has ISO 5000 F4.5 1/40th written all over it’. nnI’ve actually never taken an exposure with my camera on anything other than Manual mode. Not snobbery, just my preferred way.
Excellent article Jay, as most people probably know from looking at my photos, I agree with everything you are saying. There is a huge difference between good exposure and perfect exposure. The world around us isn’t perfectly lit, and when I shoot I attempt to capture what my mind visualizes first, and then expose accordingly. I’ll jump 6000k in color temp between shots just to see whats at the other end. I’m not shy about high ISO’s. nnMy goal with photos is always to create something that I like first, then pass it on to others to see what they think. The best amount of feedback I ever receive are on images that are far from conventional, and far from perfectly lit.
For people reading this and really want to see examples of someone experimenting with their photography…. click on Kyle’s name and it will bring you to his website. He does amazing work. Photos shot in a way you probably have never seen before.
Leave the grey card at home … and bring the artist out of the photographer :)nI totally agree with everything you’re saying Jay, but I just want to mention something I read somewhere: You need to understand the rules of photography before you can break them. How true is this? I don’t know… but there are elements to visual art that have been used for hundreds of years because they are effective. For example, take the rule of thirds. We’ve all been told to use this one. “It’s so much more pleasing to the eye than placing the subject smack dab center because it draws the eye throughout the picture blah blah blah”. However, placing your subject or horizon in the center of the picture can produce a powerful confronting image, especially if, say, your scene/subject presents itself with a lot of symmetry. If this works. You’ll only know if you experiment!n So to summarize my little spiel: If you can make a picture look better by breaking the rules, DO it! If not, don’t. A working artist can only sell what others appreciate… Not that we’re all in it for the money anyways ;)nThoughts?n
When you say “You need to understand the rules of photography before you can break them.”, I agree with that, in the sense that you can never have too much knowledge. It won’t hurt to learn the rules because there might be some situations where applying them works. Just don’t think of the rules as a “must do”.