Chapter 5 | The First Six Months
Chapter 5 | The Professional
Recall that I had sold a number of pieces before leaving the corporate world? That means that I got to call myself a ‘professional’. If any of you have sold any of your own works of art, then you too get to call yourself a ‘professional.’
Never really wishing myself to be known as a ‘photographer’ I labeled myself an ‘artists.’ Being an artist to me meant knowing all there was to know about ones genre. After all if you are an oil painter, on canvas, you ought to know about brushes, paints, pallets, mixing, stretchers, canvases, etc. etc. To be an artist whose genre is photography then you should know all there is to know about that genre, which is substantially more than just tripping the shutter button on a fancy camera with all the gadgets. If that’s what one does, just trips the shutter and then hands it off to someone else to do the artwork part of it, then most likely you’re only a photographer taking pictures but rarely crafting a photograph(s). As it turns out, there is a big difference between taking a picture vs. a photograph in this genre. There is also a major difference between a print (aka ink [jet] on some substrate) and a photograph (chemically processed light sensitive materials created in a darkroom). This is something I learned very early on, at twelve.
My modus operandi had always been rooted in my Uncle Bills advice, which was to “Go Have Fun!” For all those years, from twelve to the moment I left the corporate world, that is what I had done. On camping trips into the wilderness, which was my favorite place to be, his advice was all I had ever followed. While hiking something always seemed to peak my interest and I’d take my time, find the right angle, distance, etc. that ‘felt’ right to me. Then the shutter would be snapped and hopefully something beautiful was stilled for a time. Never was there contrary advice given which pierced my very thick ear drums. Thick ear drums go along with thick skin or thick head or… The only advice, beyond his, I ever followed were my own senses. What I thought was beautiful was beautiful to me. Over all the years the only thing I ever did was walk around the woods and randomly come across things that stopped me dead in my tracks. When I felt that sweet abiding love for the miracle, which is this world, I knew I’d found something special. Every fiber in my being would define the composition. Pure emotion drove my selections. And that is how I did what I had always done.
But now that I was a ‘professional’ and had a family to take care of, I KNEW, I had to photograph what would ‘sell’. Or starve.
So that is what I did. Forgetting all the things I had learned over 23 years (from 12 to 35) of exploration and creating works. Instead I looked for the gimmick that would surely sell…diminishing perspectives (like fences, docks, piers, etc.), contrasting elements like grass juxtaposed with dirt or bark dust. Heck I even once tried doing a boat in the water. All of these images, while technically well done, were contrived and lifeless, without passion and to me void. And it showed.
I had moved away from what I loved doing and tried to do something that intellectually made sense. But guess what happened when I tried to sell these images…Nothing sold. Nothing.
Oh boy. I was in trouble. Had I just make the biggest mistake in my life? Perhaps.
There was only one saving grace left to do. The path that I had followed to this single point of divergence needed to be corrected. I needed to get back on The Lough Road.
To this day I have refused to even attempt to try and jump back on this very societal and popular band wagon the genre seems to have headed.
My images, by my own definition, are as pure as I can possibly make them. No color filters, no fakery, no darkroom deception, none of that stuff. You will never see a moon placed into one of my images. You will never see anything other than truth. What you see, is what I saw, with my naked eyes. It is that simple.
The path forward, from that colossal mistake, seemed very clear but would be extremely more difficult to follow. Because making things up is far more easy than finding it in the reality of the real world.
This famous Nobel prize winning writer said it best…
“Art is a collaboration between God and the artist,
and the less the artist does the better.”
Andre Gide
In 2016 things, in the genre I love so very much, had gotten out of control. Popular Photography, the Worlds largest publication of its kind for the genre, published an op-ed I had written on the topic. The public trust has been broken, sadly because of only a few very deceptive individuals. This is a disgrace in my opinion. And it sickens me to no end, even to this day.
Chapter 5 | Eight Feet Under
Ok, here we are in the dead of winter high in the mountains in need of oxygen tanks. If that weren’t enough maybe the eight feet of snow was. How am I suppose to go out and work when my snowshoes only sink in the soft fluffy snow? That left plenty of time for planning, yeah my favorite thing to do. Not.
The idea popped into my head that I could actually go somewhere that had little to no snow at all. Where would that be? Death Valley? Anza-Borrego? It’d be south, definitely south. This would mean that I’d have to leave home with the only vehicle that had four wheel drive. LeeAnna wasn’t too keen on that idea. Luckily, she had friends.
The Chevy Suburban got packed with everything I thought I’d need, kissed everyone bye bye, and off I went on my first grand trip.
My first stop was Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah, which was sort of on the way. Talk about mistakes made, there were more than a few. To this day I’m not sure I even came away with a single piece of film that could be used, though I am sure I tried. Right before leaving the east coast I had purchased a large format Toyo 45A-II camera with three lenses. For years I had been using a 35mm camera, then moved to a 645 medium format camera and then this large format camera (more on this later). This camera requires one to load a single sheet of film into a film holder, one side at a time. Guess what happens when you load it backwards? You might think you’d come away with pure black images, but you don’t. Orange images? Yep, that’s what you’d come away with. It should be noted that this is true for transparency based, films. I wouldn’t figure this out until I got back home. Luckily I got some help at my next stop.
Over the previous couple years I had been an active member of the AOL Photography forum on the web. Probably dating myself a fair bit here by even mentioning AOL…turns out that they still have an active community.
Along the way I’d planned on hitting up the first ever AOL, what we today call a ‘meet up‘ long before it was ever called that, get together being held in Yosemite National Park. I think we had some 60+ people show up. One of the online members had taken the time and effort to put together an entire ‘event’ and it was awesome! He even got William Neill to come by for a visit (look him up because you will not be disappointed). This was my first ever visit to the park that I recall, though I was told I’d been there when I was younger by my parents.
Everyone there were given so many tips on locations, times, what to be on the look out for, etc., which back then wasn’t such a big deal as it seems to be these days. The time there was fun and productive. I knew I’d have to come back on my way home. And if you’re wondering, yes we did have snow. Oh and William Neill showed me the proper way to load film. Luckily. Because a lot of my shots would have all come out wrong.
Chapter 5 | My First Big Break | April to June
When I had returned home boy did I get an ear full. It turns out the Honda Del Sol was NOT so great in the snow as we’d been told. LeeAnna made it very clear that until the snow was GONE I’d be the one using the Honda. Bummer, because that Suburban was great! It was so tall that I could sleep underneath it or in it if I had to. But this wasn’t the hill upon which I would choose to die, so the tiny sports car was my new base camp. Everything barely fit.
I would take the time from April to June to be in the Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. This time there was no other choice but to sleep in the tent. So for three months I would stick my hand out the opening in the tent to check for rain or snow or nothing. I’ll be honest here, I didn’t get up every day during those three months. It snowed a lot. It rained a lot. Some might have called me a fair weathered fellow during that time.
One has a lot of time to visit a place when they plan on being around for three months. There were a lot of places to explore and I was in my element once more.
“Anything more than fifty yards from the car
just isn’t photogenic.” | Edward Weston
Turns out that ol’ Edward is right, at least for one of my images.
Chapter 5 | The Making of ‘Day Dreaming’
I had been going down to this one location every dawn for three months. It had the potential to be Great. Waking well before dawn, including the time it’d take to get to the location, I had it down to a science. My hand would protrude from the tent, and pulling it back in it would get checked for wetness. No pouring rain, no fistful of snow…it was time to get up and get moving.
There was little indication that this would be ‘the’ day other than the day before had yielded a solid stunning bright pink layer of clouds. For months I was the only person there at sunrise. I’d not seen anyone.
Arriving well before the sun rose over the horizon to the east, my camera was set up waiting for something to happen, just like it had been for the past three months of sunrises. All that would be needed would be for me to trip the shutter should ‘it’ happen.
The most unexpected thing happened next. Another photographer had wandered into this spot. Now I’d not seen anyone down there since I’d been coming, so this fellows presence came completely out of the blue. Even more distressing was he didn’t even look over to say hello, or give me a nod as some guys do. There was nothing. He did however take the time to kneel down and look over the top of my brand new Toyo 45A-II camera to see what I’d pointed it at. He stood there a moment puffed a huff, swiped his hand as if to let me know that he disapproved of my composition and without a word walked off. Yes, that really happened.
I started to put my hand up to call him back. After all yesterdays sunrise was stunning, and in case you are wondering, I did in fact photograph that sunrise but have never released it as of yet. Basically the morning before pales in comparison to what was about to go off in spades. Right before I was to utter a word, I caught myself just short. After all this ‘fellow artist’ couldn’t be bothered to even say good morning. Did I have an obligation to him, hmmm…after three months of coming down here I was hard pressed to come up with a compelling argument as to why I should utter a single word. So I kept my mouth shut.
To this day I still wonder where he was when that sunrise went off in Grand style. ‘Day Dreaming’ was taken at sunrise on June 15th. Now you know the back story on that one.
Months later I had made a poster, my second. The first poster was of Delicate Arch in Arches National Park, Utah, taken a year prior with the Mamiya 645 medium format film camera.
It took some figuring out to learn how one goes about submitting a poster for inclusion into the Natural History Association Book Store, inside a visitor center at the park. But it got done. And as they say the rest is history, sort of. You see no one had “EVER Dared” to submit an image of The Grand covered with clouds before. Turns out it often looks that way and they’d been waiting for someone to have the Cahoonas to submit one for years. Right place, right time, right image.
Here’s the amazing part of this story. That poster has been in the Grand Teton National Park Visitor Center Bookstore for twenty-five years. Over time they have added new images to the bookstore in poster form, but that one was the first. In case you’re not aware the Natural History Associations within the Visitor Centers for all our National Parks donate all their profits back to the Park. I’d been told that the monies from that single poster have paid for part time rangers and special programs over the years. How awesome is that!?
Did you know that should you ever feel like donating to help support our amazing park system, you absolutely can? In fact you can even be extremely detailed about how you want the money you donate to be spent. Let’s say you’ve just visited a park and fell in love with one of the trails. You can donate to help maintain that specific trail and know that is where the money will go. Should you be so inclined to contribute, visit this link…
One quick story before I finish this Chapter, please indulge me.
When it comes to knowing who other professional photographers in this field are, I’m often at a loss. Not being a paparazzi or credit junky it’s rare that I know other photographers names or the work they do.
One of the things I teach my students are the three rules of landscape photography. The first rule is to explore. The second rule is to explore. Finally, the third rule is, yep, explore. This includes things beyond hiking in the woods. Often it should include exploring the books, posters, etc. in the visitor center bookstore(s) because you never know what you might find. Remember this was my first six months of being in the field. You can bet I was in there exploring.
Finally, here’s that story I promised…
It was a foggy morning and you couldn’t see fifteen yards in front of your own face. This is now after Day Dreaming was taken but before I had left to go home, at a different location. About 15 or so photographers had somehow managed to be in the same spot that morning. Not really sure how it happened but we all ended up being in a big circle just sharing stories. If we ever meet face to face it will become immediately apparent that I have not qualms about saying hello to anyone. So it was natural for me to start an introduction going. After I told them who I was and what I’d done (quitting an awesomely handsome salary, etc) and that this was my first six months out I turned to the guy on my left and passed the baton. And around the circle we went, one by one sharing who we were, where we were from and why we were here. When it finally had gotten back around the circle to the guy on my right, he introduced himself and I nearly just dropped right there and then. “Hi my make is Willard Clay from Nebraska.” Before he could get another word out, uncontrollably, I nearly shouted in his face “You’re Willard Clay!?” “Your work is amazing!” “Do you have a card I could get, and could I bug you from time to time with questions?”
He must have been a bit overwhelmed because he said he’d have to go back to his truck to get a card, but he’d be happy to help however he could.
In less than six months I had met two of the best landscape photographers in the United States. William Neill & Willard Clay. I would meet more as time passed, but this was a really good start.
The moment Willard headed off to his truck every single one of those other photographers ran over to me…”Who is Willard Clay?” was the singular question on everyone’s lips. It was hard for me to think they had no idea who we had in our presence. I told them to go do what I had done, and look in ANY picture book at the bookstore and they’d see some of his work. To put it plainly, he’s dang good!
After he returned with the card and a gracious invitation to call him if I had any questions, and after everyone else had left, I mustered the courage to ask him one simple question. “Is there any advice you could give me, given I’m just starting out?”
He didn’t even pause…“The Wind is Your Friend”, he said plainly.
Now I’d had plenty of advice given to me over the years, but this one escaped me completely. Everyone knows that the ‘wind’ is anything but your friend as a photographer. In fact it can often be our only nemesis.
I’m pretty sure my twisty dog like twisting head look showed him just how perplexed his comment was to me. I took a moment, thought about it for more than just a little, before saying “I don’t get it.” To which he asked me to contemplate on it a bit more. Boldly I explained I wasn’t the dullest tool in the shed and was at a complete loss. Seeing that the wisdom he had just imparted was about to be completely lost he explained further. “If you wait for the wind to die down, to the point where you can actually snap the shutter, because it can often take some time, the other impatient photographers will have left and you will be alone to capture the image they all wanted but were not able to because they left too soon.”
Well heck if he had explained it was a Zen thing then maybe it would’ve made sense and I could have figured it out. Talk about a great lesson though.
I have never forgotten that incredible piece of advice and have learned that the wind is indeed my friend on many occasions since. Today, when someone is just starting out and I end up being the guy asked for some beginner advice, I go to Willards words. They’re better than anything else I could share. It’s amazing to me though just how many doggy twisted head looks there have been over the years. Willard the wise.
This image is an ode to Willard, aptly titled “The Wind is My Friend”, because it took forever for the wind to die down…and I was left all alone.