Burning Man Will Set Your Creativity On Fire
After a 3 year hiatus, I returned to Burning Man in late August, this time with my new bride. Once again, I had the time of my life. As a photographer who loves people, I can't imagine a more fascinating place to make photographs.
If you've never been to Burning Man, it's difficult to imagine what it's like to live in a city of 40,000+ people that has replaced a cash economy with a gifting economy. It's the ultimate counterpoint to the Fergie song Glamorous where Ludacris raps "If you ain't got no money take your broke ass home." Without cash as a determining factor of where people live and who they associate with, socio-economic barriers are broken down and interpersonal relationships (and life) become so much more interesting.
In 2004, I made photographs at Burning Man with a digital camera. Since I enjoy photos of people most of all, I brought plenty of business cards so I could let people know where they could download the photograph I made of them. This ended up not being an ideal solution for several reasons and I came away feeling like I had taken more than I had given. So this year, I decided to bring three Polaroid Land cameras and Polaroid 665 positive/negative film. This allowed me to give everyone their photo right after I made it. I can't describe what a rewarding experience it was to see people's response to their black and white portrait.
Not having photographed with a Polaroid before, I couldn't have anticipated the psychological shift that happens when a person knows they're going to receive their print 30 seconds after being photographed. They're no longer posing for the photographer, they're posing for themselves. This has an enormous impact on how engaged they are in the process. If anyone reading this is engaged in street photography, there's an important point to consider here.
This experience has reinvigorated my passion for photography and resulted in me returning to my film roots as well as well as becoming more experimental with digital photography. Last week I did something I thought I'd never do - use a cameraphone. However, I made things more interesting by shooting a series of 3 photographs and combining them into a panoramic using Photoshop Elements.
One of the most exciting things I've explored recently is HDR (high dynamic range) photography where 9 identical images are made at varying exposures and combined to create a single image with a much wider tonal range than is normally possible.
After nearly 20 years of making photographs, there's no doubt in my mind that right now is the best time to be a photographer.