Learning to take a picture

Some shots you just see. They present themselves, and you receive them. Others you have to learn how to take.

My college work often encompasses the latter modality. Especially in situations that I have been in frequently, I try hard to find a new photograph that I haven’t done before. It requires learning how to take a picture.

Barnard has a highly regarded dance program, and in my schedule was a modern dance class. It’s almost impossible to avoid taking an appealing photo in a dance class, and I did a bunch of those. But I also wanted something different and more engaging.

The choreography was a complex bundle of moves, and the group of dancers swarmed from one corner to another in a complicated, but repeating pattern. I started following them along the floor to try and uncover the structure of the movement, and to see where a photograph might occur. I was edging awfully close to the action though. "I feel I’m being a little intrusive," I said to the instructor. "Is this OK?" "Oh sure," she answered. "You can get in the middle. It’ll be good for them."

Now I had license to be a speedbump. I ran with the dancers, with a strobe, at a slow shutter speed, to see what would happen. I found lots of positions that looked awful—awkward, unflattering body postures, no coherence to the image. This wasn’t the repeating pattern of a contra dance line—I had to learn how this worked. I kept at it, until I found one place in the choreography that looked like it could be a photograph. There would be a body close to me at the right moment, and a mirror of another dancer or two behind her, but it kept that loose feeling of a workout. I found the outlines of the photograph, in a dynamic situation that repeated. With every new group I ran alongside, and fired at the same moment. I whacked away at it, knowing with most there would likely be some element out of place that would wreck it. Until I got lucky. One of these times, it would come together. It would just take 50 tries to get that one.

I had taught myself how to make a new photograph.