Camera

Disclaimer: I realize that this is somewhat short, but this is where I stopped. I can't seem to squeeze anything out for now. Hopefully this will suffice. In any case, as always, reactions, grievances, and violent reactions are appreciated.

The background shows a grayish lake. The ripples on the water show signs of the passing wind that was blowing that day. It makes the water look like wiggling gelatin. My niece would have liked that. The lake is bordered by grassy banks that were presumably manmade. On the far bank of the lake is small field with trees the mark out its boundaries. Some trees have already shed their leaves, while others still have them, clinging on to their branches. In the foreground is a bench. It occupies the right-half of the photograph. The bench’s edges jump out from the relative grayness of the grass on the ground. On the bench are two figures, one male and one female. They both have white baseball caps on. The woman’s medium length hair pops out of the space between the cap adjustor and the rest of the cap. She has her head turned to the right, as if saying something to her partner. I wonder what it was she said. I’m sure it’s better than what I can think of. The man has his left arm around her. They look content, though I really can’t see their faces. I felt happy when I took the photograph. Perhaps they were happy too. I didn’t ask. How could I? It’s not like I knew them. But that doesn’t really matter. The question I’m dying to answer is this: Why did I take this photograph?

I have a camera. So I take photographs. No, not your typical digital photographs but your archaic, black and white, printed from film, photographs. It’s a tedious task, developing film. There’s a long list of procedures that range from pouring chemicals to washing the film in a special water-flowing canister. It’s almost mundane, perhaps the only thing that keeps me going is the end result, a developed roll of film. The unfurled roll of film would have to spend sometime in a drying cabinet. The wait is almost unbearable, I’m always anxious to see what I was able to immortalize in film. However, enlarging and making prints from the developed film is just as tedious. Gauging how long the enlarger should expose the expensive photographic paper requires so much attention that one can spend a good half hour fiddling with test strips. Even then, there’s no guarantee you’d end up with a print worth keeping. Despite all of these, I keep coming back, even if my hands are dry from all the chemicals I touch, even if my eyes complain every time I move in and out of the dark room. It’s tedious, laborious, and at times frustrating, but I keep coming back, I keep taking photographs.

I realize that this doesn’t answer the question. It didn’t mean to, at least not yet.

Photography is a wonderful media for capturing memories. Family gatherings are never complete without somebody whipping out an old photo album while reminiscing about the good old days. But I rarely take that kind of photos, at least not with my film camera. It’s always been a little bit of an artsy relationship I have with my Nikon FM10. The good ones that come out are better suited in a gallery than in a family album (although I don’t think it should be in a gallery, it’s not good enough, it’s just the kind of photographs I take). Perhaps one may call it art. I call it therapy, but what do I know? In any case, if it is art then maybe the old saying “art imitates life” may be applicable in answering my query. But as I look at the “Bench” photograph, I think, there’s nothing in my life that the whole composition imitates. It is easier for me to conceive that I take photographs, especially the “Bench” kind of photographs, only because I can take such photographs.

However, there might be a whole different “imitation of life” aspect in this photograph. Sure, it’s not an imitation of my life, but who’s to say it can’t be an imitation of a life I want. At the risk of sounding voyeuristic, perhaps I vicariously live off from the photographs that I take. I re-examine the photograph and I find an eerie speck of sadness to the whole composition. Perhaps it’s because of its black and white nature. It’s very possible that the couple themselves were unhappy. Fact of the matter is, under the sweet undertones of a happy couple sitting in the park enjoying an afternoon off, is a tainted view on life.