Over the past couple of years I’ve been more than pleased, thrilled even, with the praise I’ve gotten from a wide range of people — friends, colleagues, family, readers, etc. — for my photography.

Often times, the individual photos that are praised are the well composed shots. By that, I mean, generally, there was conscious effort on my part, some creative thinking, or just making sure all the factors aligned properly. I love it that such pictures, pictures I’ve taken care or effort in creating get praise.

But there is another kind of picture I like to make that rarely seems to get much feedback. Maybe I overvalue these photos, or maybe people just don’t know what to make of them. Perhaps, I think, the “art” I see in them is more subtle than today’s “glance at the web” culture misses. And I don’t mean that to be as pretentious as it sounds. I’m just really wondering if people see what I see, or if it’s just missed, or if it’s not there in the first place and I’m just delusional.

The shots I’m thinking about are what I think of as finding order in chaos. The situation is fast moving, there are multiple elements that are out of sync, but as the photographer, I sense there is something here — if I keep peeping through the view finder, perhaps I’ll spot some order and make a picture at the right time, or with a continues shutter fluttering, perhaps a pattern will emerge after I import the photos into Lightroom. In all of these shots, there’s a bit of what I recognize in the view finder as a possibility and a happy accident.

Take the photo above. It was taken, of all places, in a photography studio. When I lifted my camera, I just sensed an order of people I wanted to capture, but as soon as I lifted my camera, the two people in front struck a pose. Still, as I clicked, I felt good there was a possible composition in the frame and not just chaos. When I chimped (looked at my LCD screen) I could see I had horrible blownout areas (over exposure) in the frame. So I dialed down my flash and snapped again — fearing, even knowing, the composition was falling apart — but I had over exposed areas again. I took several more pictures, seven total, each stopping down more and more trying to rescue the situation. Later, I would figured out that in this photography studio where the action was taking place, my flash was triggering the strobe in the light box to my left. But here’s the happy accident: My instincts about the composition of the first picture were right. The composition isn’t perfect, but the people do make an attractive pattern, and the overexposed areas actually — to me at least — help the composition.

Above, however, is a case where I have no idea what I’ve snapped until I’m working in Lightroom. This photo was taken just six or seven hours ago, and what got me thinking a little more on this topic. This is not a good sports photo. The real action is the two players back of frame — one carrying a ball and one about to make an unsuccessful tackle. To please a sports editor, this picture should tell more of a story, but the actual story of the shot is confused. The kid carrying the ball is about to score, but the real action of the photo is one of his would-be blockers getting knocked on his ass while the guy who should have been blocked, and should NOW be involved in tackling the runner is moving away from the play. None of what happening in the frame, however, is important to me. I just like the symmetry of the shot. It feels more like street photography than sports photography.

Here’s a case of three men at a public event. I’m just trying to capture an interesting composition. The man in the middle is moving around a lot. The photo I have in my mind to try and capture — the three men in parallel profiles is being thwarted by his movement. I decide to go ahead and snap a couple of frames while he’s moving forward. What emerges is not a formal portrait, but rather something that has a feeling of action, spontaneity and still some symmetry.

Sometimes you just snap the shutter, and snap and snap and snap, and hope for the best. I took 20 frames of this kid throwing balls at the Elba dunking tank. This was the only one worth keeping. The lines aren’t obvious at all, but everything seems to line up so beautifully — it’s pure chaos, but a compositional whole, I think.

Here’s a case of what I got isn’t what I was after. When I snapped I was just interested in the kid on the horse. The chaos and symmetry comes from the other clear figures in the picture, most notably from the clown, who struck an inexplicable forlorn pose just as I clicked. These are actors of independent notions forming a compositional whole. A triangle is formed from boy on horse to clown to man on the right who is also looking down, giving the frame some unplanned symmetry.

Curves are great compositional devices. When I took this shot, I could see through the view finder that the lead singer struck a pose that could potentially give the photo great energy. It’s one of those rare cases where I knew instantly that chaos had been given order.  What I saw later was how the singer’s curve creates a yin to the guitar player’s yang as he stoops forward. Nobody has ever commented on this photo, but I always find something new in it every time I look at it.

This is a case of taking several frames of action hoping one shot will work. When I opened this frame up in Lightroom, I was immediately struck by the classic “newspaper wild art” feeling of the shot. I’m sure community newspapers across the country have run this same exact photo hundreds of times over the years, which is why I like it so much. But the emergence of lines forming a triangle in pretty much the final frame of the series is what turns a chaotic situation into symmetry.

So, I’m making no claim to great photography here, just expressing some thoughts on interesting compositions arising from fast moving situations and wondering if anybody else — especially accomplished photographers — see what I see.

As I mentioned previously, I was going to try a roll of Kodak BW400cn in my old Nikkormat.  This post is about the results.

Most of my shots are not worth sharing.  I spent a good 12 shots playing with stops and focus on nothing I intended to publish.  Some of my shots were over exposed.  Some of the shots were out of focus (pure manual focus here).

For the shots that were properly exposed, I’m sharing with you all but three of them.  Those three shots were failures in previsualization where what I imagined is not what I got, and what I got wasn’t very interesting.

Earlier today, I read an interesting post on five advantages of film, and I found myself agreeing with the key points (unfortunately I didn’t book mark the post and can’t find it now).  Here’s one an observation of advantage of digital: Greater dynamic range.

Compare the photo above with the one below (which I converted to BW for the purpose of comparison).

Regardless of the results, I feel like I’m getting what  I want out of my experiments in film photography — thinking through my shots, not relying on machine-gunning a shot, and not relying on the LCD screen to see if I got it right.  I do believe working in film more will make me a better photographer.

Below, the remainder of the shots from this roll I have to share.

The last roll of film I shot was probably in 1992, when I left the Daily Californian in El Cajon, Calif. After that, I put away my Nikkormat and I can’t remember touching a camera again until about 2002 when I got my first digital camera.

The Nikkormat is the camera you see in the header of this blog. My brother Don gave it to me in 1995, when I was co-publisher of The Beacon, covering Ocean Beach and Point Loma. Even with training from a local photographer, Pierce Harris (RIP), I wasn’t much more — I realize now — than a point-and-shot photographer. The one difference, my partner and I, Keith Finley, developed our own prints (and that was mostly Keith.

In 2005/06, I was a big advocate for every reporter carrying a point-and-shoot camera. I still think they should, but one thing I learned pretty quickly after taking over The Batavian — when you don’t have a well-armed staff photograph, there’s a lot of photos you simply can’t capture with a P&S. Try, for example, shooting sports with a Casio, or getting in close on that cop searching for a robbery suspect way down the railroad tracks.

There are some photography assignments that simply require a DSLR and glass sufficient to the task.

So when you’re the only cameraman, you better get yourself a good camera.

In the fall of 2009, I bought a Nikon D90.

It didn’t take long to learn that readers of The Batavian really loved my photos, especially landscapes of Genesee County, especially pictures of barns. To this day, I continue to get high praise from readers for the photos I publish on The Batavian.

With this encouragement, I’ve been fully immersing myself in working to become a better photographer — reading books, following photography blogs, shooting pictures every day. And I think I’ve gotten better.

All of this interest in photography eventually led to a purchase at an auction a few weeks ago of four old cameras, including a Pentax that is in really good shape (except the light meter doesn’t work and the cap won’t open on the batter compartment). Holding this camera in my hands gave me the itch to shoot some film, so I bought a role of 400 ISO BW negative film.

After the past few weeks, I shot off 24 exposures, starting with the mud races in East Pembroke. It was in the middle of this even that I realized I should use my digital camera as my light meter. I over exposed about seven frames before I started using this little trick.

Yesterday, I took the roll to CVS to be developed. About an hour later a clerk called back and said they couldn’t process BW film. I said I would pick up the roll later, but didn’t get back in until today. I was pleasantly surprised that the film had been developed. I was given my prints and a CD of my images. A kid there named Jeremy knew how to process it, and today, he figured out how — for future reference — to save my digital files as TIFF rather than JPEG (for better editing in PhotoShop).

So with that success — and a good deal of properly exposed shots — I plan on shooting more film.

And here’s the thing — I’m going back to the Nikkormat. For some reason, I was thinking it wouldn’t work any longer, but it seems to be working, including the light meter. The best part of the Nikkormat is the glass — a 28mm f3.5, a 55mm f1.2 and a 135mm f2.8. All three lens where top-end glass back in the day. I’ve got another roll of BW in the camera and if that comes out well, I’ll try color (I’ve NEVER shot color with the Nikkormat).

Below are the rest of the shots taken with the Pentax.

I’ve always been interested in photography, but when I had a good SLR I couldn’t afford much in the way of film or developing.  Then, when digital came along, I couldn’t afford, nor justify, anything but a point-and-shot camera.

In running The Batavian, I realized that with no photography staff, the "reporter armed with nothing more than a point-and-shot" just wouldn’t cut it.  There are some photo assignments that can only be handled by a quality SLR camera.

So I bought a Nikon D90.

This immediately led to an improvement in my photography, which led to a lot of positive reader feedback, which encouraged me even more to take photography more seriously.

I’m very pleased the the ongoing positive feedback I get from friends, family and readers for the pictures I’ve been taking.

I don’t know where a serious interest in photography will take me, but I keep pursuing it.

This has led me to set up a photoblog: VuFindr.com.