History is made of courses and appeals, human race shines for his lack of memory and tends naturally to repeat previously made mistakes …
Few days ago, with my great surprise, I came across an article by a great Italian photographer, who I also admire very much, arising against the upcoming usage of ultra high resolution video shoots in wedding reportage, allowing you to “extract” individual frames from any video stream, true high-quality photos, which could completely replace a traditional wedding photo shoot.
The article urged in having at least the decency not to call this photography, but as you can guess, my point of view is fundamentally different …
In the past I have witnessed stances, to defend a status quo or better, to defend what was known until then. The unknown is always the source of our worst nightmares, the unknown and fear are what holds us back and basically … fuck us…
The origin of species
Today I will not discuss about photography, I will reflect on the many ways in which any of us can live in freedom, our own existence. I think I can say without fear of contradiction, all of us are united by two constants: error and change. No one is immune to mistakes, no one has a life without changes. Now, you can pretend not to see changes, and we are also free to endlessly repeat our mistakes. But the day will come when the evolution of the species will win out, the day when someone ready to ride the change will surpass us, rising the bar and making us all of a sudden, unnecessary and outdated.
Over ten years ago, attending a Kodak event, the great Australian photographer Yervant, claimed that the photograph would shortly thereafter, became almost exclusively digital, relegating the film to a minor market. Yervant was seated in the wrong way by Kodak speakers, which of course at that time defended their dominant position in the film market. Yervant is still one of the most quoted wedding photographers worldwide, Kodak filed for bankruptcy.
From photographers to something different
Let’s go back to our topic of making wedding photography, taking single frames from the stream of an ultra high resolution video recording. Honestly, I do not feel today, neither ready nor prepared for such a step, but I can not be ruled out that this will be my way to work in ten years.
Maybe I will not call me a photographer, as today I don’t claim my picturse to be called photography or even, art photography. Hundreds of kids are coming out of our schools of photography and art, ready to get involved, to experiment, to evolve and suddenly to sweep away old dinosaurs, remained to defend a territory that does not really exist anymore.
How can we afford to say that in making videos, you can not do photography?
Have you ever seen a film by Paolo Sorrentino, with photography by Luca Bigazzi? (…and this is the first example of hundreds I could do…).
If a Luca Bigazzi would create a team of two / three videographers, to lead them in the film making of a wedding event, do you honestly think he would not be able to create a photo shoot, made of frames out from his video stream, able to leave anyone with his mouth open?
Only time will judge and from there on, from photographers who we are today, we will become something different, or we will be extinguished.
Maurizio Mannini
