PixelatedImage Blog

Having made a commitment to myself to take one portfolio trip each year I spent nearly three weeks in India this January. India is an astonishingly big place that necessitates a very selective itinerary so for this first trip i decided on Jodhpur, the famed Blue City in Rajasthan and Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges in Uttar Pradesh. Because they were en route I also added Agra, home of the Taj Mahal and Old Delhi. India was, in every way, a surprise and the results of my trip were, for me equally surprising. I came home with images I never imagined, having re-learned an important lesson about expectations and the art of seeing.

It is said that we “see what we want to see” and having spent 12 years in a former career as a magician and comedian, I can tell you this is more true than we like to think. Where this is relevant to photographers is that before we can truly shoot a place from our own unique perspective and vision we must first find that unique perspective; a task made more difficult when we refuse to relinquish our expectations. A couple of examples may, perhaps, make this clearer.

I arrived in Agra with one goal – to shoot the Taj at sunrise and sunset, and to get out of there as quickly as I could on the night train to Varanasi. All within about 12 hours. Having never been to the Taj I find it strange, in retrospect, to think that I had expectations at all, but lingering in the back of my mind were all the images I’d ever seen of the world’s most photographed building. So on arrival I shot the same images – Taj reflected in every pool I could find. But I wasn’t SEEING the Taj. How could I? I was essentially telling the Taj what to be, how to look, and didn’t give it a chance to show me what it was to me.

It’s a little like the difference between shooting a generic model for a product shoot and shooting a portrait. A model is what you want him or her to be and the photographer shoots image OF the person. A portrait, I forget where I read this recently, is an image ABOUT the person. The difference is huge when your goal is to reveal the spirit of a place and not just its pretty face.

In the end my favourite images of the Taj came when I stepped back a little, and just wandered – not looking for the perfect image, trying to conjure it out of marble and sunlight, but seeing and listening and finally shooting scenes I felt strongly about. My favourite image of the Taj is of a man, silhouetted, sweeping the floor of the mosque at the Taj, with the Taj playing a background role. This is the image that most resonates with me – most says to me of the Taj, “this is what I am.” It’s personal, and I think that makes it, technical issues aside, a good image.

I could never have shot that image had I spent my time chasing the postcard shots on a list. I had to slow down, recognize that I was looking but not seeing, and let my heart get involved with the process. Not only did I eventually leave with stronger images, but I truly experienced the place, something you don’t always do with a camera stuck on your face.

The week I spent in Varanasi is another good example. I arrived in Varanasi with a lifetime of images from National Geographic and travel documentaries mulling around in my brain. I knew exactly what I wanted to shoot and then I got there and the city overwhelmed me, was more than I had imagined it would be and I realized quickly I had no idea how to shoot it. It took me a couple days before I felt I could truly “see” the city, or a portion of the city. I thought Varanasi would be bright saris and crazy sadhus, lots of colours and characters. In the end I came home with a series of split toned images that were more about the river and the relationship of the people that lived and worked on the banks. Sure I came home with the other pictures too, but the ones that most clearly speak what I feel about Varanasi are the ones in this series.

Travel photography at its heart is about capturing your vision, thoughts, feelings, about the spirit of a place. Before you can tell those things to others in a truthful, compelling way, you must first take the time to feel something true and compelling about a place and you can’t do that thinking about how to force a scene into your viewfinder or comply with the rule of thirds. You have to slow down. You have to listen, hear, touch; engage all your senses. You have to get out of the car, train, rickshaw, and walk. And you have to walk the same paths every day, meet some people, drink some chai, until you come to see a place through your own eyes, feel something about it strongly enough that your photographs “speak what you feel, and not what you ought to say” to quote Shakespeare (King Lear).
Practically, how do you do this?

1. Spend time. Your primary photographic tools are first your eyes, and your heart, and you can’t engage these fully shooting from a car or a rickshaw as you speed by. Plan itineraries that allow you to spend more time in fewer places. If you are after stronger images rather than just many images, then you’re better off seeing fewer places in deeper ways. Cut your itinerary in half and spend twice as much time there.

2. Be open to surprises. Wander until you’re lost, then find your way home – you’ll find the spirit of a place more readily when you are off the beaten path and far from the tourist trail. The spirit of a place is rarely found in the forts and monuments but in the temples and alleys and homes.

3. Be prepared. Because I anticipated shooting mostly portraits I nearly left my 17-40/4.0L lens at home. That would have been a mistake and would have prevented me from shooting a full half of the images that made my final selects from this trip. My expectations told me portraits, but the places themselves whispered otherwise. I could not have shot the images I did if I had come without that favourite lens. Same with my tripod. I almost didn’t bring it, but having it on my back meant images I couldn’t have shot otherwise.

4. Be present. You can’t shoot if you aren’t there, and in much of the world the action happens in back alleys, markets, and out-of-the-way places at hours most travellers would prefer to be asleep. Get up with the sun and get out there – your images will be stronger both in terms of what you capture and the light in which you capture it. When I travel I shoot between 5 and 10am, spend the midday hours researching, eating, resting, and downloading files, and 4 and 9pm shooting again – depending on the time of year. Beautiful images require beautiful light and the easiest way to get that is catch it when it’s low and soft.

About the Author

After shooting for twenty years and spending twelve of those as a professional comedian, David duChemin turned back to his first love – photography. An impassioned travel and humanitarian photographer, David has shot on five continents for assignments and projects covering places as diverse as Paris, Haiti, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo, and India.