Effort versus results in landscape photography: The value of the process versus the final image

 

 

It's conventional wisdom that the more effort you put into something, the more you will get out of it. Is this always the case with photography in general and landscape photography in particular? Ben Horne recently released a new video, seen below, in which he discusses this topic.

There are times when a photographer works hard and spends a lot of time to capture a specific shot and the final result is not all that spectacular. In contrast, a person might luck their way into an easy excellent shot. Of course, the more you shoot, the more chance you have to get lucky, so that is absolutely a form of effort. Nonetheless, do viewers of an image necessarily care about process and the context of a shot or is it more about the final result?

In a way, it is something of a cycle because while people ultimately want to see great images and they don't necessarily care that you worked really hard to get the shot, the best way to get awesome images is to work very hard. Horne doesn't think people want to hear glorified tales of heroism from photographers about how they captured an image. It's more important that people feel a connection with an image, that you give yourself the best opportunity for capturing great images and that people feel confident that they themselves can go out and capture beautiful landscape images.

(Via Ben Horne)