On Photographing Punk Musicians – Part 5

Recently, I published my latest zine, How To Photograph Punk Musicians In 5 Easy Steps. This newsletter contains the final chapter of that zine, with previous ones still available on terror.management. If you like it, please consider buying a physical copy at store.terror.management.

I also have copies left of my earlier zine, Terror Management, containing edited versions of essays previously published through this newsletter. Foreword by Greg Bennick (Trial, Between Earth and Sky, Bystander). Thank you.

Chapter 5: Touch Grass

Take a picture of a tree once in a while.

A cool building.

Maybe get up early one day and shoot a sunrise.

What constitutes a "good" photo is different in every discipline – even leaving the concept of taste out of this equation – so walking around a forest trying to find something worth capturing versus walking around a city versus taking portrait photos versus taking pictures of live music… It’s all completely different worlds within the microcosmos of photography.

This is obvious, of course. What might be less obvious, however, is how useful these different viewpoints can be. Referring back to getting stuck in a rut and getting lazy, back in chapter four – this is how you get out of that.

Again: it’s all just shapes and shades.

While more static than a mad person flying around on stage, the image you capture of a tree is no less truth than that of the musician. Or more truth, for that matter. If anything, it will help one appreciate different types of shape and shade.

For a photographer, the world around is a palette. The lovely thing about this entire endeavor is that it lets us luxuriate in the vast possibilities of art all around us, just ready to be captured. All we need to do is add our fun little photographic ingredients: composition, shutter speed, ISO, aperture…

Stepping out of one’s comfort zone is, I would argue, a great way to get unmoored from a silly, fixed, self-imposed identity. People know artists by their work, and usually by their most well-known work. But what a joy it is to not have to view oneself through such a limiting lens! Not merely a concert photographer, but also a street photographer! A portrait photographer! A landscape photographer! Perhaps not a photographer at all!

Perhaps this can be one small step on the road to detaching one’s ego and self worth from a set of actions.

Perhaps.

But in the mean time, go photograph a tree.