Photographers' Perspective Triggers Attention
Story time:
When I was out taking photos with two other photographers, we stumbled upon this right-hand drive Mini Cooper. As people who pay closer attention to things around us than the average person, it is interesting to see just how much attention we drew to the car as everyone else passed by without noticing it, before we came. For over a year I've worked specifically taking photos and video of cool cars. See here. Coming across an obviously unique, imported car in SF is not the most common thing to happen, we had to act. We started taking photos of it, as the photographers we are. The funny part is people started noticing three people with cameras surrounding a car more-so than they noticed such a different car parked like it's no big deal. A few people pulled out phones to take a few photos, some people pointed, and other's just looked at us. It's interesting how people react. If a photographer noticeably starts taking photos of something, everyone suddenly feels like it is important. It is actually pretty fun to "prank people," by taking photos of something totally random and ordinary and see just how many people suddenly pay attention as if there is something really important there.
As visual storytellers, we control narrative. We help people see things they are not accustomed to noticing. Photographers, filmmakers, and other visual storytellers help society focus their attention. This is why social media, traditional media, etc has such an impact on people. We as storytellers have to be aware what we are doing and what images we are putting out into the world.
As the public, you have to understand that without media the way people were to see things would be really different. Until something is made to feel important by a camera on it, people tend to overlook many things. This kind of power can be used for the better of humanity or the worst. I would love to hear some peoples thoughts on how photos/videos/media may or may not effect your view of the world. Feel free to drop me a line.
