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Meet Photographer Joe Smith - part 3 of 1 2 3

by Mike McNamee Published 01/04/2010

At that time Joe had made his mind up that the tonal range of film could not be matched by digital technology - but now he takes it all back.

'Since I converted there is no looking back,' he admits. 'I still keep some film in the fridge but my darkroom has gone. I still have a neg scanner though and a processing tank. I consider myself fortunate to have gone through the pre-digital era. Now I use Photoshop but only in a very subtle way to improve the image. I believe that the building block of an image must be there at the shooting stage. Every image has its own personality, its own message and its own emotion.' Joe hasn't gained a sackful of awards and qualifications by taking 'all the usual' photographs expected of a portrait and fine art photographer.

'My nature is not to always go for the traditionally accepted shot. Where one photographer might plump for a short medium telephone lens for a certain shot, I might go for the fisheye lens instead.'

And he is a master of the application of design in a photograph. He says: 'You have to have a good design structure to the image - and that discipline for me came from my early art education. That training was always the mainstay in classical composition with great artists like Da Vinci and Raphael. With photography the more you shoot, the more you find that compositional decisions like where to place the main subject, thirds, etc come to you automatically. You end up doing it subconsciously because you have trained your eye to compose in an instant.'

Two years ago an iconic image of a village cobbler in Malta beat off stiff competition from thousands of entries from across Europe to win the overall prize in a special European Union photographic competition entitled, 'Cultures on my street.'

'I am extremely proud of that shot,' reveals Joe. 'I knew this cobbler and I had always wanted to take a picture that perfectly summed up his environment.'

Joe was one of 150 seminar speakers at our 2010 Convention - and now he's looking forward to next year's show.

'Phil and Juliet have done a masterful job in developing The Societies and their annual Convention,' he concludes. 'They are tireless in their desire to help all photographers improve the quality of their output. It is frankly impossible to turn up at these events and not learn new and useful things.'

http://www.smithjp.com

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1st Published 01/04/2010
last update 09/12/2022 14:56:38

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