Chapter 1 Response

I thought that the chapter was somewhat hard to read. There was a lot of information given. However the two parts of the chapter that interested me the most were the part discussing Susan Sontag relating the power of a photographer to that of someone in the military with a gun, and the part relating photographers to writers.

I myself think that Sontag had a point in saying that the camera is like a gun in terms of wielding power when it comes to documentation but less when it comes to art. I feel this way because the camera can document things people may not want seen and therefore has immense power through possibly exposing the intricacies and private parts of life that people do not want seen. I also think it has the power to let the photographer show a reality in a way that may not be true but seems true because the photograph is so real. A photo can crop something out and create a completely different shot. However I do not think we can compare artistic photographs to that of a gun because the power is internal. The photographer holds the power of persuasion but it is not a forceful power instead it is a much more subdues suggestive power.

As for the part about photographers being like writers I completely agree. I have even been told to try writing the stories and scenes I want to show before I do shoots. I love the idea of thinking of the clues and codes that photographers use to portray what they want to get across. In some ways photography is easier to use to portray realities and explain situations however sometimes it can be far more complicated because writers can write down what they want and photographers have to rely on codes.