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<\/p>\nClich\u00e9, to many photographers this is a dirty word.\u00a0 Photographs of Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View, the Tetons from Ox Bow Bend, the Watchman in Zion from the bridge, Delicate Arch \u2013 all are considered by many to be clich\u00e9s.<\/p>\n
What exactly is a clich\u00e9?\u00a0 Something that has lost its originality, ingenuity, impact from long overuse.\u00a0 In other words, it\u2019s been done before \u2013 and many times.\u00a0 Some have gone so far as to suggest that there are no photographs left in Yosemite Valley that are not clich\u00e9s.<\/p>\n
Not all of us agree.<\/p>\n
I denied myself the pleasure of doing the sunset shoot of the Watchman in Zion from the bridge for many years because I saw the photographers elbow to elbow, tripod leg to tripod leg and thought it was to trite, to common.\u00a0 In fact there\u2019s a photograph of the bridge scene in the Zion administrative building that makes just that comment \u2013 about so called \u2018creativity.\u2019<\/p>\n
But a couple of years ago I relented and shot it and I\u2019m glad I did.\u00a0 For one thing, there\u2019s a wonderful camaraderie there amongst photographers of all skill levels and from all over the world.\u00a0 But even more importantly we\u2019re out there doing what we love to do \u2013 photographing a beautiful sunset in an exquisite location.<\/p>\n
But apart from the experience, are all the popular photographs now clich\u00e9s?\u00a0 Well, if taking the same shot again and again by hundreds and thousands of photographers constitutes a clich\u00e9 then that begs a parallel question.<\/p>\n
Why do conductors still record Tchaikovsky symphonies.\u00a0 These are some of the best loved, most recorded symphonies in the classical repertoire.\u00a0 So aren\u2019t all new recordings clich\u00e9s because they\u2019ve been done so many times before?<\/p>\n
But we know the answer to this question already.\u00a0 They are not clich\u00e9s because the conductor applies his own interpretation to work.\u00a0 Each of the major conductors delivers a totally different experience because not only does the personality of the composer come through but so does that of the conductor.\u00a0 And the orchestra.<\/p>\n
As photographers we have the opportunity to apply our own interpretations to our images, interpretations that are original, individual and personal.\u00a0 We can stand elbow to elbow, tripod leg to tripod leg with other photographers all sharing the same experience and still produce an original work of art.<\/p>\n
We do that by developing a rich creative vocabulary with which we express ourselves through our photography.\u00a0 And with that creative vocabulary we each share with our audience our personal view of the world.<\/p>\n
I\u2019d like to think that the photograph that came out of that session on the bridge in Zion with, oh, probably 20 to 25 other photographers is unlike anything that any of them produced.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because it says what I wanted it to say.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
So, are there clich\u00e9 photographs?\u00a0 There don\u2019t have to be.<\/p>\n
Join me on an upcoming workshop.<\/a><\/p>\n To see more of my photographs click here.<\/a><\/p>\n (738)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Clich\u00e9, to many photographers this is a dirty word.\u00a0 Photographs of Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View, the Tetons from Ox Bow Bend, the Watchman in Zion from the bridge, Delicate Arch \u2013 all are considered by many to be clich\u00e9s. What exactly is a clich\u00e9?\u00a0 Something that has lost its originality, ingenuity, impact from long … Continue reading “Cliché”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[120,25,13,93],"class_list":["post-1350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journal","tag-creative-vocabulary","tag-fine-art","tag-photography","tag-workshop"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s9Nl7-clich","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1350"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3997,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1350\/revisions\/3997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}