John Gilbey
Myriad decisions are involved in the act of taking a photo – do you take it or leave it?
Which is more memorable, the photograph you take or the one you don’t? If that sounds a bit strange, just bear with me for a moment. When you capture an image there is often the hope that, by hitting the shutter release at exactly the right critical moment, you will be joining the fellowship of the classic photographers and giving another timeless artwork to the world.
But what about the masterpieces you don’t take? I don’t mean the ones we miss, trying to juggle lens/shutter speed/ aperture/ISO/focus combinations instead of being ready when the picture presents itself – we all have a raft of those tragic ‘ fish that got away’ stories. I mean the images that we see form in the viewfinder and choose not to capture.
Maybe an example will help. A couple of years ago, I was on the train from Denver to San Francisco – a 34-hour journey that carries you through the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, across the badlands of Utah, the deserts of Nevada and the Sierra Nevada of California. It was a reconnaissance trip for a bigger project, and I was concentrating on the amazing, diverse and magnificent landscapes as they rolled by – but around me, my fellow passengers were an equally engaging bunch who could have formed a great project in their own right. Washed- out gamblers heading for Reno, earnest young men who would alight at Salt Lake City and simply dressed, deeply religious families travelling to northern California.
Through the Rockies, the track clings close alongside the wild, fast Colorado River and cheerful hordes of young people were riding rafts downstream as we came past. Many waved, but one group stood up, turned away from the train then collectively dropped their shorts and mooned us. I’d been taking pictures of the rafts, the camera was to my eye, my finger was on the release and the image was focused – but although it would have made a hugely striking shot I didn’t take the picture.
Why? Well, surrounded by young families and God-fearing traditional folk I was worried what they would think. I’d be on the train with some of them for another 30 hours – and I didn’t want to come over as debauched, salacious or just weird. It was clearly a concern shared by the train conductor, who immediately apologised on behalf of Amtrak: ‘Sorry folks, I guess you now know why we call this stretch “Moon River”...’ My moral stance was slightly undermined when the elderly patriarch of the four- generation family nearby leaned around the seat and said, ‘Did you get any good ones?’
I shook my head, and there followed a long, rambling conversation about families, travels and farming while the landscape of Colorado became increasingly coloured by the afternoon sun. I never asked his name and I didn’t ask to take his picture; somehow it would have spoiled the moment. I have several thousand pictures of the landscapes from that trip – but the mental images of my companions are just as real. Sometimes, that is enough.