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B+W
I
feel that we have reached
a turning point in the world
of mobile photography. I feel
that a monumental change
has come about and an
announcement needs to be
made. In order to discuss this
I have to take you back to
my childhood.
I am (sadly) quite old now,
in my mid-sixties and, when I
was a kid, my father was a
photographer in the Royal Navy.
He would never have claimed
that his professional life as a
photographer was in any way
creative, concentrating as it did
on such fascinating subjects as
rust damage on the propeller
shafts of submarines and
such like. He was never really
a hobby photographer in
his spare time until later in
his life when he embraced
photography again after training
for the priesthood. But his job
meant that I grew upsurrounded by cameras and
general photographic
paraphernalia. He shot mainly
on large-format plate cameras,
and occasionally on a Rollieflex
that he always described as
shooting ‘two and a quarter
square’ (meaning 120 film).
I must have been around eight
when a colleague of my father’s
(remembered fondly as he hadthe magnificent name of
Septimus Protheroe!) came over
to our house bearing a new
camera that the department had
been given to use. It was pored
over and discussed at length,
and I remember it because it
was the first camera I was ever
allowed to handle, Mr Protheroe
even letting me have a look
through the viewfinder. I’m notsure what model it was but my
father recalled it as a Contax. It
was a rangefinder camera, the
sort you held up to your eye to
see through rather that the
Rollie, which you looked down
into, or the cumbersome, whole
plate MPP cameras that
necessitated a tripod and a
darkcloth over the head. What
I remember is the wonderful feel
of it in my hands and gazing out
at the living room through it as
the two colleagues discussed it.B
ut as I cradled it in my
hands the word I
remember being bandied
about was ‘miniature’.
I remember discussions about
‘quality’. I remember the sneering
tone in my father’s voice when
talking about ‘professional’
photographers being expected
to use a ‘miniature’ and I
remember laughter...and not
nice family laughter.Tim Clinch looks back in time to discover how history repeats itself
and to claim the right of smartphone photography to be no longer
called by that name – it is, he says, simply photography.
SMART GUIDE TO PHOTOGRAPHYtimclinchphotography.com | @clinchpics | clinchpicsTECHNIQUEAll images
© Tim ClinchTHE PICTURES THIS MONTH
The pictures you see here were all shot on my phone and they
are photography, pure and simple, and I like them!INSTAGRAMMER OF THE MONTH
...is Miguel Flores-Vianna (@miguelfloresvianna). I have known of Miguel
for a long time as a competitor and colleague in the world of interiors
photography. He has recently published a book of beautiful photography
called A Wandering Eye subtitled Travels with my iPhone – and it is this
book which has inspired me to come to the conclusions I have in the main
text. Y ou see, Miguel’s book is full of very beautiful photographs taken
in beautiful locations, beautifully printed, designed and presented. The
point that they were taken on an iPhone is, to my mind, totally and utterly
immaterial. They would be beautiful whatever they were taken on. The
use of an iPhone makes no difference whatsoever to their merit.