Words and Wandering

After a lifetime in photography, I'm finding the greatest joy in sharing my images and words. This blog is the perfect vehicle to express that. I am surrounded by the most creative people in the world; some are my peers, others are part of a whole new generation of photographers and artists. I'm inspired by all of them.

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. Through words and pictures and idle ramblings, I hope we can make our way together through this odd and humbling life. We are all wanderers. We should take a few pictures along the way.

Dave Hutt has been a professional studio photographer and printer since the 1970's, and one of the early reps in the digital photography marketplace. He and Dr. Dave Carsten founded DMD Digital Dental Photography, and he lectures with groups and clinics throughout the U.S; he is the Photography Mentor of the COORS Dental Study Group in Vancouver, Washington.

He is, however, only an amateur wanderer.

Notes From The Edge

January 10, 2019

Magnolia blossom and pine needles 2016

Things are interesting on the edges. And I’m speaking photographically, it’s not that I’m living on the edge, mind you. This isn’t a testament to my sanity, such as it is. No, after a lifetime in photography - learning, teaching, making a living - I’m uniquely unqualified to speak in any terms other than visual. And visually, all the interesting things are on the edges.

Edges, of course, must mean there are centers, and there, I think, are where the uninteresting photos dwell. And you’ve seen them - that tree, that mountain, in broad daylight, no shadows, no mystery, no excitement. Even a brilliant sunset is usually a photo from the center. If it’s the color only, without context, the eye quickly grows tired of it and looks for other sources of entertainment. I want to see what that sunset is shining on. I want to find its edge.

It’s what I mean when I say I’m always looking for that perfect light: it’s fleeting and frustrating and subject to the vagaries of time and space. Its the yin and yang of light and shadow, where a landscape hides as much as it reveals, where the soft shading of a human face plays with our emotions, where the last moment of a setting sun is captured in the inky blackness of a watery foreground.

Lily pads 2014

Maybe I’m over-thinking it; I usually do. Maybe summer and winter are just center months, and I need to wait out my dulled senses for the edge months of spring and fall to come back around. That’s when the light is changing, the seasons are in flux, and our visual worlds get turned upside-down. It’s zen photography, and the zen of photography, and it occupies my head and heart.

I’ll just keep on wandering and looking, no matter what. In a former life I’d have said I’m fueled by coffee and dektol, but now I’m just fueled by coffee and, well, more coffee. But I know I’ll always find light that is good and interesting and edgy. On occasion it’ll even be perfect. Kurt Vonnegut said “Out on the edge you can see all the kinds of things you can’t see from the center.” So my advice is to take his, and stand as close to that edge, camera at the ready, as you can.

Try not to fall.