Moonrise & Aurora

Moonrise & Aurora

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up vote 14 down vote favorite
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Possible Duplicate:
Which photographer do you find inspirational?

I am curious to see what draws your inspiration into this field. One photograph per answer.

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sorry, I forgot to mark this CW after noting that in my comment. I am merely curious to see what photographs people store as their inspiration. – CodeToGlory Aug 9 '10 at 1:20
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I think it's an interesting question. We did talk on meta about the value of keeping the artistic side of photography in mind and not getting swamped in the technical parts, and this question seems to me very appropriate in that regard. – Reid Aug 9 '10 at 2:22
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I agree with Reid. It is far too easy for a site such as this to forget that photography is also an art. Frankly, if it does, I, for one, would soon lose interest. I'll let DP Review stand as an example of a site that has been smart enough to ensure that the artistic isn't lost in the technical. Frankly, I'd love to see some photo challenge threads here. – John Cavan♦ Aug 9 '10 at 2:41
I totally agree as well. I think this is a great idea. I just thought I would post a warning so that if the thread was closed for any reason, it wouldn't be too surprising. ;) – jrista♦ Aug 9 '10 at 5:09

marked as duplicate by PearsonArtPhoto, Jeff Atwood♦ Feb 20 '11 at 0:31

This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question.

10 Answers

up vote 12 down vote

Virtually impossible to pick a favorite-of-favorites, but City of Shadows, a series of long-exposure shots of St Petersburg, by Alexey Titarenko always comes to mind, this shot in particular:

City of Shadows

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up vote 6 down vote

Michael Kenna is my most admired photographer. "Six Sticks" is my most favorite photo from his work.

alt text

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That is a remarkably stunning image. – John Cavan♦ Aug 9 '10 at 3:10
Beautiful image. – fmark Feb 11 '11 at 5:44
up vote 3 down vote

Freckles II

This photograph is from an incredibly talented artist who has a meticulous talent for macro shots. His work inspired me to start taking my own insect macro shots, as I never knew about the amazing detail and complexity of such tiny creatures until I found Dalantech's work.

Freckles II

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up vote 3 down vote

There are way too many. I love Annie Leibovitz's work, this one sticks out a bit cause of the story behind it. It was created the same day John Lennon was shot.

alt text

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up vote 3 down vote

The most inspirational photo?

Kevin Carter's Pulitzer prize winner. The link bellow is from a blog of someone where I found the picture: See here for the photo's history.

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(One of) the best photographers? James Nachtwey.

For example:

alt text alt text alt text

HTH

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Kevin Carter's obituary in Time is worth reading not just for the story of his iconic photograph, but also for the toll the work took on him. time.com/time/printout/0,8816,981431,00.html – ex-ms Aug 10 '10 at 8:47
up vote 3 down vote

Silently Sleeping

I recently discovered John Parminter's work on 1x.com. His work is an exquisite combination of lighting, composition, and majestic beauty. His work is very earthy in tone, but always clear and sharp, uniquely composed, and fantastically lit. His work recently inspired me to entirely re-evaluate my approach to landscape photography.

(The image host forbids external linking, you'll need to click the title above to view the image.)

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The image appears to be broken. – Evan Krall Jan 6 '11 at 4:40
The host disallows external linking such as this. editing entry to reflect that. (once you've seen it your browser has it cached, so jrista wouldn't have been able to tell that his link was broken.) – cabbey Feb 11 '11 at 7:36
up vote 1 down vote

This image is:

alt text

Why? Because it was the image that sparked me back into photography in a big way. Once you get the "shot" you want it again and again and this shot I took was the one that did it for me. I haven't looked back and even now I still really like it.

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up vote 1 down vote

Hard question to answer, but I guess the only photo that I have bought and stuck up on a wall is by Philip Plisson:

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(Incidentally, his warehouse burned down in September, together which many of his photos, apparently.)

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I've seen this print hung on a few walls. Its such a great photo. Very sad that it seems to have burned...what a loss. – jrista♦ Jan 6 '11 at 8:24
up vote 1 down vote

It's not one image that inspires me most, it's the depth and breadth of variety that folks shoot. One of my favorit ways to see that, and get inspired is to look at the popular pages over at SmugMug: http://www.smugmug.com/popular/ and Flickr's "interesting 7 days" page: http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/

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up vote 1 down vote

Tracey Moffatt, Useless, 1974, Photolithograph, 80.0 x 60.0cm.

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