Just looked at Lynn Mohamad's photos in the photo gallery. The first five are especially spectacular.

No Joke! I'd love to know what kind of camera you were using and if you are a pro or just a gifted photographer. Stunning!

I was looking at them too. Beautiful photos! Makes me miss TB, but only 3 months until I return.

As a someone who studied photography and is a photographer (a good amateur, definitely not a professional) I suggest you don't ask about the type of camera equipment someone uses--unless you know them and it's face-to-face.

Here's the reason. Yes, some cameras and lenses enable you to do some things others don't. However, the big difference is the photographer, not the camera. I have a friend who's shooting professional photos with his iPhone. I have shot some of the pictures of which I am most proud on a $20 camera.

I know when asking about camera equipment, people are not trying to be slightly insulting. At the same time, they would never dream of walking up to a portrait painter and ask which brand of paint he used--as if that were the reason a painting was so good. Think about that. Please.

Guess that'll teach me to keep my well intentioned comments to myself!

No disrespect to you Ms Kennedy, but I have seen comments similar to yours before on this site, and I have never been able to understand them. Perhaps I'm simply unsophisticated about this sort of thing but yes, I would ask this type of question. I would ask writers and poets about their writing style; I would ask musicians about their instrument; I would ask fashion designers about types of fabric, and so on. Why is it such a touchy subject to ask a photographer a similar question?

Dear Wow,

I believe the message addressed to you was also well intentioned. I am a professional photographer and agree with Mrs. Kennedy. The question you asked was absolutely innocent. The problem is that we photographers hear it all the time, and we feel it diminishes the value of our talent.

I do not know how she could have answered you more kindly. She could have ignored your comment, but then it wouldn't have provided a learning experience for all readers. My guess others thought the same question you asked. You are not alone and you should not feel insulted.

Sincerely,
Marcus

The footsteps in photo no. 5 are interesting. How do you so that?

Those are great photos Lynn! Thank you so much for sharing. I especially loved #2 and #5.

Wow, you asked nor said anything wrong. Please do not recluse because of a comment by those who overthink

Some of you are awfully touchy. The type of camera you use may make better quality pictures but a better camera does not aide in composition. That comes from experience only. Provide help with the type of photo equipment, it will not make a better photographer.

Puzzled, Miss Kennedy's response must have been unclear. Granted you would ask a writer about their STYLE, but you would not ask if they used a pen or a pencil or a MAC or a PC. Those are TOOLS. The style has to do with talent and a unique way of seeing and expressing things. There IS a difference.

No one needs to apologize for anything in this string. It is all provided as compliments and a bit of perspective. The point is Miss Mohamad's photos show wonderful talent regardless of the TOOLS she used.

No wonder hardly anybody writes anything on this site anymore!

Yes saddened. This kind of mean-spiritedness though veiled not as mean spiritedness despite the compliment being paid keeps me from posting frequently.

As a photographer of over 25 years I wanted to big up the photographer by using the name WOW, by
completely agreeing with the spectacularness of the shots that Ms.Kennedy invited on a DISCUSSION forum for others to see.

I would never be insulted if someone asked what type of camera I used for a shot.

I only asked because I am soon to upgrade and when I see great image quality I'd like to know the TOOL utilized, well aware that the best of cameras in unskilled hands will not result in a great shot.

Why do you think tutorials, how to books and the like go into such detail as camera used, F-Stops, filters etc? Personally I wondered if there was a certain setting or filter combined with a great camera and obvious skill and talent.

Glad others felt the slight. Sometimes we should not write or say the first thing that comes to mind, especially online where messages are not always clear. I will end this the way Ms.Kennedy ended her post, and beg her to do the same. " Think about that. Please. "

What about the footprints in #5?

And stop the squabbling!

tools/talent, you are right in that I would not ask if a writer used ink or lead because, apart from the fact that the medium would be obvious to me, it would be irrelevant. Context does matter however, so yes I would ask an ARTIST about a particular medium. I think of a photographer as an artist so I would certainly ask about his or her TOOLS. Last time I checked, a camera is a tool, just like a chisel in the hands of a skilled sculpter.

Wow has it right. Read his/her penultimate paragraph above and you will get the gist of the original question posed.

I mean no disrespect to anyone, it's just that I can't seem to understand why asking someone what type of camera they use should be shrouded in such technicality. Seems I would get more of an answer from a masonic lodge than I get on this topic.

By the way, the pictures are oustanding! What camera did you say you used again?

Wow Lynn --great photos!! I especially liked the one of the Buttonwood tree. I rented Herron's Reef for my honeymoon and that picture took me right back there. Thanks for sharing, you made my day.

{edited by TBNet} Do not cause a seen over something as simple as the picture of someone putting such a beautiful photo for us all to admire.

No reason for the negative postings.

JUST LOOK AND ENJOY.

For drawing - that's graphite, not lead...

Graphite, Lead, felt tip pen whatever it is still drawing and art!

Lynn Mohamad…After the storm clears, follow a Rainbow. In this case, wouldn't it be exhilarating to tune in to more of those sunset/travel images that Lynn shared with us.

If you take a trek through Lynn’s Flikr Photostream site, you’ll notice a photographer who relishes the adventure and raw discovery of travel, treating her images to systematic documentation.
The fact that Lynn describes her profession as a psychiatric nurse adds some depth to her insights of what content and emotion she may wish to evoke.

By the way, for the curious, Lynn has described, on her Flickr site, that she uses a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XT. (marketed at about US$200)

Enjoy Lynn Mohamad’s Flickr Photostream (Including her Treasure Beach Set)
www.flickr.com/photos/lynnmohd

Photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited, and the wealth and confusion man has created. It is a major force in explaining man to man.
Edward Steichen

Not wanting to impose too much unrequested burden on Lynn’s photographs, but it could be contended that her classification of “sunsets” in various landscapes, before the sun goes down, anticipating a bright new tomorrow are optimistic gestures.
The care that she takes in seeking out vantage points, and shaping (crops) her finished frames the way a painter selects dimensions of a canvas, shows a studied creative selectivity over her compositions...while valuing beauty and the tokens of preservation.

We don't arrive at "clicking" a photograph without some inherent sensibility or point of view, and the wonder of the instantaneousness of photography, which is not staged, is how much more detail of life's choreography we can seize than the eye can see at that moment.
Patience, in anticipation of a confluence of something expressive of a pertinent time-space-light-shadow construct and presenting that experience in a meaningful way, seems relevant to this posting.

We arrive at a scene with art, music, history, literature (poetry), empathy streaming through our being, and a good photograph ought to plumb some of those sources.

We are reminded of what the working photographer, Elliott Erwitt, had to say about seeing through the act of capturing an Image:
"To me, photography is an art of observation. It's about finding something interesting in an ordinary place... I've found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them."

And as far as investing yourself in your adventures, discoveries, and creative development, as Lynn Mohamad, has shown...
“No Vision and you perish; No Ideal, and you are lost; Your heart must ever cherish some Faith at any cost. Some Hope, some Dream to cling to; some Rainbow in the sky; some Melody to sing to; some Service that is high.”
-Harriet Du Autermont

To Lynn Mohamad...Recommended: A Magnum Agency Street-Photographer, Alex Webb, Who Has Covered the Caribbean Region & Other Locales Where Colour Sings:
www.magnumphotos.com/C.aspx?VP3=CMS3&VF=MAGO31_10_VForm&ERID=24KL53Y_H


“The true harvest of my life is intangible-a little stardust caught, a portion of the rainbow I have clutched.”—Henry David Thoreau