Documenting our Landscape

I often hear people comment when looking at my work something to the effect that “I took a photograph just like that once, only yours is better.” Now I don’t mean to brag or put on airs or puff out my chest but this remark, repeated often while exhibiting my images by would be art buyers, set me thinking…Just what is the difference between a photograph as art and a snapshot. Both are made with equipment designed to capture an image on either film or on a digital sensor, both require one to look through a viewfinder, frame an image, make a decision to release the shutter, and ultimately make a printed record of the image captured. Once printed the image is an artifact, a documentary record of that which once was. The equipment need not be fancy, expensive, or high tech. One of the finest images I own was made by a homemade pin-hole camera made from a round oatmeal carton. The only meaningful variable then can only be the photographer.