Technician vs Artist

When you were in school, you were taught to use a specific structure to write a story: introduction, middle, and resolution.
And if you tried to use another structure, you’d end up with a bad grade.

But, if you are a reader, you know that great writers don’t always follow that specific structure.

This is the difference between a technician and an artist.

A technician follows rules whereas an artist is considered good because of their ability to create something different and unique. Of course, like a technician, an artist can use common structures -they cannot reinvent everything. But the more unique their work, the more of an artist they become.

Based on this, you now understand that there are a lot more technicians than artists. And as my experience as an artist taught me, it is much easier to make a living while following the mediocre technician path instead of doing art.

How This Applies to Photography

Most photographers are technicians

Photography is no different: the vast majority are technicians and very few are artists.

Because they have been educated to follow rules, most photographers will try to apply rules to secure a photograph instead of creating something original.

Technician-photographers teaching inefficient techniques

A problem unique to photography is the use of rules that have no scientific basis and don’t work.

Take, for example, the rule of thirds and golden ratio. It has been demonstrated multiple times that they are urban legends, but literally every youtube video about composition teaches them as rules you should absolutely know.

The worst thing about it is that I am convinced that those who teach you those dubious rules don’t take them seriously. But because it makes people click, they continue to keep these myths alive.

Forget these pseudo-rules, and learn the true principles of photography in the contact sheets.

Here is the previous post debunking those dubious rules:

Stop Using the Rule of Thirds and Golden Ratio

Practice photography as an artist

As stated earlier, an artist is considered an artist because they find their own way of telling a story. Thus, they cannot simply follow rules blindly. But that doesn’t mean they should have no education.

In practice, as an artist, I have to understand the deep principles of composition instead of relying on pre-made techniques. Knowing those deep principles, I can shape my images precisely.

Think of it like language. You can communicate by learning by heart a set of phrases. But if you want to formulate your own precise ideas, you need to learn grammar and gain vocabulary.

A technician knows a certain set of phrases, while an artist knows how to create their own sentences.

How to learn photography as an art

You may ask yourself, how you can acquire this grammar and vocabulary when YouTube tutorials only offer fixed phrases -and often useless phrases.

You can acquire this right here on ElectroCroissant with the contact sheet posts that I publish every two weeks. Starting from concrete examples -successful or failed photographs- I explain the artistic decisions and teach you about the principles (grammar and vocabulary) that will make you create your OWN photographs.