Photographer – this term seems to be highly controversial. I often read things like: “Everybody with a camera thinks he is a photographer“, or “Not everybody can be a photographer“. It made me thinking: what makes you a photographer?
Well, in fact the word just means a person who takes photographs, especially in a professional manner. Especially, not just. So can`t you be a photographer if you don`t do it professionally? I don`t know, but I think you can indeed. I`d say it is in some way comparable to music: give two musicians a peace to play, they will always play it in a different way. Give two people, one professional photographer and one “random guy with a cam” a scene and ask them to shoot – while the professional may takes more care about the details of composition, light, arrangement and these things, the non professional just shoots and tries to capture what he thinks is just nice. Both will have good pictures in the end, but they won`t be identical. And maybe they don`t even like the pictures from each other, but some people like the random shoot more while others desire more set pictures.
Whoever likes your pictures, for them you are the photographer. The professional kind, who captures a unique moment or a scene in a way nobody else could in this moment. So whoever says “Everybody with a cam feels like one” – Yes, in a way they are. Maybe not to make money, but to share moments and stories in a unique way. So if you have a cam, you have fun and enjoy taking pics – you are the photographer.
