Ryan Dorgan | April 13, 2011
 |
| Photo by Ryan Dorgan |
| Photojournalist Bryan Moss advocates building a relationship with subjects and trying to get in the "zone" to capture great shots. He spoke to photojournalism students Monday. |
Related |
Moss, whose work has taken him from his hometown of Corydon, Ind., to 13 newspapers across nine states, talked about that conviction Monday with students in adjunct lecturer Chris Howell’s and associate professor Jim Kelly’s photojournalism classes.
The first “push” may be establishing a comfortable relationship with your subject, something Moss said is perhaps the most important step in making great photographs.
“It should feel like you can come to their house and they can go do what they’re going to do and not care about what you do,” said Moss. “When you go to their house, they’re not offering to feed you dinner, iced tea, asking if you’re comfortable, if you want to play gin… When they just go ahead and do what they do, that’s the ultimate comfort.”
To demonstrate, Moss told the students to stand up and face one another. “And get close, really close,” he directed.
The students stared at each other almost nose-to-nose. Smiles and laughter. An almost uncomfortable laughter, but laughter nonetheless.
“Now you see? That is intimacy,” Moss said. “And that is what you’re ultimately after when you’re taking pictures.”
 |
| Photo by Ryan Dorgan |
| After working at newspapers around the nation, Moss now operates a website, LifeInCorydon.com, documenting that small Ohio River town. |
“I value pictures of ordinary people doing ordinary things,” Moss said. “We live these lives, and somebody needs to record them.”
With roughly 12,000 unique visitors per month, LifeInCorydon.com is recording those lives. But Moss said even photojournalists with great people skills fall victim to perhaps the greatest challenge of all – convincing yourself of your work.
He told about a book he read on the mentality of the game of golf, and how the conscious brain, what he referred to a “little drill sergeant,” is constantly trying to correct and override the intuitive brain. The trick to being successful at whatever you do is learning to balance the two voices.
“This is the key to changing your pictures from being good to being great,” Moss said. “And the reason is that the good pictures are primarily being thought out and not felt. They are conscious-brain pictures and they can be OK — they can be good — but the really great pictures are intuitive.”
Moss shared some advice from associate professor Claude Cookman, whose latest publication, American Photojournalism: Motivations and Meanings, focuses not on the “how” of modern photojournalism but the “why.”
“Claude Cookman said last night at dinner, ‘You can’t think when you shoot.’ Good point,” said Moss.
Moss likened this intuition to what athletes call “the zone.”
“By letting intuition take over, athletes can reach an exalted state of being in which time slows down, the ball goes where it’s supposed to go, and when they’re all done, they may be hard-pressed to tell you individual details of what happened because they’re operating on a different level,” he explained.
His simple, to-the-point philosophies resonated with and even comforted students, who realize their post-undergraduate futures include a tough job hunt.
 |
| Photo by Ryan Dorgan |
| Student Chaz Mottinger, with Moss, said his enthusiasm made her "fall in love with photojournalism again. I really feel inspired." |
Howell, a photojournalist at the Herald-Times, appreciated Moss’ talk.
“He has an eloquent way of putting things. Sometimes they’re kind of gruff, sometimes they’re really to the point, but at the same time when you sit and think about it, it makes sense,” Howell said.
Moss’ final point was the simplest and most poignant of all. “The greatest advertising slogan ever created was…?” He paused and waited for an answer.
“’Just do it,’” he told the students. “You put the camera up to your eye and you press the button. You start.”
Questions? Comments? Email the Web editor.
