Blurred. And Yet It Works.

I curse this technology as much as I love it.

This Polaroid is blurred by camera shake. With my expensive Nikon, the photograph would probably have been technically perfect. I would have had more control and captured something very close to the image I had in mind.

But I chose Polaroid. And even looking at this photograph, I still believe it is the right choice for TWO WAYS OF BEING REAL.

That doesn’t mean I have to declare every blurred photograph a work of art. Sometimes I’m simply frustrated because an image hasn’t turned out the way I imagined. I didn’t intend to blur this photograph. It wasn’t a creative decision.

Still, I think it works.

The lights leave little trails, and the outlines soften. To me, the warm light and the blur give the image a painterly quality. I find myself paying less attention to individual details and more to the atmosphere. It isn’t the photograph I planned. But it is one that holds my attention.

This photograph won’t be part of the series. Yet dismissing it as a reject doesn’t feel right either. An image can sit outside a series and still deserve a place of its own.

Perhaps that is part of what draws me to Polaroid: I deliberately choose a medium whose quirks I don’t always welcome. And sometimes the very result that frustrates me at first is the one that surprises me.

Perhaps something else should come of this photograph.

What do you think—should I do more with this image? And what do you see in it?

pete john