What Makes a Photo Art. Also, Whimsical Magical Enchanted Fairy Gardens, Emotion, and Such...

I'm part of a local photography club here in Billings, MT. Every month we have projects and contests, and a local photographer judges these contests. The latest contest is entitled, Whimsical Montana. When I think of whimsical, I immediately think of two things...fairies, and toadstools...or mushrooms...Is there a difference? So I did some searching and found these three mushrooms in the grass. (Click the button below to see the photo.)

So this brings me to the point. There is a difference between journalistic photography and fine art photography. Personally, I would consider myself a fine art photographer. Journalistic photography is basically taking pictures of things as they are; conveying facts through a photo. Fine art photography adds some different elements. It focuses more on aesthetics. In fine art photography you are allowed to step out of the box and create a mood, feeling, thought, emotion, and impact using whatever means necessary. You can add or subtract elements to the photo, play with color, texture, angles, lighting, and all sorts of other things to turn the photo into art. Had I just taken a picture of these three mushrooms, it would have been ok...just ok...a picture of some mushrooms. But the photo wouldn't really say anything or evoke much emotion. By doing things like turning this into hdr to create dramatic lighting, adding sun flare, and yes, a ladybug (He wasn't really there. I think you can kinda tell but in this particular image for some reason I actually like that his isn't "real". For me it adds to the whimsey.), I have effectively created art out of this photo. The viewer is drawn in and a sense of peace, happiness, and imagination kind of happens. I have found one of the best ways to instill emotion into a photo is to go out and shoot while you are feeling kind of...emotional...Happy, sad, lonely, excited, whatever. Use symbolism in your photos to convey these feelings. In this photo I used the sun flare and the ladybug to add some more happiness and warmth to the photo. I thought about adding a fairy to make this more of a magical fairy garden, but that isn't really where I wanted to go with this. I wanted it to look just a bit more realistic. I did however, do another one with a fairy. Below is the link to that one you can paste into your browser. Happy shooting!
http://2-wendy-thompson.artistwebsites.com/featured/whimsical-enchanted-garden-of-muchroomsand-a-fairy-wendy-thompson.html

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