P3D Re: PHOTO-3D digest 3635

[Rehotshots@xxxxxxx]

I would like to thank everyone for the help and information regarding 3D
that you have all been so kind to send and sincerely apologize for calling 
you all a bunch of arrogant snobs. You certainly are not that at all.  In 
fact, 
I have never met a more helpful and thoughtful group of people.

At the risk of repeating myself,  I have had to deal with my artists friends
telling me that photography was not a medium for art for the past 30 years 
and I have seen that gradually change in the past 15 yearsor so. I really 
found it shocking to hear, or perceive at least, other photographers 
denigrating conventional photography.  I realize now that I must have walked 
in on the middle of the conversation and took it all out of context. 

I certainly have enough information to try this out now and hope to do that 
with some of my photos of christmas lights.  And I plan to visit all of your 
sites.  I was happy to hear that Dr T, or George,  is trying to get a 
beginners guide on the list. I hope someone out there knows enough html
to put it up for us.  I know a little, but I don't have a windows 98 CD  and 
I need it to use my browser to build a page.  It's a long story.  I build my 
pages with a program that only uses limited text, I think.  

The beauty of photography is that it can be used in so many ways--to create 
art, or just to record something you see.  It can be factual or fanciful. I 
can no more imagine the world without photograpy than I can 
imagine the world without the light bulb or the telephone.  We can take 
people there more realisticly than any painter or sculptor and at least as 
imginatively.    

All people are creative.  That is our most basic quality -- creativity.  
That's 
what the spiritual writings allude to in saying that we are made in the image 
of God.  What else could it mean?   We  are  made in the image of the 
creator, therefore we are compelled to create.  I am not an overly religious 
person, certainly not a fanatic, but I do believe there is a creator 
and that creativity is our most basic instinct.  I also believe that when 
people don't have a creative outlet ,  if they have had a disfunctional life 
experience , they can easily become psychotic and psychopathic.  And 
look how perversely creative they are.  Even in sickness we are creative.  
Some think even more so.  My sister loves Stephen King.  Sometimes I wonder 
what kind of psychopath he might have been had he not developed 
his writing ability.  I think even he has expressed that thought.  Seems like 
I have heard him say that.  

I think about all these kids out here shooting their classmates and I wonder, 
"Why doesn't someone just give this kid a camera and a little attention."  If 
we don't acknowledge our emotions and give ourselves the 
right to feel them and express them creatively, we are either going to become 
very ill from surpressing them or become psychopaths in some cases.  So I say 
let's  not argue about what is art and what isn't, what is a medium for art 
and what isn't.  I know of a man who became very famous 
here in Memphis, Tn using garbage as a medium for art.  "Prince Mongo", 
he calls himself.  Quite an interesting character.  
     
We are a creative and intellectual species.  These are as much our 
characteristics as the fact that we walk upright and have a spine.  Some of 
us surpress these characteristics because we either surpress or fail to 
acknowledge our emotions or think these characteristics only belong to a 
few select people, but I tell you , they are your heritage as a human being.
Just as surely as you have 10 toes and 10 fingers, feet ,legs ,eyes, ears and 
arms you have creativity and intellect.  If the world would focus on 
developing these two characteristics in people, the world would be a much 
safer and secure and pleasant place for all of us.   Yet, we persist in 
treating
it like there was a shortage of it, as if there wasn't enough to go around.  
There's all we wish to develop to go around.  Creativity and intellect are 
infinite.  They are not in short supply at all.   You know, I can understand 
how one determines the winner in a 100 yard dash, but some of these photo 
websites that want to force us to choose a best photo.  That's very 
difficult for me, because the best I can do is narrow it down to my favorite 
3 or 4.  That's like your mother telling you to choose just one piece of 
candy.  How does one measure the value of something as subjective as art?
Who here will appoint himself the omnipotent?  It's all a matter of taste, 
basically.  Who am I to say that my taste is better than yours and who are 
you to say that your taste is better than mine.   What we generally call 
reality is really just our own narrow little perspective.  We are pieces of 
the puzzle, so how can we perceive the whole puzzle?  The best we can
hope for, considering our relative position as a part of the puzzle is to 
share our perspectives in order to broaden them.   Doesn't it seem that 
the two words reality and relative come from the same root word?  Well, 
maybe not, but they should.       Just soom thoughts I wanted to share with 
you.  Hope I haven't bored you all to death.   I have only been on this list 
a couple of weeks.  Is this a purely technical exchange or do we also aspire 
to inspire each other as well?   I wish George would hurry up and send me 
that viewer he promised. Or was it Jimmy or David?  I was a little 
overwhelmed by your generous responses. I must go back over my mail to see 
who said that.    My Mother told me never to cross my eyes, so that is a very 
difficult thing for me to do emotionally and physically.  I can't thank you 
all enough or apologize enough for my misjudgement of you.  

                                                              Sincerely, 

                                                                - Teri