They say a picture is worth 1,000 words. Trust me, it is not, that is complete BS. Some pictures are worth only 1-2 words. However some photos only need 1-2 words to make a statement.

Take the photo above for instance. Yeah you could pull 1000 words from it, 998 would be completely worthless in communication though. Those 998 words represent static, just trying to fill dead space. The photographer here is trying to say something, there is communication behind this and it is really easy to miss this through all the static.

Photography is a little like body language. There is something being said 99% of the time, sometimes even unintended. The special thing with photography however is the communication that exists beyond words. Many times people try to use 1000 words to describe the un-describable and come up short.

This is the reason cultures have used drawings and paintings. It wasn’t that the cavemen could not communicate with each other and didn’t have words; it is that the images they drew went beyond words into expressing feelings. This is true communication. Yes Michelangelo could have written a book about the Sistine Chapel, chances are though it would be thousands of pages long and never really express what one minute of looking at the painting does.

Photography is similar, only instead it is real. It requires a photographer to go out and angle the lens or set up the shot to properly express the emotion. Sometimes it is impossible. But sometimes it speaks just a word, and means so much more.

As I study communication I am always reminded of how complicated communication can be. We can over complicate communication and need to try not to fill what we are trying to say with 1000 words or a 10 page paper. Sometimes there are only one or two words, but they mean a whole lot more.  It can be analyzed and theorized, but it never expresses what the one image can.