Due to this article, The Photograph, Vilem has made me realize that I was a part of the majority, who are naive and allow photos to represent the world itself to them. However, photos are only concepts of the world and the colors we see daily and represent the state of things in the moment of which they were taken. I had never thought of photos this way until this article opened my mind to this idea, and I have come to agree with Vilem on his interpretations of photography, photographers, and their philosophy.

Although I was a part of the naive population, unlike them I do care deeply about the philosophy of photography and found this article not only interesting, but a very useful insight to the world of photography. I now realize that my job as a photographer is to inform the people of the state of our world and my conception of it using my camera’s programs. According to Vilem, being successful in this job will mean that I cannot allow the camera’s program to override what my intentions were for the photograph to represent. Nowadays cameras and cellphones can set everything easily for us to take a photo, and this is continuously becoming easier and easier. However, we as photographers cannot allow the evolving technology of photography to alter the purpose of our photographs. If photographers were not informed of the manual settings and only automatic ones then the world would not be represented nearly as accurately.

The way photographs are taken and developed is proof that indeed photographs are just concepts and theories of our world. Cameras use a reflection from a mirror inside the lens to create the photograph, therefore the photograph is merely just a reflection. Just as the colors used to develop film were generated by theories of the actual colors in our world. Photographs are the photographers representations of our world, which means photographers play a crucial role in how people perceive our world. Every photo has an intention set by the photographer, whether it be a selfie meant to show off your beauty or a front page photo meant to grab attention from its reader.