The power of a beautiful photograph

With the invention of Kodak’s Box Brownie camera in 1900, photography started to become a democratic activity for the masses. Camera phones first started appearing in 2000, ensuring that, today, practically everyone’s a photographer. But, few can achieve the beautiful images created by experts like Simon Devitt, one of the most celebrated architectural photographers in New Zealand.

For the past 22 years, Simon has photographed homes and buildings across the globe and in every nook and cranny of our country for publication in countless magazines, books and awards programmes. He has also produced five books of his own authorship and, in the past decade, his passion for the medium has led to lecturing, public speaking, and running an awards programme for budding photographers. 

Justine Harvey spoke with Simon about his love of photography and sought advice for anyone preparing their home for a photo shoot.

Simon: When I was growing up, my dad took a camera wherever we went and made slide shows with some of the photographs for us to watch. Most kids would become very bored, but I loved it – I was enthralled. 

Architecture and photography are great friends – they have a rare and special bond that I really love. If I don’t learn something from doing this job every day, then I feel ripped off. That involves investigation and hanging out with the work for a day, sometimes two days, because shooting architecture shouldn’t be a tick-list exercise.

It’s important to let the architecture speak. Architecture creates the dynamism. It feels calm and meditative, which is often the most beautiful thing about architecture, that I like anyway. I have found that if you attempt to impose yourself on the photography, then you assume that you know more than the architecture. I try not to make any assumptions; I just capture the moments. 

Photography offers a broad view of the world and, personally, it allows me to study and meditate on that. Photography is always about what’s happening now. Holding a camera makes you thoughtful, focussed and present in the moment. 

Creating my books, Portrait of a House and Rannoch, has taught me a hell of a lot about my own view as a photographer. I believe that a picture can transform our view of the world outside and within ourselves. It can say something about our experiences, and architecture is certainly mostly about experiences. Photographing the architectural realm is not just about the built environment, landscapes and the relevant context, but telling a rich and fulfilling story through pictures.

The responsibility of photographing people's homes is giving readers the opportunity to experience a house that they will most likely never have the chance to visit in the flesh. The pictures travel but the house doesn’t. So, I have this opportunity to tell the story of the home and I see it as a big responsibility to capture that moment, because we often don’t have the chance to go back.

Most homeowners are very proud of their homes and will make an effort to tidy up, put away any clutter, vacuum the floor and make things look good. Although, some people will tidy up too much and it can become too sterile. 

You want to avoid the distraction of detritus, but you want to gain a feeling about how the homeowners live in the home and their personalities. I like the home to feel natural, such as a bed left unmade if I’m publishing the images in a home publication; although, that wouldn’t be right for using the photographs to sell the home on the property market.

Often, it’s just me in the houses but if people are available to be seen in the home, that would be my preference rather than it appearing like a showroom.

At first, you just make it up as you go along and, then, after 22 years, hopefully you become pretty good, but you have to put the time in – and I'm still making it up as I go. 

I need to be engaged and present every time, at every shoot and, as time’s gone on, I’ve become more in love with what I do to achieve the best outcomes I could hope for. I keep asking myself, ‘how can I be better?'

To be good at photography, you have to really love what you do to the point of being obsessed; that is important – and I am obsessed. So, I feel pretty lucky and really grateful that I get to do something I love.