Allison DeVore: Documenting Despite Difficulty

During the second week of my photography internship, I was given the opportunity to photograph a college graduation ceremony. The event was the Newberry College commencement ceremony, and to my knowledge I would be the only photographer there. Event photography was something I had a lot of practice in during my time photographing for Lander University, so I felt fairly confident in my skill to document organic photos of students during the ceremony. However, during the days leading up to the graduation ceremony I began to feel like I wasn’t the right person for the job.

I sat on my bedroom floor the night before the event, practicing using my supervisors Nikon camera, a camera I had no experience with. I went through every menu setting, control, and button imaginable, and I switched out and tested every single lens in the camera bag. I gave myself a fake scenario in which I needed to change settings quickly and I took tests shots with every lens. Everything on the camera seemed to be manageable, and so I put the camera away feeling optimistic about the opportunity I was given to photograph such an important event.

The next morning, I arrived at Newberry College at 7:30am, to prepare for the pre-graduation photographs. I planned to photograph students as they hung out with friends, dressed into their cap and gowns, and as they got in line before graduation. As I began taking photos, I noticed that the camera wasn’t focusing properly and most of the photos were not sharp. Instantly, I felt a huge pressure that I thought had gone away the night before. At around 8:30am they let me know that I would be taking the group photo of all the seniors.

The whole walk over to the location, I was trying to press every button imaginable to fix the camera. As I slowly climbed that tall ladder in front of everyone, I realized in that moment that if this photo was even one bit out of focus, it would have consequences. It is already hard enough to take a photo of 200+ people and have them all in focus. I had to think fast, and I had no idea what else I could do, so I decided to put the camera into manual focus and started snapping away as I tried to compress the anxious feeling that continued to build.

On a camera, focusing happens either automatically or manually. Manual focus is a mode in which the focusing relies on your own hands and you have to turn a ring on the lens in different directions to get it to focus. With autofocus, the camera will focus on a subject automatically just by pressing a button. The main reason autofocus is used during event photography is because it is fast, efficient and can be more accurate when the subjects are moving.

If I said that putting the camera into manual focus mode fixed the problem, it didn’t. I knew that I could not shoot this entire graduation ceremony in manual focus. That would be impossible. I tried calling my supervisor, but because she was not there, it was much harder for her to know what was wrong. I tried swapping lenses, to see if the lens was the problem, from what I could tell, it wasn’t. I figured I could google something to try and find a solution, but I didn’t have enough time before the ceremony began.

That’s when I spotted him, there was another photographer there for the diploma photos. He looked older, and so I had a feeling he looked experienced enough to help me out. I shyly walked up to him and asked if he could take a look at the camera. He blasted through every menu setting, swapped lenses, took test shots, and he said there is nothing wrong with this camera. I felt like such an idiot in that moment and felt so uncomfortable. In the end it turns out I hadn’t been screwing the lens in all the way, and there was an extra click that I hadn’t reached yet by screwing the lens in just a little bit more to the right.

As I walked into the gym for the ceremony, I scoured over the whole building looking for a spot to sit. The other photographer, waved at me from the very front row, and motioned for me to come sit beside him. In that moment, I felt as if I had just made a friend. As I sat there waiting for the ceremony to begin, I wiped the sweat off my forehead, and began to swap lenses in preparation, while many thoughts ran through my head in what seemed like the beginning of my very own existential crisis.

“What if I’m not good enough for this?” …and that turned into

“Why am I even doing this?”

“How do I connect with these strangers?”

“Is it even possible to create meaningful photographs here?”

I began to feel like it was all meaningless. I felt like just another passerby, watching everyone else, waiting on that ‘special moment’ to happen so I could photograph it. It felt like everyone was watching me and could see the word ‘amateur’ written on my forehead. I wondered when I will feel like I am good enough, I couldn’t even screw the lens in the right way.

The graduation ceremony continued as I took photos of the graduates as they crossed the stage and different moments in between. Halfway through, I went back to my seat to swap out lenses. I turned around in my seat to photograph the grads who already walked, and then turned back around to see if I got anything.

 That’s when it hit me, I saw a photo I had just taken of a girl who was laughing with her friends beside her, and it made me genuinely smile. I smiled because she looked so happy and something within me felt what she felt. I know why I am doing this. At the same moment, the crowd started cheering, and as I looked to the stage quickly, a graduate had brought his baby on stage as he crossed to receive his diploma. The camera, an extension of my own body, just as an instinct my shutter went off, and again, I know why I am doing this.

Allison DeVore is a graphic design major and information technology minor from Saluda, South Carolina. For her breakaway experience, she spent the summer of 2022 interning with Chelsey Ashford Photography in Greenville, South Carolina. Allison will graduate from the Honors College at Lander University in December of 2022. She plans to continue working as a photographer and graphic designer.