Interview with Ebru SİDAR

...let's start new year with interview with Ebru Sidar, one of most talented photographer i saw. Hope it will interest you as much as her beautiful photos....

Hello. Please introduce yourself. How did you get into photography?

I was born in 13th january 1975. I come from Trabzon city of Turkey. I have a personality who loves life much, cheerful, curious and fanciful. I’m an ambitious person and to reach my dreams I do whatever comes from my hand. In the year 2005, one of my friend sent me a link of a photographysite in case i look at the photos, while i was watching the photos i got excited and i, immediately, became a member of the site and load a photo of my friend which i have taken by a webcam. After i had the criticals, i wanted to be better and i worked harder. My that effort is stil going on.

Do you try to create, display or express something special with your photos? Where is your favorite location to take pictures?

I don’t want people to look at my photos just thinking that they are beautiful. I’m not just taking the photos of an empty beauty. My aim is to touch the souls not only the eyes. If they’re looked more carefully, it will be understood that, every photo of me has a different story. At least for me. I believe that they are the language of nature. I’m just trying to understand and learn this language. In fact, there’s a talking silence in my photographs.

I can’t say that there’s a certain place i like to take photographs but, i can’t leave the places where i feel something strong and that provokes me and makes me more careful. It’s sometimes a cosmopolitan place sometimes a pure one..it’s just about my communication with that place.

Much of your work focuses on landscape and waterscape. Do you think it is important to specialize in one area of photography?

In fact, i began photography with portraits. Then i took photos of models and nature and approximately for two years, i’m taking nature photographs. I think it’s very impotant to specialize in one field in photography if you want to gain money from it.. But if you take photos just for yourself, i think that a photographer may take the photos of anything s/he wants. A photographer must be fearless and take photos of what s/he wants not the others’. That person must chase what makes him/her excited. Therefore, i can’t say that a photographer must specialize in one area, i’m one of the ones who think that a good eye can show his/her talent in every area.

Did you have a mentor or someone who helped you as you were getting started? Have you been inspired by any particular artists/photographers?

When i began the photography in past, there was nobody interested in photo around me. By the time passed, i accelarate in the pthography by asking questions to the friends i had through the photography sites.

There are a lot of photographers and photographs i get influenced. What had traces in me are the images not the names of the photographers. I have always been in the aim to reach those pictures.

There are many talented photographers from Turkey on deviantart. Is it popular to be a photographer in your country? Are there some good photo schools? And what about relationships, do you feel any support from others?

After the years 90s, the photograph schools have grown but though to those grown quality education and educators problems haven’t declined. There are a lot of photography clubs and art galleries but, i can’t say that photography is popular in my country. I don’t have any connections with a club nor i had the education about photography. Neither i want to go. Cause i’m afraid of my point of view would change and become a stearotyped. I have questioned a lot, the only thing is good for my development is to watch and take much photos.

What sort of equipment and software do you use? What is your opinion on post-processing?

I’m using canon eos 5d. I believe that everyone is free to manipulate his/her photo as they wish. It can be exeggerated or not but the effect of to manipulate a photo is unquestionable. You can quadruple a photo’s emotion according your manipulation or you can destroy everything.

Your opinion on : lensbaby, analog photography vs. digital, square format...

Lensbabay gives perfect results in abstracting the places and in the hard light during noon.

I haven’t used an Professional analog camera but i’ve seen the ones using it. I don’t have that patient. That’s why i don’t think that i can use one of an analog cam. Digital cams are benefaction fort he people like me.

I think you can go inside subject very easy with square kadrage and this is one habit of my eyes too. The photos i like are generally square and as i go on watching them i became a person that doesn’t like other type of photos. We would be talking about the round photos, if the photos are liked were round at the beginning.

Tell us your funniest, scariest or maybe most bizarre story from a photoshoot.

We had to climb a hill which was very hard, to get into a forest. When we got into the forest, i had an interesting fear and excite in me. That’s why i couldn’t go ahead much. When i looked at the floors i couldn’t see anything related to human beings. I had stayed in the forest approximately 15 minutes and when i saw a dog running over me, i had tumbled the hill. My right arm was above because i was holding my cam there. I had succeed the impossible; nothing happened my cam but my arm hurted much i’m afraid of dogs much. The next day, a young who knows the environment well, helped us to climb up the hill again. As soon as we climbed, we had seen a fox in the mist but it suddenly disappeared. That was a gorgeous forest. It’s stil on my mind and i’ll go there again next year.

What do you do in personal life ?

I’m a civil servant in a public organisation.

What are your plans or visions for your future?

I want to have my own personal exhibition and i have some preparations for it. I want to travel around the world and to go to places never gone before and want to take photos of there. I want to find the most interesting trees of the world. (..hope your dreams will come true...)

Contact: Ebru SİDAR