Military Photography Skills

While it may not appear that a photography class may be of use to a public health major, I have taken from this course many skills which I can use to be a more productive individual. The skills will not only be useful to my future civilian career but to my future military career as well. The first and perhaps most important of these skills is time management. This class is more in depth than simply snapping a few photographs, time needs to be set aside in order to properly develop film and print photographs as well. Failure to do so leads to a person falling behind in their work. Time management is a universal skill that I can use in any future career, but it is especially imperative to those who are officers in the United States Army. In the Army everything takes place at a set time and failure to comply with the time you have been given results in negative reports or ineffective results.
The second important skill I learned in photography is attention to detail.
Attention to detail is another learned skill that is highly praised in the U.S. Army. Being able to see something out of the ordinary or find a detail others can’t see can mean life or death in the army. The most important thing about being an officer is protecting those who are under your command. In the army during reconnaissance troops are sometimes given cameras to use as well to take pictures of an objective (so it is still possible to use photography itself as well). Attention to detail is also linked to sound judgment to a degree. If we see something and perceive some small details of it we may be able to judge for ourselves what to do with it. For example if you see someone coughing on a train, and you also notice that person looks extremely tired and is pale/sweating, you may want to move away from that person as you think they may be
sick. While there are still many skills which I have learned to apply from photography into everyday life, the final one which I will talk about is confidence. In our photography class we do not use any kind of fancy digital camera which allows us to take pictures and see if they are acceptable or not. We have to set everything up on our own to make the subject come out nicely. Once a picture is taken, you cannot take it back. The picture is now a part of your film and you must follow through with it. It is impossible to do this without learning to be confident in yourself to some degree. The learned confidence from photography has a million and one uses for anyone’s future career. I can’t think of a job interview or career where you are supposed to be humble about yourself. Employers (especially today) want to hire an individual who they think is going to do their job to the best of the expectations of said employer. One might say that because we have taken basic photography we are all guaranteed a future career. In the Army if you don’t have confidence you might as well quit from the beginning because if you aren’t sure of yourself in a life or death situation you are going to get everyone hurt or even worse. Officers and NCOs are trained to be able to see in an individual if they are confident or not for this very reason. Confidence will always help you excel and move forward in life.