A stormwater grate. A daisy. A pickup truck grill. A crumbling brick wall. Tracy Schneider’s Instagram feed brings each of these mundane items to life with unconventional lighting, unique angles and unfamiliar proximity. And on social media, she matches each photo with a quote to emphasize the emotion that each photo seems to convey.
The first thing you notice when you look at Schneider’s Instagram feed is that all of her photos are black and white. “When I first started, I put a mix of photos, color and black and white. Nearly any photo I took, I put on there,” Schneider says. But as her photography skills improved and she got feedback from others, she realized that she enjoyed black and white photography the most. It is her niche. “So I ended up deleting all of the color photos from my Instagram feed. My subject matter is all over the map, but every image is black and white.”
Because she doesn’t rely on colors, Schneider’s photos emphasize the interplay of light and dark, contrasting textures and unexpected angles. Schneider describes her subject matter as “super, super random stuff.” It is made alluring because she actively seeks out a different perspective than an eye-level, straight-on vantage point.
As an example, she recently was leaving an appointment and saw an old, corroded water main grate with shiny leaves from a plant hanging over it. “I guess not many people would have noticed it. But I got right down on it and took a picture of it.”
She says that most of her photos are of things she happens to notice while walking down a sidewalk or across a parking lot. “How I’ve not been hit by a car, I don’t know,” she says. “I’ll be looking down or not where I’m supposed to be looking. I’ll be bent over at the waist because that’s where I find stuff to photograph.”
Words and pictures
Even though Schneider has a high-end digital single-lens reflex camera, she doesn’t remember the last time she used it. She takes all of her pictures with her smartphone. “I tell people the best camera you can have is the one you have with you – your phone.” It’s not only that smartphones take great photos; Schneider says the photo-editing tools on a phone are exceptionally good.
Schneider started taking pictures when she was 8 years old. She got her first higher-quality camera when she was 13. In high school, she took a semester-long photography class, which she said left her “genuinely hooked.”
Her favorite photographic subject is flowers, often bought at Food Lion. “One thing I like to do with flowers is black out the background so it really pops,” she says. She prefers daisies because of their design. She also loves taking pictures of her six cats and three dogs.
Not surprisingly, she describes herself as a very visual person. But she also loves meaningful quotes and poetry. One of her favorite poets is Robert Frost because of the vivid imagery that comes from his words.
Every photo she posts on Instagram has a quote with it. “Sometimes the quote is misleading because it might make somebody think that I’m having a really bad day. But it’s about the emotion that’s in the picture. It’s not what I am feeling but what I think the picture is trying to portray,” she says. She never re-uses a quote with a new or different photo.
She admits that finding the right quote can often take longer than taking and editing the picture. But she believes it makes her photos more meaningful. “Some people say the quote really meant something to them, and that made them look more deeply at the photo. Or other people start by looking at the photo, then say the quote really matches it,” she says.
Whether it’s the image, the words or both, her biggest joy is when people connect with her photos. “It’s when people say they enjoy looking at the picture or that the photos inspire them to take pictures."
Reducing stress and spreading joy
Earlier this summer, City Revenue Administrator Susan Kluttz asked Schneider to take photos to hang in the new Customer Service area at the Garland Center. The photos displayed in Customer Service are of familiar City images such as the City Hall statue of children playing, the Loray Mill sign and Rankin Lake. Those photographs are in color.
“Tracy is extremely talented,” Kluttz says. “The vibrant colors of the photographs stand out and are a nice finishing touch to our new office space. And customer feedback has been very positive.”
Schneider has worked for the City for 22 years, starting in the Police Department and moving to HR in 2000. She says she’s honored to have her work hanging on the walls of the Garland Center and City Hall where the public can see it. “I went over to the Garland Center one day and I noticed that citizens were standing in line, looking at it,” she says. “If it makes standing in line seem a little less long, I enjoy knowing that.” And she enjoys the feedback she gets from her 575 Instagram followers.
However, Schneider says the biggest benefit of photography and quote-hunting is that it helps her manage stress. “I tend to have problems with anxiety,” she says. “When I’ve got a picture and I get focused on the editing, that calms me down more than the medication will. It’s a lot of work, but it allows me to focus on something pretty intensely. That allows me to decompress and it’s therapy for me.”
Schneider has never sold a photograph. Instead, she takes pictures because she enjoys it. In July, she finished the coursework for her master’s degree and hopes she’ll now have more time to take pictures. She wants to continue to find inspiration in the work of photographers like Ansel Adams and poets like Robert Frost. And she hopes to find more ways to share her love of photography with others. In her words, “Using art to connect with people’s emotions, that blows me away.”
Some of Schneider's photos displayed in Customer Service:
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