Photography can be broken down into two major categories:  "Taking pictures," and "making photographs."

"Taking pictures " involves recording something that is happening or exists, while "making photographs" includes responsibiity or everything that affects the silver halide on the film or whatever a digital camera has.

Good examples of "taking pictures" includes the snapshot of Mount Rushmore or runway pit photography.  Good examples of "making photographs" would be Adams' "Half Dome" or large format portraiture.

The difference is the amount of control the photographer actually has of the recorded image, or perhaps the amount of surprise upon seeing the recorded image.  Another difference might be the number of exposures to get the desired image.  "Made photographs" usually require one exposure (which means large format actually works for those).  "Taken pictures" usually involves sorting through a whole bunch to find a good one.

Is there virtue in getting what you want in fewer attempts?  Is it worth the effort?

-Don

Its always worth the effort to get what you want in the fewest attempts.  But it is also not the only way to work it.  Adams photographing a mountain and me photographing a model are not the same situation.  The mountain doesn't move, doesn't show a slightly different look each pose, etc. 

The basic look you may be going for in a photosession segment should certainly be thought out in advance and the set up and exposure, etc, should certainly be planned, I agree with you completely on that note.

I maintain that there should be at least one more strata:  Finding/Discovering photographs...Which I think contains elements of both Making and Taking a photograph, but allows space for serendipity/random chance/luck/whatever to become almost a co-creator along with the photographer and subject.

A good example of this would be Avedon's "Nastassia and the Serpent" image from the late 80's.  While much previsualization and preparation went into the image [styling, lighting, snake wrangler, etc.], there came a point where the finished image lived or died depending on the instinct and actions of the Boa.  The whole thing took hours [and only Avedon knows how many blown shots] before the snake made it's way up Nastassia's body to kiss her on the ear...had it decided otherwise, the world of photography would be minus one legendary image.

While I don't consider myself in Avedon's league, I do feel that I use the same intuitive tools that make so much of his work great.  I rarely "plan" anything more than a general emotion/sensation combo that I want to discuss, and that totally depends on the model I'm working with [eg: there are things I would do with Mayan Lee that I wouldn't consider trying with Pinky and vice versa].  Once the idea is established [along with a very general idea of how to get there], I leave the door open and basica let the image come to me...sometimes it does, and sometimes it sends something totally unexpected [but just as good if not better] in its' place...for me, "waiting for the snake" is at least half the fun.