Confession of a Mediocre Photographer

I love to take photos, plain and simple. Unfortunately, I can almost never duplicate how my eye sees a particular scene, which is a cause for much frustration and the desire for better equipment. Is this the fate of those who strive to record the world for posterity?

A great photograph is a full expression of what one feels about what is being photographed in the deepest sense, and is, thereby, a true expression of what one feels about life in its entirety. ~Ansel Adams

OK, so here's my confession: if I didn't live in such a spectacular place, with outstanding beauty all around, I wouldn't get half the photos I manage to snap. This realization has come after touring friends around the beautiful Pacific Northwest this past week. You just can't help getting a fab-o shot of the sunset when it is painted in a bazillion different shades of gold, orange and red right in front of you. Or when the "monster" that is Mount Rainier is close enough to touch.


So, if I lived somewhere else less, let us say 'picturesque', would I be as thrilled with the pics I have captured? I'm not sure. When we trekked around the country last spring, I was able to accumulate over 1,000 pictures stored on those little memory chips...a lot of them acceptable, I must say. But, I wonder...would it be harder to continue to come up with new and exciting photos if you didn't travel much?

In reality, I take my camera with me when I think a particular activity or obligation is going to be a little, well, less than exciting...just to keep me occupied.

No place is boring, if you've had a good night's sleep and have a pocket full of unexposed film. ~Robert Adams

And thus I continue to strive for that perfect snap, the one that will satisfy the need to duplicate what is in my mind's eye. Everyone needs a goal, right?

Photographers deal in things which are continually vanishing and when they have vanished there is no contrivance on earth which can make them come back again. ~Henri Cartier-Bresson