There is no light, its the shutter…
Yah, so this photography gig is something I have dabbled with quite extensively for a few years. Lived and breathed it for a while. Spent some big bucks on a high-end camera (a Canon DSLR), lenses, etc, etc…. I acquired professional grade software for editing and manipulating. I took seminars and spent countless hours sharing knowledge with other experienced photographers and watching tutorials. I learned A LOT in a short period of time. In my mind, I mastered what I wanted too, then dropped it cold and have only picked up the camera a couple of times since. Its been two years since I was serious about the art. I do miss certain things. I miss the ability to be creative and the praise I received from many people in doing so. I never took my work to the point of making money, other than photographing one wedding which I will never do again. Thankfully, the bride and groom were awesome, but it’s not something I fully enjoyed. Maybe some day I will get the courage to print and frame some of my work and sell it. For now, it just sits on an external hard drive in my office. Literally thousands of potentially great photos probably never to go anywhere. Inspiration! That is what I need to start again. However, I just have none. I don’t know why. I went out on a photography day trip a few weeks ago. I just loaded the gear in the car and drove around. I had camera in hand and I had totally forgot my settings and how to change them for what I needed! haha, I just shook my head and laughed at myself. (actually, I believe I had called myself a dumb ass). Well, after 30 shots in the setting I had chosen, I just decided to throw the camera in auto mode. (shhh…don’t tell anyone!) I didn’t even shoot in RAW this time either, just JPG. I usually shoot in both but like I said, my motivation isn’t there. Another 300 pics just sitting on the hard drive. Oh well.
So…I thought I would post a few of my favorites I have taken over the years for one reason or another. Not the “best” I have done, just a few examples I was happy with.
(BTW, I generally do not give names to my photographs, just seems corny too me.)
(The following photos were taken by me)
This pic of the tug boat was taken in Sturgeon Bay. I held my camera out over the water near the rope for the shot. Thinking back, it is kinda scary because I didn’t even have the strap around my hand and could have lost the camera in the water if I had dropped it! Duh!
This was taken during a blizzard, literally! This was deep, fresh fallen snow not yet to be disturbed by human contact. I applied a “lomo” effect to the photo to give it character. I like it.
Overcast day in the capital city. I just like the angle and how my editing turned out.
Navy Pier, Chicago on a cold winter day. Oddly enough, I never noticed the one missing carriage until later during editing.
Port of Milwaukee. I saw the rust and had to capture it. Very minimal editing here.
One of hundreds of pictures taken at car shows all over, as mentioned in earlier blogs, I LOVE classic cars.
This last pic represents where I was heading in my photography before I quit. Photographing models. I had plans to get pretty serious about it, but hard times prevented me from purchasing the lighting equipment I really needed. I am very critical of myself and in order to obtain the level that would make me happy, I had to invest money, and it’s just not justifiable at this point ant time. Priorities, they are a mother!
In addition to what I have posted here, I have done many abstract, selective color, black & white, city scape, long exposure, limited light, duo-tone, sports, action sports, band photography, commercial products and much more.
This just touches the tip of what I have done. It used to be so much fun editing and creating a masterpiece out of a diamond in the rough. I could photograph a girl and change her looks in editing to make it look like someone completely different. And it wasn’t a half assed grade school job either. It rivaled top paid professionals! But that is gone, at least for now. I just wanted to throw a few pics in a blog and talk about what happened. The photo in the banner on this blog is also one of mine and one of my favorites. Maybe someday I could find someone interested in what I learned and teach it to them. It’s nice to pass along what you know to others, so long as you get credit. I did that once and got nothing in return, maybe that’s where I lost my mojo? LOL Good day.
