Wow! Has it been 5 days since I’ve last written? I guess so. Well, I’m in Florida at, what else, a basketball tournament. The tournament is actually finished, save one fun game.

Of course I have my cameras with me, but I’ve not been taking many pictures. I’ve been making room for other things. Usually when I awaken in the morning, I go out and shoot; however, I’ve been feeling that that leaves me a bit unbalanced. I could go out and shoot six or seven days a week, just because I love it so much; however, I really need to get in some exercise.

Exercise has never been something that I desired to do. To be quite honest, I put it off whenever I can, but the truth is, I need to do it and I ain’t gettin’ any younger. So, for the past two weeks, I’ve been going out every morning, sometimes with Hobbs, sometimes not. Since I’ve been here, I’ve gone out every morning at walked a minimum of 1 hour. This morning was a 2 hour walk, netting me some 7 miles.

As I really hate to give up my morning photography, I took my D300 with me on the walk. It made the walk so much easier. I stripped it down to the bear minimum by removing the vertical grip as well as the L-bracket and placing on a 50mm lens. After a while, I hardly noticed the weight. I took off down Irlo Bronson Parkway, as I have done each morning, to see what I could see.

Most of what is to be seen on this street is some serious traffic and lots and lots of advertisements for Disney ticket sales. Also, the street is lined with the ubiquitous tourist gift shops each hawking cheap t-shirts and all manner of memorabilia.

During my walk I was thinking about my impending temporary move to Charleston and how I will have to create a new life, at a least 5 days per week. It’s pretty easy to get in a couple of hours of walking the morning when you don’t have to go to work. Now that I’m getting back into the work world, I guess that I’ll just have to make adjustments. Looks like I might become an evening photographer and explore that light. Exercise in the morning, work during the day, shooting in the evening, sleep at night. Sounds like a full schedule to me!

Well, tomorrow morning we leave. We are heading for my wife’s favorite place, Seabrook Island, SC. As a matter of fact, she’s on the way there right now. It is her first time driving there alone. We will meet her tomorrow afternoon. I should be able to share some good beach pictures with you in the coming days.

Like some photographers, I could turn into a photographer/collector. I’ve seen a number of cameras that have piqued my interest, to be sure. I’ve already mentioned the Nikon D3 and now the D700. One that I haven’t mentioned was the, now discontinued it seems, Epson R-D1. This was the first digital rangefinder that went to market. Epson, it would seem, has discontinued the item after making an initial run of 10,000 cameras. I suppose that the market just wasn’t big enough so support such a camera.

I was really wanting one of these on my recent trip to West Virgina. Photographic opportunities abounded, but I wanted a smaller, more silent, less obtrusive camera. Something that I could keep at the ready at all times to, you know, capture that decisive moment.

A year or two ago, I don’t recall exactly when, Leica introduced a digital rangefinder, the Leica M8. This camera weighed in at a stunning $4999. While I was at my Next Step workshop last year, two gentlemen in our group had them. They looked pretty nice and I was intrigued, though not enough to drop 5 grand on a rangefinder!

Epson’s R-D1 was priced in a slightly more affordable range. You can still find one on eBay for about $2,100. Even a search on http://froogle.google.com, which is where I usually price shop, turns up nothing except batteries for the ill-fated machine. A similar search for the Leica M8 turns up a number of sellers hawking the camera from $4995 - $5495. Still, for me, way out of the ball park to satisfy a curiosity. A film rangefinder could be had for much less, but I think that my film days are over. I’ve given in too much to the instant gratification of it all.

Oh well, I guess that the market is only big enough for one, and only one, digital rangefinder. I guess that the Leica M8 is it. I’ll have to satisfy my curiosities some other way. I’ll have to keep using my little D40 for such outings, just like I did with this picture.

Our family moved to Charlotte, North Carolina just over 4 years ago. We moved here because of the wonderful lifestyle change that we could make. There were trees, rivers, beaches, an ocean, and temperatures in the summer evenings that wouldn’t make you feel like a candle inside of an oven.

The only downside to Charlotte was that, for software, it’s pretty much a one horse town. It’s banking, for the most part. With the problems that the banks have been having with the ‘mortgage crisis’, they have cut, cut, cut, and cut some more. My job ended on June 6, 2008.

My subsequent job hunt has been fruitless. Rates have been slashed to record lows. Jobs are paying much less than what I was getting 4 years ago when I first came … those jobs that you can find and, let me tell you, there aren’t many.

I decided, a week or two ago, to widen my search area to include a radius of about 4 hours drive time from Charlotte. Well, I struck pay dirt, so to speak. I got a job! Of course, this will involve me living in Charleston, SC, some 3.5 hours from home. I’ll come home on Friday and return on Sunday. The initial contract is for 3 months; hopefully, things will look slightly better by the end of the 3rd quarter (Sept 30).

I’m a guy who loves his home. There’s no place that I’d rather be; however, here comes the chance at a bit more growth … I’m getting growing pains from all the growth that I had to do this year! Sheesh!

Naturally, I’ll be taking my cameras and exploring a bit of Charleston, SC in the evenings, or perhaps the mornings. It has a rich history especially from The Civil War. I believe that there are still a few plantations around. I know that the slave mart is still there as well as many other historical artifacts. Truthfully, Charleston is more of place for my wife. She loves the beach. I’m not much on heat, humidity, and painfully biting bugs that I cannot even see (no-see-ums). I do however, love to catch the motion of the water as well as photograph the marshes during the high and low tides.

It looks to be a busy couple of weeks. Monday, Tony and I go to Florida for his final tournament of the summer (Yeah!!!). We’ll be there until Friday. Friday evening I plan to meet my wife in Charleston. She’s going to help me look at furnished apartments, which go for about $1,100/month for a one-bedroom, everything included (furniture, cable, electric, water, etc). Of course, she worked in a weekend trip to Seabrook Island, her favorite place! I’ll return home on Sunday, July 27, then leave for Charleston on Sunday, August 3rd, and begin working on Monday, August 4th. I’ll be there until the end of October … at least.

So, I’m sure that my future posts will reflect my view of Charleston, my new digs, and life on the road. I’ve never done it before. It should be interesting. My wife stayed in Dallas for 3 months after we moved here. She visited on the weekends. Now, it’s my turn, I suppose.

Oh yeah, I will have an Internet connection, so I should continue with my posts!!!

Along I-79

I have just returned from a trip to Morgantown, WV. My son had a tournament on Monday and Tuesday. It did not go well, but that’s another story for another time. Let’s just say that the competition was a bit more fierce than we’d ever seen!

I’ve driven the road between Charlotte, NC and Akron, OH a few times. Each time that I drive, I must admire the beauty of both Virgina and West Virgina. There are, in my opinion, some exceptional shots to be had along the highway! The highway crosses numerous rivers and valleys. It meanders through the mountains carving sensuous S-curves for miles and miles. If you come through at the right time, you can see fog rising from some of the Appalachian valleys.

Sunday evening was such a time. As they say, bad weather makes great pictures. There were isolated thunderstorms in the area as we passed through Virginia and then West Virginia. From my vantage point, in the car, it seemed as if I could have stopped every 2 or 3 minutes and have taken another series of impressive, awe-inspiring shots, but but unfortunately, the traffic along I-77 moves 70+ miles per hour and there are lots and lots of trucks. This is a main corridor between South Carolina and Ohio. No way am I setting up my camera on the side of road and taking pictures!

We crossed the New river, ironically named, because it is thought to be the oldest river in North America. Of course, some of the most beautiful views of the river are from atop the highway bridges!

It has been on my list for a while, to make a visit to Virgina and West Virgina to photograph parts of them … I just need to explore and find a place to stand! After all, that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Finding a place to stand and the right moment to click the picture!

In the end, I took very few pictures … what amounted to a few snapshots from the hotel parking lot. I was there to watch my son’s basketball tournament and don’t feel really comfortable straying to far at all hours of the morning while he’s asleep in the hotel, especially when it’s just the two of us and my wife is not along.

In response to this post, Rez said:

Paul, I desperately need to learn how to take photos like you. I dont try to pose off people, but with you i make the exception.

Please write about this if you can in your coming blogs. kind of a like a tutorial on how not to suck…i’d be very grateful.

First, a sincere thanks for the compliment. Now, so that we’ll know what the heck I’m talking about, let’s define that word, suck. I would, for the purpose of this post, define it as a serious dissatisfaction with the output of one’s own work. As in, all of my pictures suck, or at least the majority of them!

I do my best not to judge the work of others, other than to say, it appeals to me or it doesn’t. I’ve seen lots of work that hasn’t appealed to me, but that certainly doesn’t mean that it sucks. It simply means that I didn’t like the subject matter or the way that it was portrayed. That’s it.

Practice
The answer is quite simple and contained in the punch line to this joke:

A New Yorker (or in some versions Arthur Rubinstein) is approached in the street near Carnegie Hall, and asked, “Pardon me sir, but how do I get to Carnegie Hall?” He replies, “Practice, practice, practice.”

Types of practice
Of course, you could go outside and practice, practice, practice, with no particular goal in mind. This type practice is not so effective as goal-oriented practice. First, you need to find what you like. Then, you need to find your voice, or what you have to say about it. You may like sunsets, sunrises, people, frogs, parking lots, discarded shopping carts, tin cans, road signs, fog, etc. Who knows? The world is a very big place with lots of interesting things!

The most important aspect of the whole thing, I think, is to get that camera in your hand and shoot, shoot, shoot. Don’t be afraid to experiment with different ways of shooting, even if someone else says that it’s wasteful, fruitless, unorthodox, etc. So what. What works for them, might not work for you. Do your thing. If you have an idea, follow it.

The work of others
In finding your voice, you’re going to run across the work of others that you like. Keep viewing the work of other photographers that you like until you discover why you like it. This is a huge clue in finding your voice. Perhaps you like the photographer’s choice of subject; the use of lines and shapes; the bold use of color; the abstract nature of the photo; the sentimentality of the subject matter.

We all seem to start by mimicry. I know I certainly did. I remember how captivated I was by Ansel Adams’ photographs when I first saw them. Every landscape photographer that I knew, seemed to want to be like AA. Similarly, in the early 80’s and 90’s, nearly every basketball player wanted to be Michael Jordon. When they went to the playground, they tried the moves that they saw Michael do last night, or perhaps they would practice the move in the driveway a few hundred times before putting it on display to the rest of the world (playground). Eventually, they added their own particulars and made it their own.

The methods are same. See something that you like. Try to duplicate it. Practice. Practice. Practice. Add your own flavor. Make it yours. Sure, there are those critics who will yell “derivative”. So what. Ask to see their portfolio! You have to be pleased with your work.

Proficiency
I think that you have to be technically proficient with your camera before you can become very expressive with it. The camera can get in the way if you don’t know how to use it. It can be a frustrating experience. Even if you understand color, lines, composition, etc, it really doesn’t so much matter if you cannot get the exposure right or figure out why your pictures are constantly blurry. Technical excellence turns the camera into an extension of your imagination, not a roadblock.

Acceptance
You have to accept where you are at this moment and realize that as long as you keep shooting and evaluating, not judging your work as good or bad, then you are growing. Evaluate the merits of the photograph to decide if you met your goal for the picture. Did I capture the feeling that I was trying to? Am I satisfied with the result? What more could I have done to make the shot more appealing to me? What if …? Again, the merits of the photograph, not the abilities of the photographer. Tell the inner-critic to take the day off. You’re not interested in his/her opinion of your skills!

The paradox
Don’t look for your voice to hard. You won’t find it. You’ll have to be quiet. You have to listen for it. Just keep shooting and, over time, it will find you. You’ll be drawn towards that which you like and that which speaks to you. When you start to over-think it, that’s when the confusion and anxiety sets in. Have fun and don’t let anyone tell you that you are doing ‘it’ wrong. There is no right or wrong. It’s simply what works for you.