When I go out to photograph there is no other motivation than to capture the beauty that appears before me. There is incredible joy and happiness that comes from finding something beautiful and capturing its image with my camera.
There is no deep, thoughtful preparation and mystical revelation in this act. It is purely satisfaction of the desire to be in the presence of and record my reaction to this situation.
There is no intellectual rigor in this activity. In fact, nothing could be further from that. It is strictly instinctual, moving around, setting the edges of the photograph and making sure I don’t “muck it up.”
A long time ago I read Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book of Golf Instruction. A sage bit of advice from Harvey was that while on the golf course, “concentration is good, thinking is disastrous.” The same goes for photography. Think about what you want to do before you pick up the camera, once you pick up the camera, concentrate on what is in front of you.
Christmas decorations on Duke of Gloucester Street in Colonial Williamsburg. No neon, lasers, on giant snow globes. Natural items that would have been available in the 1770s.
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