Was just looking at some pics to post....put these together due to the lines I saw in each... All different styles/different points of focus, but thought they worked well together as a set. I am amazed, over and over again, at how my first shot at any scene is often ends up being my favorite, no matter how many I take following that initial shot. I love to shoot objects/subjects/scenes the way I find them, and the most genuine or most striking (IMHO) shots turn out to be from the point I look up and say "oh, wow" and then reach for my camera...I know that sounds generic and even semi retarded, but I think there is something to be said against over thinking a shot or too much effort being placed into a perfect angle. However, I included Bixby Bridge in this set, because I had a story that goes along with it, and that shot counters what I have written so far. I traveled up to NorCal long ago and photographed the bridge after passing over it. I rushed my effort and was never satisfied with what I captured, and for the longest time thought about what I really wanted with it.. Sooooooooo.......When I went to Neil Young's Bridge School shows in October of last year, we traveled along that amazing coastal route and I took my time once I was back at the bridge. I walked around a lot, looked at a lot of angles and thought about what I saw with the bridge... The shot is not one of the first I took, and it was really one of the first times that I really surveyed everything before starting to shoot. Around that time, I ran across a quote from Ansel Adams....it has, of course, stuck with me... "A good photograph is knowing where to stand."..... It is so true...cameras are getting better, fully automated etc.. I guess my point in all of this is that I know everyone with a 1000.00 dollar camera has an equal chance to stand in the same place and use the same angles....sure, timing with or presence around "events" or light is always a variable, but my best advice to anyone that ever asks me for it (total requests for advice thus far is still Zero) is this: when you see something that moves you, if you aren't close enough, simply walk up to it and don't be afraid to stand there at any point that makes you say "oh, wow"... if you say that at the first spot you find yourself, then that is your most genuine picture..you only get to experience that moment once, don't lose that chance by checking everything out first - you will not remember to walk back to that first wow spot. Word of the day is "wow" apparently, and I am giving myself a timeout...
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