Down Time
Every weekend LeeAnn and I head out to take pictures. The jeep takes us wherever we decide to go and there we pull out the trusty Nikon and go to shooting photos. Well not the last two weekends we didn’t go take pictures. We found ourselves with bunches and I do mean bunches of pictures that had been taken but not looked at and edited. So these last two weekends have been spent, both relaxing a little bit and spending some time looking over our past work. It just had to be done, however, we did not get as much done as we had planned. You know that sometimes life just gets in the way. Not to mention the fact that we are old and we get tired. Now don’t be looking at us saying “that will never happen to me” because it will. Age has a way of sneaking up on you and then you feel, well, old all of the sudden.
Taking pictures is not easy, well I suppose it is if you use a phone to take your pictures, but we don’t, we use the trusty Nikon D850. Admittedly it does have a fully automatic mode on it, but it has never and will never be used on the trusty Nikon D850. I always laugh at the meme that shows up on Facebook occasionally that says everyone is a photographer until M. M on the trusty Nikon means Manual Mode, which as you might expect means that the camera does nothing for you except use the settings that you put in prior to snapping that all important shot. There is the aperture or F stop to worry about, then the shutter speed, then the ISO, besides looking at composition, the rule of thirds, the light triangle, then focal point, controlled by the aperture or the F stop, as well as the depth of field. Fortunately the trusty Nikon has a meter in the viewfinder that will alert you to settings that are horrifically wrong and will cause a picture to be unusable. I personally have a difficult time looking at that meter, because of course I know what I am doing! Which does explain why I must take the trusty Nikon home, download the pictures into the Adobe Lightroom Application on the computer and promptly throw a number of my perfect photos in the trash.
Thankfully, LeeAnn is here to help me as we take the first initial look at our photos. We always know when we get a really great picture (dripping in sarcasm) when we both look at each other and say “What is that supposed to be?” Well, most likely it is one of those photos that I decided that looking at that helpful little meter in the viewfinder would be of no help and therefore we have no idea what we have there staring at us on the computer screen. Those are the photos that we agree that no amount of editing could possibly fix the vast amount of errors that took place during the capture of this photo and this picture ends up on the toss out list. On the other hand there are those that we are amazed that we actually took, the ones that make it appear that we know what we are doing out there.
Then there are the countless YouTube videos that are watched trying to understand Photo Shop and Lightroom. You can’t imagine how many times words such as these or very similar have appeared on my search history. “How do you do this in Lightroom?” or “How do you do this in Photoshop?” Then the results to said search comes up with a one hour and twenty-two minute video on how to do the very simple thing I was trying to do. I try, I really do, I start watching the video, I really do! Within the first thirty two point eight seconds I am so unfathomably lost that the only hope for me is to decide not to do what I wanted to with the photo, prompting that photo to end up in the trash pile like the “What is that suppose to be?” photos. Now don’t get me wrong here both Photoshop and Lightroom are amazing editing tools for the photographer, and I do use them and understand some of the concepts and am very thankful that I am able to use it to the capabilities of my older and less adaptive mind.
Once this process is complete, we must figure out which ones will be added to our print file and which will go to the social media file complete with a watermark for use on the website and Facebook and other social media outlets. Behind me in the office is the Canon Pro 1100 Professional Photo Printer, weighing in at a paltry eighty pounds and filling up an entire five foot desk. It will print from four by six inch pictures to sixteen by twenty. Actually it prints larger than that but I haven’t figured out how to do that yet, older less adaptive mind. Once I get a picture printed then it must be mounted on a mat board and be placed in a shiny silicon bag and be ready for purchase. Which seems easy but it is not, too much tape and paper weights and alignment, etc. etc., but just on the off chance that I sell a photo they must be ready for purchase!
Then there is this thing, right here, the website, the thing that you are on right now if you happen to be reading this blog. Back in the day, and I am not tooting my own horn, but I used to be pretty good at designing and creating a website. Now I am not that great at either of those things. It is a struggle I must admit! Again, my search has a lot of, “How do you do this or that on Squarespace?” Thankfully the replies are must easier and understandable and I am able to at least make an attempt at my dream. Not that it always comes out, but it gets closer that I was before I searched. I am still trying to figure out how to make the store a little better, but I will keep working on that. Someday this thing my look just like I dreamed that it would when I began this journey.
Down time is good, it refreshes the soul, it give the mind a little break. However I feel a little guilty that I have ignored the trusty Nikon D850 these past two weeks. It is ok though I need to rest and get some of this stuff done…wait is that relaxing? Well I better finish this blog up, I just got a new tripod in today and I need to get is out and see if I can work it, older less adaptive mind. So much for down time.
God Bless
Jim