Peveril Of The Peak

Peveril Of The Peak, originally uploaded by afortiorama.

Someone started a thread in the Manchester,UK group asking "What have you learnt over the last year that improved your photography the most?". It's a very interesting question. And after going through my stream I think my photography hasn't improved much I took good and bad pictures independently from the gear and although each camera allowed me more space what I really learned to do is to take the same pictures with a different camera. So what is missing or what have I learned?

From the technical point of view I probably learned many things that go from screen calibration to using RAW files instead of JPG to the use of the AV mode of when to use manual vs continuous vs auto focus or the use of a remote for self portraits and so on. So why my photography hasn't improved? Here are some of my excuses

*) I don't shoot enough
*) I don't think long enough before shooting
*) I'm not critical enough of my pictures
*) .....

But I think that most importantly most of the time I'm not having fun with my camera. I'm just spending time with it. I'm not into what I'm doing really. The gear is important yes. There is no denying that some cameras have far better capabilities than others and that lenses are critical both in their quality and type. Changing gear has improved only the fact that the new camera allows me to take pictures in more situations, but my pictures haven't changed that dramatically. I'm not bold enough with the attempting new strategies and I haven't learned to have fun with the small details that make the difference between a great picture and a good one. Or perhaps I'm just lazy and hope others will not notice. I think that now I'm and have been at stage two of the acquiring a competence process and I've been so for a long time.

To conclude last year what I learned was "know your camera" I guess this year is "have fun with it". But there's the sea between saying and doing.