A Year to Measure by the Numbers
When I look back upon a year, I look at it in terms of numbers. Numbers of photographs, that is. And by that measure, last year was a very good year for me.
Some 2,069 images made their way into my Lightroom catalog (of 16,035 total), for viewing, editing and exporting, from locations all over the United States and Mexico. That gave me much material to work with from my ‘traditional’ cameras. And then there were my iPhone photographs, which defy quick accounting and cataloging, but delighted me none the less for it. (And which amounted to far more than their numbers might indicate, in terms of learning, app editing and immediacy.)
The photographs are significant to me for the memories they evoke of the eureka moment I felt when I knew I had a photograph. You know that feeling, too (don’t you?) when you are on the trail of a photograph because the light is so right, and then suddenly your lens shows you the scene the light was meant for.
There are times when my camera and its lens take on the power of a Ouija board, and I am merely their instrument. I exist just to push the shutter button, which I do with wild pleasure, thrilled just to hear the satisfying thlunk of the lens’ split-second open-and-close.
I look up, and there’s a photo. I look around, and more appear in unlikely places.
The sky conspires with earthly offerings to show me photographs, where blue piles upon blue, and lines caress angles, and light floods my lens to make me pay attention, to keep my eye trapped to the viewfinder.
This is what it is to be smitten with photography, with light, with patterns and shapes and the framing of things, and of people.
These are just a few of the scenes that grabbed me and commanded my attention, when I was lucky enough to have my camera, and that I hadn’t yet published. For these, and for their many fellows in my image library, I am grateful.
Originally published at my blog, Pairings :: Art + What Goes With It,
at austindetails.me, where I share art + photos + words — I hope you’ll check it out.
Let’s connect on Twitter, too: @austindetails
