Welcome to “As I See It”

Initially, I had decided to use the next few blogs to tell the stories of my photo series.

I started to make a list of the order that those stories would take, when I was drawn to start by telling a different story. The story of me as a photographer. 

I have already shared that I got my first camera, a Kodak Instamatic, as a Chanukah present. There was a time, in my late teens, when I had a Polaroid camera. Somewhere in a tote, in my oldest son’s house, there are a couple of photo albums containing a small handful of the Polaroids that I took. 

I loved to take a Polaroid photo, and then squeeze the bottom of it, releasing the developing gel into the image. Or, I would do the same without taking the photo first. Dude, what a psychedelic trip those were.

When digital cameras first became a thing, I was proud of rolling old school. I wasn’t going to give up film. The excitement of, after waiting a week, going into the local Thrifty’s to get my pack of developed photos. I didn’t realize at that time, the excitement of being able to look at all 495 photos, moments after having finished shooting them.

I also had quite the disdain for the manipulation of images. Darn, I was cute. I didn’t know until I was in school at the JC, that Ansel Adams was a master manipulator of images. He would divide his photos into a grid of 9, and in the darkroom, develop each grid separately, dodging and burning as he went. I make no judgement as to that fact, I’m just making a point. Image manipulation didn’t begin with Photoshop, or whatever digital programs came before that.

Since I have brought Ansel Adams into the story, let me state that there are ways that I consider myself the antithesis of Ansel Adams. You won’t find me waiting somewhere for hours, for the sun to hit something in a particular way, to get a particular shot. I’m more like, “Hey look, that there is a great shot.” Snap!

I don’t use filters. I don’t use light rings. I don’t even know of all the equipment that I don’t use. I have a tripod, but I don’t remember the last time that I used it. I’m a no fuss, no muss photographer. In the moment. For the most part, candid shots, though not always…

I have shot some weddings..An amount in between several and many. I’m not a fan of shooting weddings, though I’ve been blessed to never have had a bad experience shooting one. (Oh wait, come to think of it, there was one that I never got paid for.)

Since I don’t have equipment, that limits where I can shoot. Not so much for indoors without natural lighting. Also, I find it stressful, in that, if those images of Uncle Ed and Aunt Ruth don’t turn out well, they’re not coming back from Chicago to reshoot them.

I do love the idea of, as a guest, shooting candids at the wedding, and then framing one or making a photo album as a wedding gift.

Along with scapes of beauty in nature, I like my images to depict irony, or humor. I like shooting images that encourage people to think, to stop for a moment and look at the story that I’m trying to tell with that image. 

Even though on my first blog, I posted images of myself, I’m not one to shoot the standard selfie. Usually, my selfies are taken in reflections, or through seeing my feet, and the story that they tell about where I am.

Well, enough about me, for now..

Till next time,

Be Well