Category: Photography

What’s Up with Retro?

Gear, Interesting Stuff, Life, Photography

I watched a piece recently in which a 20-something YouTuber extoled the virtues of a fixed lens, limited function camera that has been sold out since its release – the Fuji X100VI. His message was a simple one – it makes photography fun again. He is a professional photographer and it seems none of his other higher end Canon mirrorless cameras were fun any longer.

I saw something similar in my recent short career working in a camera store – young people in their teens or twenties with old film cameras they had found in the attic or purchased at a thrift store. They wanted to buy film and/or get a quick lesson on how to use them. In those cases, they often did not know anything about photography, but wanted to learn using these cameras, not something more advanced. When asked about the appeal of these devices to them, the answer was – I’m told they are fun.

I have only one question for both – why?

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How Perfect is Perfect?

Artistic Ideas, Life, Photography

One odd thing I’ve run into in both daytime and astrophotography is the hunt for the perfect image. The number of photographers who mention it, speak about their quest for it, show their edits for it and either feel rewarded or insulted if others don’t share their views has always puzzled me.

The definition of perfect of course takes many forms. Here are a few examples.

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My Next Trip

Life, Photography, travel

Over the past few months, I’ve had a number of experiences that have shaped how I will be approaching travel in the future.

Seniors are definitely great travelers. It’s what the retirement brochures say you will be doing with your time once you retire – visiting family far away, visiting places you have never seen before, having adventures with like-minded souls and meeting new friends. All hyped up to help you comfortably transition from filling your days with work to filling your days with ???

But I’ve never been a big traveler. There are a number of reasons for that, but mostly because I’m a solo traveler – no regular companion. A number of reasons for that too, but I digress. I was determined to add more travel to my retirement plans and have only modestly achieved that goal. Some trips have been with family, some have been with friends, some have been with groups having a common interest and some have been on my own. I’ve enjoyed some more than others but have learned something from each one.

In the past few months, I’ve looked into 5 separate trips, each one offering something different. Two are now booked, another will likely be booked by the new year, one is complete and the other, well, didn’t happen. Here’s what I’ve learned about me and my travel interests at this stage of my life.

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A Fantastic Month

astrophotography, My Community, Photography

Summer is coming to a close here in Canada. The evenings are darker and the mornings are just a bit cooler (although this past week we had a literal heat dome for 2 days where you would just start to sweat taking one step outside). But I have had a fantastic month and wanted to share it.

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Image-ination

Artistic Ideas, Photography

I went for a walk in the neighbourhood the other evening. It was a beautiful evening and I had to get out, if only to feel the late day sun and smell the air. Late spring air smells lovely.

I found myself stopping at various points along the way: watching a neighbourhood baseball game, greeting a neighbour out with his family, watching some kids skateboarding on the oval. And something unusual happened. I started taking pictures, without a camera.

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Family Moments

Life, Photography

Early spring for my family is filled with birthdays, including mine. This year, the eldest sibling in our family reached 70 years of age. Who would have thought that day would come! Seems we were all just in our twenties, let loose on the world to make a difference.

My brother turned 70 and we gathered the extended family at a restaurant to celebrate. Mid-way, my sister suggested, and my niece’s husband took, a group portrait of all us old ones (I was going to use another word…) and that resulting image has now been shared with everyone through multiple printed copies. (Not shared here for privacy reasons.)

I realized as I printed the photos that we don’t have many family moments like these in pictures. A sad reality of growing up in a household where food and clothing were the priorities and a camera was a luxury we could not afford. But you don’t get a second chance at these. So I have a few thoughts on this subject.

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Discovering Young Talent

Life, My Community, Photography

It’s a sad reality for each generation that we tend to gravitate either to the familiar – people we know – or to the contemporary – people who are like us. That means same generation, maybe the same values, maybe the same challenges, maybe the same likes and dislikes.

It’s certainly somewhat true for me and something I have to work hard to avoid as I get older. Even in this age of endless social media, I now tend to seek and follow people who are closer in age to me than to the grandbabies in the family. It’s not because they share the same likes and dislikes, but more because they share the same challenges of age, mobility and have somewhat similar general life experiences as me (didn’t grow up in the Internet age).

I think it’s important to recognize these trends in us and maybe from time to time to step away from them. Here’s a couple ways I’ve done that.

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When It Doesn’t Go As Planned

astrophotography, Learning, Photography

A week ago, like many of you, I packed up the car and headed out to what I thought was a good location to view the total solar eclipse. The first one in my area since 1979, it promised to be epic, if you found the right location.

Well I did and I didn’t. The location was good – open space, near water, where we would see everything surrounding us. The problem was clouds. They thickened as we were setting up and completely engulfed us at totality. No corona shots, no Bailey’s beads, no diamond ring, no nothing.

I learned a few things from this experience and thought I would share them.

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Is YouTube Dying?

Interesting Stuff, Landscapes, Photography, Videos

For some odd reason, over the past couple of weeks, several of the landscape photographers I follow have posted videos about their YouTube experiences. Some have been active for years, others for just a couple. But all are reconsidering what the effort to produce content ultimately means to them and whether/how they should continue.

Most have noticed a slowing in the growth of their channel in both views and followers. Some of that appears to be a legitimate change in audience interests. But some of it also seems to be the ever present YouTube algorithm, which chooses how and how often a video is presented for viewing.

I rely on YouTube for my artistic “fix” and also for more mundane activities such as home repairs. So this change is troubling to me. What does it mean?

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Get Real, OK?

Artistic Ideas, Photography

There is a raging debate right now among pro and hobbyist photographers alike about where to draw the line when editing images. Of course, this stems from the other big debate around the role of AI (artificial intelligence) in photography, but comes at it from a different slant.

Some time ago, Samsung was accused of faking a moon image to demonstrate the new low light (or was it astro?) features of its latest smartphone. Samsung’s response was that nothing is “real” in photography anyway so what does it matter?

What does it matter?

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