Enough with the Gulls Already
I have a problem. I take too many pictures. I take pictures of dumb stuff all the time. Maybe it's a common ailment, but I assume that it usually afflicts rookie photographers rather than the consummate professional. One of the side effects of this "shutter diarrhea" is that when you live on the coast, you take way too many photos of seagulls. I'm so tired of seagulls. So why do I keep doing it? Like I said, it's a sickness.
Today's photo was taken from the same place as Friday's photo. I turned around and this stupid bird was looking at me in a sinister way that said, "Come on, I know you want to take my picture." This gull obviously knows a rookie photographer when he sees one. I gave in and took his picture, despite the fact that I already had a lot of pictures of gulls. I'd love to be able to tell you that I haven't taken any photos of this hideous beast since then, but you and I both know I'd be lying.
All that being said, I actually kinda like this photograph. I think I like the overall blue tone. Other than cropping, this is straight from the camera. Looking at it again, I realize it needs a bit of straightening, but that's life. What do you think of the photo? Is there anybody else out there that suffers from being just a bit too trigger happy with their camera?
Canon PowerShot S2 IS, 46mm, f/3.5, 1/15sec, ISO 50
posted by Bethany at 10:21 AM
22 Comments:
Very nice composition and crop! What happened to the other leg, was it just pulled up?
Ya, he's just standing on one leg for some reason. Perhaps doing an Ian Anderson impression...
Heh. I didn't even realize he was standing on one leg.
Nice pic. Maybe you're just looking for that quintessential seagull shot.
Yeah Ill put my hand up to that. But I see it as a positive, Ill photograph just about anything - you never know what you might want to see in three months time.
I dont think this is amateur territory only - look at a professional camera spec > 3 frames per scond, burst up to 110 frames at once. But I suppose thats slightly different. Consider it framing/lighting/whatever practice.
Anyway tirade over, the shot is good, but for me a little dark. i think I would have upped the brightness a little.
I do the same thing, Tim. I take tons of photos, but many times I get home, download them, and at the time don't like very many of them. I tend to save them though, because I find on another day I may get a totally different feeling from one of them. I look at it as helping me to improve my skills.
Besides, that's the good thing about digital cameras....if you've taken a ton of photos but aren't happy with any of them, you've not spent a ton of money getting film developed.
I really like this post of the seagull and of the beach scene from Friday's post. Very good job on both.
Keep up the great work!!
Too many photos? There is no such thing as taking too many. However there can be too many to post process, just give up sleep! or work on a select few that are deserving of the effort.
I picked up the Kelby book a few months ago. I have revisited a few older shots, time well spent IMHO (Cape Florida Light is one I recently revisited). Most of my time is spent on new work, but it is nice to use new techniques on old work.
As far as the birds, if you look into their eyes they can control you! Be careful, sometime they will insist that you feed them.
Nice Work, Keep shooting
Shutter diahorea is a common affliction we all suffer from Tim - you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find the princess -
Like you last couple of posts -
Im finding that all the blogs I look at have suffered from a dwindling number of comments lately - must be the spring sunshine - people have more to do I guess -
Hope you having fun with photoshop - if you need anyhelp or have any specific effects you'd like to try and need some sort of explantion drop me a line at infinity and I will endevour to email you with a response - its a wonderful program once you master it - its the darkroom of the digital photographer -
TB,
The wondeful thing about digital cameras is that most of the expense is up front. With film, rookie photographers took too few photos and it took a lot longer for them to find out what they like. Take a million pictures: some will appeal right away, but others will grow on you. Keep on shooting -- someday that pidgeon will turn into a marvel. We are all learning.
LOL one legged gull!Arrrr pirate gull!LOL ok on to the actual photo - lovely shot for me - I love how the image is uniform with the great blue tone - gull looks so smooooth - GREAT SHOT!
I agree with others here. With digital in particular, there is no such thing as too many photos. Digital gives you the freedom to push to the edge without having to worry about a wasted shot. I mean who cares if it's a dud, just hit delete and it's gone never to haunt you again.
When I used film so many years ago, my budget was very tight. I passed up so many shots out of fear of not having good enough light, thinking it would be a dumb shot, and numerous other things. I didn't "grow" very fast in the creativity department as a result. Now I have no fear, I'll shoot ANYTHING! I'll also take 10 different shots of the same thing at all different angles, with all different settings, etc. Freedom is a wonderful thing!
Yesterday alone I took over 300 shots. Most of them had some value, many did not. I have seen that over the last few weeks have have many more keepers than I used to. The only thing I have to deal with now, is that since I think I am improving, I have a lot more shots that I keep now, which isn't too bad since they only take up space on a disk, as opposed to boxes of photos and negatives.
Oops! About the shot, I almost forgot trying to do too many things at once. LOl
I love the gull! Great tone! Great framing. Great shot!
Nice post! I like the overall composition of this shot.
Re: Trigger finger on the shutter button.....I think I am an opposite case to you...when I first started taking pictures, I didn't take enough. I'd sit and wait and hope to get "the shot"...now however, I blast away frame after frame, then sift through the rubble on my PC to find the one I like. Mind you, my old point & shoot digi only allowed me to take 1 shot every 3 seconds so I had to be very choosey, but I also missed many great shots too...now I can fire off 10 shots in the blink of an eye on my DSLR.
Tena koe ehoa
TB the image isn't doing a lot for me I'll admit but, Gully is looking rather regal to me!
As for the discussion piece....
I actually agree and disagree with some of the other comments about the amount of photographs blah blah.
For me its more about increasing the quality of images than shooting a lot of them. I can imagine how a "rookie" would/could be trigger happy and enthusiastic and perhaps fill a card in an hour or two.
But sooner or later there comes that defining moment when we must critique our own philosophy on photography, processes of photography and the quality of photographic images we take!
I mean.... "Who in their right mind wants to continue shooting 100 images to get a measily 10 images of reasonable or higher quality, forever?"
For me its another step in the process of learning photography. Perhaps the amount of images one shoots is still the same or thereabouts but, the quality of images is by far well above the initial amount of quality images they were shooting when they first waded into the digital photographic waters. And so it should be! I guess its likened to that old adage "Its about Quality not Quantity".
Perhaps we sometimes justify our photographic processes by saying, "Its digital photography, and we have the capacity to shoot 1000 images a day!" Or are we merely justifying shooting 1000 images?
Whats the point of having thousands of CDs of low end photographic images five to ten years after picking up a digital camera or any camera for that matter?
You'll probably know that sometimes you get in a groove with photography. Stimulus is high and equally balanced with creativity and awareness of a photographic opportunities that are around you. Sometimes they even present themselves as thoughts for you to express as photographic images. In those times of plenty is when I consider it the optimum time to test our own progression in the learning of photography.
Think more about the quality of the image than hoping to get a good one from 100 shots.
It is a sickness for me its swans but it still means that you get good shots like this one.
an interesting shot.
just keep shooting away. sooner rather than later u'll start to get a feel for the opportunities to be seized and those to be passed over.
Awesome capture! I love this shot.
lol, i spent quite a while in the weekend taking pictures of the gulls...but i was trying to get photos of them flying. everytime i clicked though, they were out of the frame already. so then i gave up and took pics of the ones staying still..
hehe the expression on the gull's face is funny in this pic.
Funny stuff! Your not alone, this is a cool pic. It looks like the gull is attached to the marker with a stick! :)
:-) Same syndrome. I found that posting once a week is also hard. I still take lots of photos, but now judging and eliminating them makes it so harder to post just one single photo. Maybe I should return posting everyday again, but I don't have enough time.
I have lots of gulls around here, too. Good shot, and it's funny, why you say that it's giving Ian Anderson impression? :-)
I love this image; it just looks a little flat. I might increase contrast a little; bring out some of the darker tones and increase the bright tones. It's a great capture. Kind regards, Brent
Hi timmybomb
I love this composition.nice picture!!
love this shot..composition an colors are awesome
Post a Comment
<< Home