Through the lens

Today's post somewhat goes along with yesterday's.  Not necessarily in that it has to do with my kids, but rather an interesting thought(s), to me anyways, when it comes to how we see the world in which we live.

There are people out there who are always overly happy.  They have always drove me nuts.  I don't know if it's because of how negative I can be at times or if it has to do with the fact that I would love to be able to be that full of joy.  Now I know the Bible talks about being full of joy and being able to have joy even in the midst of hard times.  As I listen to people like this, more often than not, they are genuinely happy because they have LEARNED how to appreciate many of the things life has to offer.

I know I struggle with this.  It's really easy to get caught up in the here and now and what is going on and forget to slow down and really look at things.  I wrote a blog quite a while ago called Looking vs Seeing which somewhat touches on this same subject.

Since I have started photographing more, I think God has been giving me the opportunity to really enjoy His creation.  I have a 30 min drive to work each day on a road that goes mostly through country side (if you call it that).  The more I travel that road the more I see how beautiful some of the trees are.  I have seen amazing sunrises, picture perfect moonlit skies, and numerous other scenes that I wish I had my camera for.

I wonder how many times in life we really miss all that God is doing and all that God has given us, because we move so quickly and refuse to slow down and really examine our surroundings.

I keep coming across this phrase by great photographers called "spray and shoot."  It's a reference to how most amateurs shoot.  We find a target that we think would look cool in a picture and we shoot and shoot and hope that we got one that looks good.  I used to do that more than I do now, but I am still bad at it.

The better a photographer gets at the craft the fewer shots that have to actually have to be taken. Not because there are less targets, but rather they no how to capture the real moment.  They have LEARNED how to see more than just what the average person sees.  They see light, the see subject, they see background, they see detail, they see so much more than the average person.

I once heard a story about a photographer who hiked 5 miles to a mountain side to shoot a sunset picture.  He got to the spot, set up all the equipment, prepared himself for the shot, and then....put it all away and went home, never taking the shot.  When asked why he said the shot wasn't right.  All the elements he was looking for weren't there.   Yet, to so many of us, we would have said hey, that looks good lets just shoot that.  I would fall into that category, I'm sure.

In a nutshell, what I am saying is that I think we spend too much time trying to do more and forget that God gave us so much to be thankful for....so much to enjoy....so much to appreciate and yet we miss it because we are too busy or too focused to slow down and truly enjoy...truly appreciate....truly see what is right in front of our noses.