Why Photography?

It is a good idea, for anyone, who is starting to take something a little more serious than they usually do is to take baby steps. There is no reason to go fully overboard because one may find out it isn’t for them.

I did this very method of finding my passion through writing and now I have done so in the field of photography. I used to take photos with my crappy point and shoot camera. I would take the camera anywhere, I would take a photo a day, I took it even to work to see what interesting things I would capture. I had a great time doing so, but as months passed by I stopped using my camera, I just didn’t care anymore. I made the decision over the past Christmas break to get a present for myself. So I ended up getting a Nikon D60.

Great camera, bulking, but not unreasonable, and I could learn for days on how to use it properly. Everyone learns differently and the way I learn is by playing with things without using a manual. I finally hit a brick wall, so I read some of the manual, watched a couple of the videos, and read some information online. I even bought a bigger lense for my California trip so I could take better images far away. I was in the game and knew this was my second passion of active interest.

I have now committed to being a photographer. I have bought Apple Aperture, a 16 gig memory card, and a photography book that will teach me everything I need to know about photography. I can go to classes and get the experience there, but I want to do this on my own. This is the way I feel I will learn more efficiently and appreciate the art of photography.

I will continue to do my photo journalism as a hobby and challenge myself with taking photos that provoke emotion and what I feel that gives the viewer of my work an understanding of who I am. I don’t know where this love of photography came from, but I do like how things ‘just happen’.

I wonder with my writing, and now with photography, where this will take me. I have heard from many people that are close to me and others who don’t know me much at all that I need to look into photo journalism. So, my next step is to take that part seriously and do it on my own, but first as a hobby.

Writing Update:

My writing is progressing nicely! After nearly 5 months of writing in my novel at a sporadic pace, I have written 58 pages. I’m thrilled with the accomplishment and looking forward to completing my goal of reaching 100 pages by the end of the month. I am a little stuck though, I don’t know how to introduce the beginning of the novel with the end of it. I have skipped around and wrote the middle: the part I do know about. However, I still have ambiguity with the beginning and how to make the story provide emotion to the reader. I’ll figure it out, I have to!

Other than that I am on the right track of finishing my novel by the end of the year.

I have also developed a way to write descriptively, so I will improve on that skill and see where I can get better.

I’m going to take some advice from a friend, who is also in the 2nd or 3rd edit of her book: write more and often. I will do so and get something on paper and not worry about what it looks like, I will edit and edit my work in the rewrites.

Also, and lastly, I have come up with the grand idea of writing a memoir, specifically about the process and year of me becoming a writing. I am not going to start writing this until I am more than half way finish with my novel. I am having a hard time imagining writing 2 books at the same time, and how it will affect my creativity or drive to get both goals done. I’ll see, I think this memoir will give people a different side of my mind and the unique way I process information and get things done.

I’m at 170 days of non-stop writing, and counting…