Upgrade The Photographer

Also known as “No New Gear For The Rest Of The Year” season.

I’m what I like to call a “retro-grouch.” I’m not really all that grouchy; I think I have an adventurers outlook and I love to try new things, explore possibilities, and learn. It’s just that often the learning, the experiencing, gets all bogged down in all the “stuff” that seemingly goes along with it. I’m reminded of George Carlin’s famous skit about needed a bigger box for all the stuff we accumulate.

Well, photography and specifically the plethora of gear that can go along with this craft is beginning to feel like it is too filled with “stuff” for me. I’m yearning for something simpler. I’m beginning to recognize that my accumulation of more stuff does not necessarily correlate to better, more satisfying images. It doesn’t even necessarily correlate directly to more adventure or more fun either.

Ugh.

I’m not in this for more stuff. I have a house full of stuff. I have cycling gear from my days as a racing cyclist. I have rock climbing gear from my time squeezing rocks for dear life. I have backpacking gear from the time when I carried everything I needed on my back, in one bag. I’ve got lots of stuff and I am recognizing that I’ve experienced this feeling of increasing complexity in the quest for simplicity in each of these previous endeavors. And each time I chose an enforced simplicity and discovered more of what I was seeking.

So, I am beginning by putting a moratorium on new gear acquisition. I need to understand light, composition, exposure, aesthetics better instead. I don’t need another lens (I really want one, but I don’t need one!) This is the time to upgrade the photographer (special thanks to Stuart Sipahigil for the idea and the term “upgrade the photographer.”) This is the time to push my skills, use what I’ve got, and focus on the image, be involved in life, tell the story of my community, fall in love with shooting images rather than the gear used to do it.

So, what is on the docket? Well, simplifying for one. Going light. When I was childless and backpacking a lot I read a book about ultralight backpacking and discovered that camping in this way entails philosophy that completely served my reasons for being in wilderness. I left comforts at home and only took necessities. And you know what? I was more comfortable on the trail and consequently in camp as well. I could move faster, see more, experience more, and still have the energy to dance a giddy jig when I experienced something magical.

I plan on applying this same philosophy to my photography; if I can be less encumbered can I then be more in the moment and better able to make a worthwhile image. Henri Cartier-Bresson did it with a Leica and a 50mm lens. Andrew S. Gibson shot stunning images in the Andes with a Canon Digital Rebel and a kit lens. Why not me?

Secondly I plan on studying. I plan on studying other’s work: Larry Towell, Cartier-Bresson, Norman Mauskopf, Trent Parke, and others. I plan on exposing myself to as many art and cultural opportunities here in New Mexico as I can.

I plan on trying to tell the story of the land where I live. Of starting and completing projects that are of interest to me, about people and cultures that interest me. And to have fun. Somewhere along the line this got all serious. No good. Time for some fun and a return to the excitement and wonder I first started shooting with.

I hope you’ll join me on my little journey. I just know there is something magical in the works.