Bad Photos? Anyone? Anyone?
I received an email from a woman at Grove Lake WMA the other day asking if the picture I took of her and her family turned out well. “It did not,” I told her, then apologized for taking such a horrible photo of her group.
When I say “horrible,” I am not referring to poor light or composition. My definition of “horrible” requires that all viewing parties would agree.
The interesting aspect of a horrible photo, however, is that rare few people, aside from the photographer, sees these photos. They are all quickly deleted. Yet we all take them (except for Eric Fowler), and I feel that they should be occasionally shared.
Maybe to encourage newcomers that all photographers, regardless of how long they have been shooting, have some bad photos in their history. Or maybe just because I want to make sure I’m not the only one.
Here are some examples:
There is a difference between motion and blur - this is an example of the latter.
I love flash photography.
A bird on a tree limb. It doesn't get much easier...at least for some it doesn't get much easier.
I have no idea what happened here.
I think you must have meant Michael Forsberg or Jon Farrar when you said everyone takes bad photos but me. I delete gobs of them.
EF
These aren’t too bad. They look quite artistic.
I secretly agree. I’m glad someone thought this as well.
Forsberg made a bad photo once, but it was so long ago I’ve forgotten what it was. It is so much easier to get rid of your bad photos in this digital age. You just sent those little excited electrons off into outerspace. I recall days with a wastebasket half empty of slides. That, of course, is a pessimist’s take on it. Some might have seen the wastebasket as half full.
Funny. I delete hundreds each week! Everyone takes bad shots – we just destroy the evidence as quickly as possible.
I thought it was just me. And my cheaper camera! Think that all of you probably have a better camera than me, being as you are in the business of taking some pics and using them in your job. I take them for Ebay listing and maybe every other one is a blur. Now I know it just a fluke, maybe a little shake of the hands or something like that?
I have a lot of the “shake of the hands.” On this staff, I probably have the overall shakiest. Farrar’s the oldest, but makes wooden decoys that actually look like the real thing. Pretty steady, I imagine. Carroll’s hands have probably never shaken. Fowler’s have, however. Hopefully one day he’ll write about trying to get a photo of a striking snake. A very short, but good, story.
Always looks good in the viewfinder! It’s when you get home and start sorting through prints/slides/images the “what was I thinking” feeling creeps up on you.
Of course, you can always just say it was an artistic decision….
All of this makes what Jim Brandenburg did with his North Woods Journal project for Nat’l Geographic so impressive. It’s been 13 years since that came out, but I still remember how inspired I was by the fact that he took only 1 exposure each day for 90 days – and got 90 excellent images. I’m no less impressed today.
http://www.tpl.org/tier3_cd.cfm?content_item_id=1862&folder_id=646
I’ve never seen this book, but will definitely be looking it up.
Jeff Kurrus Associate Editor, NEBRASKAland Magazine Read our blog at afieldandafloat.wordpress.com