An End of Year Retrospective for 2009Posted by drfl on December 29th, 2009
At the end of every year there is a deluge of “Best of” lists. Wholly subjective and different for every person, these lists hopefully celebrate the successes and identify the failures so that the next year can be even better. It is during the cold wintry months I sit down in a warm location and review my previous year. I look at my work, look at how I grew and changed artistically and ask myself a few key questions (summarized):
- Did I accomplish my artistic goals that I set last year?
- Were my business efforts met with success?
- What images did I fail to capture the mood/scene/emotion that I wanted?
- Did I surprise myself?
- Do I still enjoy what I am doing? (Most Important)
If #5 is a Yes! (and it has been year after year), I look to next year and ask myself a few more key questions:
- What artistic goals do I have for this year?
- What locations should I focus on photographing?
- What types of lenses/filters/techniques should I try?
- What business ideas should I implement or push this year?
- What hasn’t been successful and what should discontinue?
So what have I found by asking myself all these questions? To follow the lead of others, here is my ”Best Of” list to illustrate my triumphs and to help answer those questions. This is a collection of my favorite images, perhaps not the most profitable, but the ones that I feel exemplify my artistic growth.
#5 (Tie) Glorious Sandhills Sunrise and Toadstool Dawn
One of my ongoing projects is to photograph Nebraska, especially the not often seen places. I want to show the diversity of the state and the beauty that exists. These two photographs each show a different region of the state and places that many would overlook.


















