Reviewing and Setting Goals – 2011Posted by drfl on January 11th, 2011

As I mentioned in my End of Year Retrospective, with the start of every new year, I review my goals for the previous year and set my goals for the next year. This is an activity I recommend for everyone engaged in an ongoing activity photography or not. So what did my review find?

Last year I saw a fairly good growth in business, more and more people are becoming aware of my work which means that my marketing engine is working. Website traffic has grown and a great deal of interest in my work came from a diverse collection of sources. Is my marketing working at 100%? Probably not, but then again most marketing schemes do not, there is always room for improvement. How about shooting? While I captured some new and different images, I feel the need to expand my existing collections, try new things, and above all else – learn more!

So what am I planning for 2011? From an image collection perspective, I have at least 2 trips envisoned – one for Rocky Mountain National Park and another for western Nebraska. I really want to show a different side of the state than to which I accustomed. I also hope to add a couple of pieces of really unique equipment, one which may be coming this week! Stay tuned for what that may be! We can learn together (if you’re into that sort of thing.  A shiny new thing may help me lift the photography funk that has plagued me since early November. The 6-8 inch blanket of snow that just fell is also helping with that though.

From a business perspective, I hope to expand my stock offerings and collection with additional supporting imagery. So often I pick 1 image out of a couple of hundred, process it, and present it. There are several variations of my images that I simply archive, some of these may be useful to those looking for a larger variety. I do not know how I will accomplish this yet, but I hope to a have a structure and plan for this by the end of January. I also plan on expanding to new art fairs. In the past I have only attended one per year. I hope to expand that to 2-4 this year.

So what are your goals?  Share them if you like, but be sure to set some!

2011 looks to be exciting and I’m looking forward to making some new images!

Technical Details:
Falling Water Falls, Ozark National Forest, Arkansas
Canon 5D Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 33mm, f/16, 2 sec., ND Filter (3-stop)

5 Arguments Against “Is That REALLY How You Saw It?” – #3: Can You Stop Time?Posted by drfl on June 9th, 2010

A hundredth of a second here, a hundredth of a second there — even if you put them end to end, they still only add up to one, two, perhaps three seconds, snatched from eternity.”
- Robert Doisneau

Let’s face it, our eyes are more geared towards movies than photography. When we look at something, it is rarely static. Still photography captures only a slice of moments, fractions of experiences. Our lives are interactive films. Even on a still day, when we point our lenses at an outdoor scene, the sun’s deliberate transit causes shadows to move, light to scatter, and depths to change. A photograph is a wholly singular point in time. We never truly see anything as unchanging. Waterfalls, for example, are usually caught over a long exposure, transforming the motion into silky-smoothness. Is that how we saw it? No. Sometimes, water is captured in a quick stop, drops hanging in mid-air. Is that how we saw it? No. So how did we see it? Simply, motion. A photograph by its very still nature makes it only a frame from the movie of our lives. Unless one is using mind-altering drugs or have achieved higher levels of consciousness can one maybe stop time, and I don’t recommend the former and I have no answers for the latter. Only through a camera can you freeze time easily and effectively.

Mass Believability? – 7 That water looks so surreal!

Technical Details:
Canon 5D Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm, f/16, 1.3 sec., Singh-Ray 3-Stop ND Filter
Six Finger Falls, Ozark National Forest, Arkansas

Photo Friday: Curved Reflections (The Arch in St. Louis)Posted by drfl on May 7th, 2010

I haven’t had a photo Friday in the last couple of weeks since I was actually out photographing!  I took a little adventure to northern Arkansas and ended up in St. Louis for a wedding. I will be sharing some of the results of this trip over the course of the next week or so. Today it kicks off with an image of the Arch at the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis, Missouri.  The weather was quite dynamic allowing some very interesting shots of this monument. For this particular shot I braved the numerous mosquitoes and opted for a small aperture to give a star-look to the lights and a long exposure to help streak the clouds as they floated by.

As a side note, my 17-40 f/4l’s autofocus stopped working right the day before. That lens just hasn’t been the same since it fell out of my bag when my zipper broke about 2 years ago in Kansas City. Missouri just hasn’t been nice to that lens!

Technical Details:
Canon 5d Mark II, 17-40 f/4l @ 22mm, f/16, 20 seconds
The Arch, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, St. Louis, Missouri

Slowed FlowPosted by admin on January 23rd, 2009

Today’s image was taken on a rainy, overcast day during my last trip to Alberta, Canada. Overcast days are optimal for capturing the movement of the water and slowing it to a silky flow. I felt that this technique gave this photo a feeling of a bit of motion, instead of a “snapshot of time” where everything is completely frozen. Through this I hope that this allows you to be drawn into the composition more, rather than being just a viewer.

Technical Details:
Canon 5d, 17-40 f/4l @ 27mm, f/18, 10 sec.
Alberta, Canada

Power and LightPosted by admin on August 12th, 2008

This image was taken in Kansas City as well, in the Power and Light District. This particular evening, the lead singer of Boston was performing at the KC Live, which is at the far right of the image. I used a long exposure with the street in the foreground to capture the streaks of the headlights of the cars passing by.

Technical Details:
Canon 5d, 17-40 f/4l @ 17mm, f/16, 30 sec.
Power and Light District, Kansas City, Missouri

To view other photographs, order this photograph as a print, or purchase licensing rights, please visit my website at http://www.journeyoflight.com/.