Don’t shoot what it looks like. Shoot what it feels like.
– david alan harvey
Just over a month ago, I hurt my wrists (one minor, one bad enough to need a cast) while doing one of my favorite outdoors activities, mountain biking. I just got the cast replaced by a brace this past week so I’m still not able to ride. However, during the time I had a cast on I was not allowed to be active at all. Therefore, I was very anxious to do any sort of outdoors activity as soon as I possibly could. Yesterday provided a great opportunity for me to go hiking. The weather was nice, and it wasn’t too cool in the afternoon. That is a benefit to living in north Georgia, that even in the winter we are able to get random days here and there that are not too cold or wet to be outside for extended periods of time. The downside to hiking in the winter, of course, is that this scenery and views are not going to be as nice as other times of year. I do enjoy hiking just for its own sake, as it is one of my other favorite outdoors activities, but I also love taking pictures when I am out exploring different trails. What that means for me as a photographer is that this time of year challenges me to look for different things to photograph, or different ways of looking at the usual things. I always feel that even if it doesn’t turn out the way you intended or hoped, pushing yourself to try different techniques or look at familiar things in new ways to take a different kind of picture still makes you a better photography later on. Lately, I have been hiking and riding my bike at a particular place a lot more than I ever had before. In fact, before recently I had not been to the area I’m speaking of since before I went to photography school and moved to NYC. I took the following pictures during my several hours of hiking yesterday and I think they do represent a less often photographed side of nature. Since it was a beautiful day with a fantastic clear blue sky and there were no leaves on the trees, I like what I captured. However, I’m interested to see what I can create from one of these pictures in particular through some editing.
