I am enjoying a little holiday with my dad in the spectacular Yosemite national park. We are doing a photographer’s weekend, toting along our various cameras, tripods, and laptops to capture some of the amazing fall colors out here. It’s a great getaway.
Cell phone service is almost non-existant here, but the lodge does have wifi, thank God. So I can maintain some connection to the outside world.
The relative isolation out here is really nice though. My dad and I just wiled away the hours wandering from one amazing spot to another, shooting hundreds of photos in silence.
An hour before sunset, my dad and I joined a small band of shutterbugs on the Sentinel Bridge to try and capture halfdome mountain just as the light was fading. We all fancied ourselves following in the footsteps of Ansel Adams, whose photos still stun me.
Alas, the sun, clouds and wind did not cooperate, so we took a few shots and went home for supper.
My dad explained to me that reproducing a photo that Ansel Adam’s shot isn’t really the point of photography. He said that shooting nature is about waiting for a unique moment in time and trying to capture it. Chasing after someone else’s photo is just mimicry without meaning.
Taking landscape photos is a humbling experience. So much depends on factors that are outside of your control — the weather, the sun, the wind, the clouds. You simply have to pay attention, be patient, and take a lot of really bad pictures.
Being the control freak that I am, its a difficult but rewarding exercise.
Of course it would help if my new lasik-vision wasn’t still blurry.