Shutter Sisters

my kinda truthiness

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This is something to own, to make clear: the day we went to Ross Farm I took 300 pictures in two hours.

I’m a ruthless deleter, and proud of it—the final tally was 60 barely acceptable shots, 12 flickrable.

Early on the learning curve my goal was to improve my shooting ratio—to be happy with one in five shots instead of one in twenty (or thirty, or forty). Admirable, sure.

But then I had kids.

And then there were the mid-frame tackles and the naked streaking and the radioactive snot (we won a Boogitzer for the above, and now we’re rich) and the blur, the constant, unintentional, tasmanian-devil blur.

So now I must fess up to worshipping the continuous shutter, to being in the market for extra storage, to being shamelessly, unapologetically devoted to the Why Take One Frame When You Can Take Fifteen?  school of photographic thought. To be creatively fulfilled (and not demoralized) simply by bettering my odds.

That’s my truth. What’s yours?

What’s exploded in your life that’s flipped your philosophy, changed how you take pictures?

Comments

  1. I am a firm believer in the continuous shutter — I take *all* my shots that way — what else are 2 gb cards for? Taking 10 shots where one is good instead of 1 shot that misses the moment. Sorry, but that’s priceless. Works with nature photography as much as kid moments, too. Come on, focus on the bird, snap 10 shots — one will work. Totally worth it.

  2. Oh yes, having kids and having digital. I love the ‘messy’ shots–the blurs, the weird expressions, the creases, the boogers, the spit. The only thing I hate is bad lighting.

  3. I have my camera set to continuous. But I have gotten better at the deleting. Kind of.

    Yous son’s eyes are phenomenal, as is that right hand shot.

  4. I am right there with you. I take hundreds of shots and am proud of it. For the Easter egg hunt we did in with our twins club I took at least 200. I hardly ever delete pictures when we are out. I wait until they are loaded. Even then I find it hard to delete the so-so pictures that may never go anywhere but my computer. That is why I have almost 10,000 pictures sitting in my iPhoto and why everything is backed up twice. I can’t say that my pictures are better because I take more. I think I’m just more likely to get one or two good ones.

    These are some of those just shoot and delete later pics. As you can see I used some of the "not so great ones", but they are priceless to me.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/24035778@N04/2394364002/

    Happy Monday!

  5. I click first…alot…and delete later. Works for me. 🙂 Does anyone know how many times a person can do this before the quality of the card is compromised, if at all? I thought I heard/read that it was quite a large number. Oh well…I’m not too worried. But anyways, I do like the continuous shutter mode too. Snapping photos is like eating a box of chocolates…you never know what you’re going to get. 😉 hee hee (sorry, couldn’t resist) Happy snappin’!

  6. Oh, deleting….. that’s hard!!! So, once in awhile I sort through all my nature fotos and try to delete the not that good shots. Concerning kids, well…..since the digital world I take lot’s and lot’s of fotos of my two kids…..we bought a extra external harddrive to store more on and to have a backup. It’s hard to delete fotos for me, but I give my best to sort out. And shooting 200 fotos in a short sounds familiar;) Smiles, Anke 😉

  7. Um, I do that too. With kids, it’s almost a requirement! At an Easter party we went to recently, I filled a 5GB card. FILLED it!

    I’ve had professional photographers tell me I need to mentally compose my shots more, to be more deliberate. I don’t agree. Of course I think about composition. But when you have 2 kids moving at the speed of light, one shot hardly ever does it!

  8. Love that blue eye!

    It’s funny you should post this today because just yesterday I was snapping away in my yard with my son, and I took about 250 pictures! I deleted only about 50 of them. I, too, find it hard to delete some that are not very good, but they may have captured a look or a grin that I just want to hang onto. I also take a ton of nature photos. Lately I’ve been thinking that I’m running out of things to take pictures of in my yard (I don’t get out much), so that’s forced me to get creative. I’m setting the camera on the ground, or putting it at another angle and not necessarily looking through the viewfinder. I’ve gotten a lot of nothing, but then sometimes I get something great. Also, since I’m rarely in our family photos, I’ve been trying to snap a few of my son and me by just sticking the camera out with my arm and pointing it towards us. Yesterday I finally got a couple I like. Here’s one:

    http://www.mamaofletters.com/Mama_of_Letters/Camera_Happy.html#15

  9. oh i could have TOTALLY written this exact post. I too am caught up in the blur and, oh not another blinking one of mommahood, so digital is my friend. my very dear, forgiving, loving indulging, friend. Just this Sat. I took 141 pics on a day out with kids and hubby and posted 11 to flikr, thus showing i am not so good at my ratios… i am really trying hard to break my gaze or mama~tunnel vision that sets in and "just shoot it" like a previous sister so wisely said. so anything that catches my eye i shoot, not imporving my ratios mind you, but looking beyond a bit and it is fun.
    one from my walk.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/14811117@N02/2392636127/

  11. yes, yes, yes! i am an avid deleter too! i’d say taking 300 pictures is just about right, and scoring 60 out of it is right on par. two hours of planned time usually proves about 120 shots from me and i end up with 20 photos in my library of which i’ll put about a dozen on flickr (if nana requests) oh god, if we’re having a sunny day in the garden i can walk away with about 20 photos in a matter of minutes!

    that’s my truth. one time at a holiday tree lighting, a husband of a friend made some snarky comment about "take enough pictures yet?" it’s how i move beyond ‘snapshot’ to completely visually pleasing. by taking alot of photos i can see what works and what i like. cause really, i don’t know what i’m doing. i just take alot of photos.

    i even set my camera setting to the continuous shot so i can hold the shutter and take 3 consequetive frames which has come in handy for action shots of smashing plates, for example. and note: the one in the middle is usually the keeper.

  15. The big shift in my thinking came when I realized that just because I have the digital capability does not mean that I have to have a photographic record of every event. My mom once asked my little sister why she didn’t take more pictures on a church trip and she said, "We were having too much fun to take pictures."

    Sometimes it’s okay not to take pictures–big statement for a mom like me who used the continuous shooting mode even before the digital revolution. By the way, "extra storage" for me is boxes and boxes of photos filling the shelves of my walk-in closet.

  16. My philosophy is identical to yours, mamacita.

    The more photos I take, the more apt I am to catch a moment. Does that make sense?

    The thing that has changed me? Digital photography. What a wonder it is. And I LOVE IT WITH ALL MY HEART.

  19. I always keep my camera on continuous mode. Such freedom! I too am a ruthless deleter, however. Gotta keep some drive space open!

  20. I’ve been thinking a lot about your question a couple of days ago about what do we do when we are uncreative. Well, I just don’t create. There is nothing I have found that allows me to rekindle the juices. Sometimes I’m creative. Sometimes I am not and that is about the end of it.

    On to this question…kids have definitely changed my life and my photography. My daughter is the only one who will pose for me now. And she is three. I get photos of the boys playing football and my 6 year old (third son) will pose every now and again but I’m like you, Photoshop can drive me CRAZY. It takes so much time. And then I’m still not sure if I have the colors right.

    I posted a couple days ago about my love/hate relationship with Photoshop. It can be so consuming and overwhelming. I like that some seem to have "actions" that allow them to do the same thing with their photos again and again without have to go through each step but my Photoshop Elements will not let me do that. So I stick my tongue out at all those who seem to figure it out so easily or have more time than I do (not really it just seems the mood I’m in). It seems like you can Photoshop until you are purple.

    I agree with you. Take 2 million pics and maybe 10 will come out great!!!

    Cheerio!
    julie

  21. Two things have enabled me to feel OK with shooting a LOT – going ‘digital’ and not having to pay for all of that developing is one, and the arrival of this little guy into my life –

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/23630286@N05/2308700422/

    He’s getting sick of the constant clicking! It’s like I am a member ofthe paparazzi or something…However, I also have to remind myself to put the camera down to take PART in all the fun, not just be the recorder of it!

  23. My 50mm lens has changed the way I approach photography. I was an unapologetic zoomer from the first day I thankfully traded in my old, Kodak 126-film camera for a point-and-shoot Fuji with a zoom lens. I could not imagine using a fixed focal length. I was positive the lack of flexibility would stifle my creativity.

    Then I bought a Canon 50mm/f1.8 lens.

    I have used that lens almost exclusively for the two or so months since then. My images are crisper. I rarely have to crop to get the image I want, because I must now move to compose the shot before taking it, rather than depending on a zoom and then editing software to compose the shot. Rather than stifle my creativity, it’s forced me to be more creative about how I compose shots. I recently attended the circus and used only that lens from halfway up the arena, so I had to think about how to compose the shots to make them meaningful, since I couldn’t zoom in. And I’ve gotten more forgiving when a shot doesn’t come out exactly the way I want; after all, I can’t depend on a zoom, so my options are limited.

  24. I would LOVE a camera with a continous shutter….(why oh WHY did I talk myself out of a new camera?) last night I was trying to get some good shots of Rosalyn in the warm setting sun in the front room, and maybe, MAYBE 3 of 25 are keepers. Sigh.

    I love how Ben always looks so bemused by it all, as if in shock…it’s adorable and wonderful.

  27. Yes, the continuous shutter feature was my most brilliant discovery of late. It is a mom’s best friend when trying to take decent photos of wily toddlers!