Guidance

Couple of week before I took this picture, I told myself, "I want to have a photograph that would look like a photograph taken by a pro." For that two weeks, after my classes, I was at the park every sunny afternoon with my camera trying to compose a good photograph. I took photos of different subjects like big and small rocks, dry riverbeds, waves crashing and breaking on the shore, and floating wooden docks. Although some of my compositions were pretty good, I deleted most of them. I was not satisfied with the pictures even after I tweaked them. I wanted to bring out the best out of the picture, but it seems that I can't.

A week after I deleted all the pictures I took the previous week, without any reason, I browsed through my recycle bin, and I found this picture of the lighthouse. I thought that maybe I could work a little on this photo. However, after an hour of working on this photo, I was still not satisfied with the outcome. I decided to put the picture on greyscale, and I was surprised with the black and white image on my monitor's screen. "This is what I want!" I told myself with a smile on my face. This photograph of the lighthouse brought my ideas back to me.

I have learned a lesson from this experience. The problem I had when taking those photos that I tossed was I was thinking hardly about the idea of the subject and composition of those proffesional photographers. It is like I was trying to copy their work. After doing the post-processing of this photo, I thought that why does my brain was swimming in their ideas even though I knew that I could generate my own? Also, I think I forgot something. I forgot that every subject and every photograph has something to do with the feelings of the photographer; moreover, that feeling is what makes the photograph alive and meanignful.

Shutter Speed: 1/ 1.3 sec.
Aperture: F25
Focal Length: 25mm