By MICHAEL PERKINS
GIVE A KID ENOUGH CHRISTMASES ON HIS BELT, and he will probably confess that, in many years, the sweet anticipation of Santa's arrival far outstripped the enjoyment of what eventually showed under the tree. Photographers understand this feeling of limitless potential. It may, actually be the lure that keeps them going back into the breech again and again. Next time, we say. Tomorrow, we assure ourselves. The picture I'm about to make is the one.
That intoxicating appeal of possibility is, I am sure, what's kept me coming back every new shooting day of my life, the idea that my eye may just be about to execute will redeem me. Justify the time. Excuse the expense. More properly, validate my hope that I can actually do this. That tension-tinged-with-faith is what governs every artistic enterprise, and, for photogs, the approach of yet one more chance to make things right between eye and machine is ever keen, ever new.
New morning: Monterey Bay, 9:42am, October 25, 2010.
Photographers can be led astray of course, since their craft involves devices, and we can be fooled into believing that the magic is in the box, and that, the more sophisticated or expensive the box, the better the output. But everyone who's made bad pictures with good gear knows this for the fable that it is. The magic originates in the heart, and, with good luck, is at least partly imparted to the box. The difference between "damn, so close!" and "that's the one" is often measured in fractions of inches, pieces of seconds....but, boy howdy, when we do hit that wave and not only survive it but ride it, it is so worth the price of admission.
That's why some of my favorite images (like the one seen above) are tied most closely to the feeling that today will be different, and which tend to be the first pictures of a given day. In rifling through piles of old pics, I can always spot these shots. They stamped a little something extra onto my soul, because they got the day off on a good foot, convincing me that I could spend the entire day piling one success on top of another. Some days, of course, the first pictures of the day merely illustrate how very far my journey really is going to be. But even at those moments, I tell myself, I am just minutes from turning things around.
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