Digital BW, The Print

I hope this personal missive is not OT for everyone -- bear with me if it is
an obvious thing.  It has certainly helped me create much more satisfying
images by subduing my dominant rational, analytical (and often frustrated)
left brain.

For some time I had thought I had reached the limit of my equipment's
ability to produce the best images I could.  I struggled with minute details
and received increasingly small benefits.  The prints were getting
technically better and better but _meant_ no more to me.

This led me to ask in a previous post what other people felt contributed
most to the 'quality' of their images.  Among the good advice there was some
great advice: that I may be focusing too much on equipment.  Instead of
buying a LF camera I bought a Holga and relaxed.

There was something about holding that simple plastic camera with one
shutter speed and one aperture that let me relax and focus on _seeing_
things.  It is a much more holistic process than the formulae I used before
and the images have much more meaning for me.  Some days I now go out to try
and capture a feeling instead of a preconceived arrangement of things. It is
almost like a state of mind - a kind of relaxed attentiveness, if that makes
any sense.

Perhaps these are natural steps in an evolving skill.  Perhaps craft
improves incrementally until a quantum change in seeing/interpreting is
needed, then incremental changes is craft can resume.  Perhaps my head has
softened irreparably <g>

Kevin Gulstene