“There’s no shot around here – time to head home.”

[Greg Miller]

I find I can sometimes walk for miles/hours without seeing anything I want to photograph. But as soon as I take out the camera and start composing something, anything, I start seeing endless possibilities. So I have a rule that if I have not found anything to photograph in the first 15 minutes of an outing, I stop, take out the camera, and start framing whatever happens to be there. I'll usually end up finding something compelling enough to photograph. I think the camera acts like an on/off button sometime; in the bag = off; on the tripod = on.

[Kodachrome25]

In every corner of the world, every town, on every street, every stream, every valley, every hour of the day, there are stunning, award winning if not mind blowing photographs to be had. You just have to have the openness of mind and above all else, the raw talent to see them...

Great photographs well seen and aptly recorded are the realm of pure talent, nothing else will do...

[Old-N-Feeble]

Open-mindedness and raw talent? Sounds like too much work.

[ross]

I think the camera acts like an on/off button sometime; in the bag = off; on the tripod = on.

I find this to be particularly true as well.

[David_Senesac]

Several responses here perfectly reflect my own stingy attitudes about taking or not taking shots. Actually these are key elements of what separates large format work from that of other cameras. I have a few such stories of patience on my pages as this one:

http://www.davidsenesac.com/images/print_06-x1-3.html

So what some of us often do is only go out when there is a worthwhile potential for conditions to cooperate for possibly capturing a known landscape and then only depress the shutter when that vision occurs.

http://www.davidsenesac.com/images/print_04-i1-2.html

Other times we are out in the field at distant locations we cannot easily return to and find what we know is a potentially very valuable image that in order to capture the prize may take considerable patience. A common situation is being set up in front of a mountain mirror lake reflection waiting for an adequately calm moment. In mountains, morning breezes often only get stronger so at some point I just bag my gear and move on. Oh I may at least take out my little compact digital camera and snag a shot of what I had been pointing at for the record. But otherwise will move on and not waste pricy film and development. In the following situation of fog and overcast is my story where I waited for hours. Oh I could have easily given up after a half hour and taken a modestly interesting frame however knowing what potentially could occur gave me the endurance to wait it out even though I could have otherwise been exploring elsewhere possibly productively:

http://www.davidsenesac.com/images/print_05-bb1-2.html

And many times, I just carry the 25 to 35 pounds of 4x5 gear about exploring landscapes that I don't expect to actually find anything because 1) its good exercise for the kind of places I landscape work I do and 2) I've been burned a few times finding a great subject under conditions of fleeting extraordinary light without my gear

So whose fault you ask? Not the better way to look at the situation but rather what is the WISE thing to do and then to be happy one played that round of the game well and got some exercise while breathing some fresh air.

[Two23]

I've come to think that all light is good. There is only bad use of the light you have. Since I can't control the light in daytime, I come up with a shot that will work with the light I have. If I have trouble doing that, I might just wait until dark. Then, I pull out my 10,000ws of strobe power and make the light do what I want.


Kent in SD

[Brian Ellis]

In every corner of the world, every town, on every street, every stream, every valley, every hour of the day, there are stunning, award winning if not mind blowing photographs to be had. You just have to have the openness of mind and above all else, the raw talent to see them...

Great photographs well seen and aptly recorded are the realm of pure talent, nothing else will do...

It's been estimated that Ansel Adams made about 50,000 exposures in his lifetime, of which about 1,000 were worth printing and showing. So what happened with the other 49,000? How come he photographed the subject of those 49,000 photographs and missed the award-winning, mind-blowing photographs that must have been nearby if your theory is correct? Did he just lack the talent to see them (I use Ansel Adams as an example only because I happen to have heard a knowledgeable estimate of the total number of photographs he made in his lifetime)?

Your theory sounds nice but IMHO it's wrong. There aren't award-winning, mind-blowing photographs everywhere that most of us just lack the talent to see. In fact award winning, mind-blowing photographs are extremely rare and usually are a result of some combination of talent, luck, and circumstances.

[John Kasaian]

Mind blowing is a relative term. Some people have easily blown minds!

[hiend61]

Most of the times, I try to research about what I will find in a location before I get there. I always leave home with an idea in my mind about what I want to get, but also many times I find surprises and I end taking pictures of things I didn't thought they were there. If I end the day with nothing is mainly because of bad weather conditions.

[E. von Hoegh]

Mind blowing is a relative term. Some people have easily blown minds!

Also, one must have a mind.