SOLITARY TRAVELER PHOTOGRAPHY

So (until now, anyway) I skipped over what I did over the summer. That's because, in a lot of ways, this summer felt like a "lost weekend" of sorts, trying to find my photographic "voice" again after a period of real uncertainty in my work. Simply put (and I alluded to this briefly in my previous blog) I got a lot more "no's" than "yeses" over the late spring and summer months. A lot of my work got passed up, and income I thought would be there wasn't. Yet when that happens a

So the first part of my spring found me trying hard to avoid repeating myself (See my prior blog "Looking For New"), tossing a spanner into the works to keep things fresh for myself, mainly because I get bored so easily. The trip to Breaks Interstate Park did the trick. I had returned a bit to the old routine soon after (old habits die hard), visiting Linville Gorge for some scouting to prepare for something that never happened. Here's why...... After chatting off and on for

The never-ending winter (which seemed like a real life version of "Groundhog Day," with Yours Truly playing the role of Bill Murray) finally gave way to spring; but, just like last year, there was a real sense that I was repeating and reiterating myself again (just like "Groundhog Day"). The typical spring itinerary for Yours Truly (and virtually every other photographer in the southeast, it seems nowadays) over the past few years has roughly gone something like this, in some

On a rainy Friday, just before Christmas, in a singular, freak moment that night - I slipped on wet concrete, my feet giving way from under me, with all 200 of my pounds landing on my left wrist and arm as I vainly tried to break my fall..... And I knew as soon as I landed with a sickening thud, I'd hurt myself. I stumbled back to my feet, bought an ice cup at a convenience store, poured the ice into a bag, placed it against my swelling wrist and arm, and carried on. I even w

"Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you." ~ Satchel Paige It's always been about the "long game" in regards to my photography. One little step here, another there; slowly, but surely. My poor scatterbrain can't handle all-at-once success. There's a friend who is based in Texas who once mentioned that it took him seven years to break even and begin making profits in his photography. I'm in my fifth year as a sole proprietor, and I came as close as ever in 2016 to b

So I'm sitting here at my desktop tonight (which in reality is a Toshiba laptop with a broken screen, connected to an ancient White Westinghouse monitor - and is also cranky, slow, and old, much like its owner. But hey, it's got Windows 10, so there's that); and I can barely move. If I stand up to move around, I can't even straighten my right leg. And since my cozy little apartment is a two-level, I have to gingerly step down from my breakfast nook (where the glorified laptop

As I was wrapping up the writing on my blog "Heading For The Light" on November 28, news reports were slowly filtering in from the other side of the Smokies: Gatlinburg was literally on fire. The Chimney Tops fire that I mentioned in the previous blog had suddenly, wildly expanded, as promised and much-needed rains were preceded by hurricane force winds, some reaching up to 90 MPH. Those winds picked up burning embers from the Chimney Tops fire and rapidly deposited them at r

When I was a kid, I had my own little Saturday morning ritual. Starting around 1980, not long after my father passed, I'd make a bee line to the grand room in our house, sit on the couch, and turn the radio to Z-93 in Atlanta to hear Casey Kasem on American Top 40. And for four hours, I'd sit and be mesmerized by the tunes Casey played, some of which weren't even on Z-93's playlist. I'd listen as he counted them down, from 40 to number one. And I did this for years, all the w

In recent weeks, the steady flow of images from Yours Truly began slowly diminishing to a near halt. And it was no fault of my sometimes dodgy Honda Civic, a car that has developed a habit of starting when she darn well feels like it - with nearly 230,000 miles on her, I'm grateful that she even starts at this point. Somehow I made it through the entire fall foliage season without being stranded, even though the ol' Civic sometimes does nothing at all when I first turn the ke

"When I last left off" seems to be a recurring theme in my travel blogs lately. I'd sit down and begin writing a new blog, only to be distracted by one thing or another (and there have been a LOT of distractions), then I'd go wafting off without even typing another word, and another travel blog gets abandoned. That being said.... When I last left off....... .......we were somewhere in August, and I had endured a stormy summer, literally and figuratively speaking. I'd about ha

I had great hopes for Sunday morning. The rain that had soothed me to sleep the night before (and believe me, there's nothing more soothing than falling asleep to the sound of rain here in the Smokies) was scheduled to move out at sunrise Sunday morning. So I dutifully set my alarm for 5:15 AM, with two options for an epic sunrise shot dancing in my head. As it turned out, neither option became reality, because Mr. "My-body-feels-like-it-got-hit-by-a-Greyhound-Bus" here decid

Winter is always the toughest season for photography - at least for myself, anyway. If you've kept pace with my blogs, you already know that winter and I are engaged in a sort of "peaceful co-existence" - in other words, I (mostly) don't like it, but I cope as best I can. So I count the days and salvage whatever images I can until I see the first spring blooms, so I can give the wintry season the send off I think it deserves: "Don't come back now, ya hear?" Since winter isn't

I wish I could sit here and tell you that the majority of my work is the product of well-thought-out planning, superior knowledge and cunning skill. But oh no. It's more akin to what musician Bill Bruford once said about his forays into electronic percussion: "I'm here to tell you it's one constant amateurish shambles from start to finish." To be sure, I know all "the spots," the locations near home with all the elements that make great landscape images possible. I take menta