We went to a place called Como Gardens today. The Vintage Drivers Club have a christmas day where you find a nice spot(which isn't hard) to throw down the picnic rug and munch away before exploring the gardens. Santa turns up for the kids and arrives on the minuture railway that snakes through the property. Magnificent private residence, sprawling manicured gardens, gorgeous clear lake filled with aquatic life above and below water level.
Downloaded the images and deleted nearly all of them
Anyone else have days like this?
I feel despondent.

yes.....I've had several crap days in the past....often running concurrently.

I chalk it up to either too much camera or not enough (i.e. either overthinking or out of practice). I rarely delete files though.....I like to keep the duds to remind me what not to do next time.

Know exactly how you feel. I've been super busy with uni and work that my camera lay dormant for a month + (look how long my last flickr upload was)

Taking it out the other day, everything I shot turned out horrible...I think I need to get back into things...quickly!

oh i thought this was going to be about gambling

I thought it was going to be about marksmanship and Chinese made goods.

I thought it was gonna be about really intense diahria.


Yep. A poo gag. Class

Being honest with myself, I know that I've wasted days taking hundreds of photos and I've ended up with 3 or 4 at best (my last upload to my site was just such a day). Annoyingly I realised what I was doing wrong about 30s before there was anything left for me to shoot.

I certainly can't bring myself to do as a friend does - fully auto, continuous shoot mode. "hurr, at least one of the buggers might out ok!"

Originally Posted by swoffa

We went to a place called Como Gardens today. The Vintage Drivers Club have a christmas day

PICTURES OF CARS PLEASE.

Originally Posted by Lutze

Being honest with myself, I know that I've wasted days taking hundreds of photos and I've ended up with 3 or 4 at best

In ye olden days back when I was shooting film and processing and printing myself, the rule seemed to be that you'd get one *OK* shot out of every roll if you were lucky. And every 10 rolls you'd get one you'd be really really happy with. Most of the rest were close but never quite got there !

Don't be too hard on yourself. it's meant to be fun ! Go out and shoot with a sense of discovery and wonder. I'm sure the shots will come.

jb

Originally Posted by swoffa

Anyone else have days like this?

All the time mate

To the point where I have enlisted a photographer friend to give me a few "lessons" in return for some Photoshop tutelage

LOL, reminds me of the last Avalon airshow I went too. 5GB of shots, kept 3

Generally the shots I delete are missed focus shots/not tack sharp. So I'll take two or three photos at the time and then choose the best. I shoot raw so if you get the exposure etc pretty damn close then I have a bit of freedom in LR to make it look as good as possible. My worst photos are when I don't have any ideas or don't know what I'm going out shooting. Just walking around with no real purpose around my neighbourhood.

So I think it's a good idea to have an idea of what you want to explore before heading out, whilst keeping your eyes and ears peeled. One of my favourite things about taking photos are the unpredictable opportunities that come up. When I capture one of those shots, that's when it's the most rewarding IMO.

When I was shooting Sculpture By the Sea this year, I found myself getting fatigued in thinking of new ways to shoot the pieces. I think, for myself at least, that it's something I have to push through. Volume will bring experience and skill. I did shoot aperture-priority instead of program and got some nice depth-of-field effects that are not common on a point-and-shoot, which is optimised to keep everything in focus.

About the most sobering event in my photography was a number of years ago when I was rocking the then-new Minolta X-700, which was a semi-pro camera and cool as hell. I was shooting on Phillip Island and sneering at a noob with a massive, clunky, cheap SLR. God I was a snob! Later I discovered that I had failed to thread the film properly and despite my earnest snapping, had not netted a single photo!

Thanks guys,
Feels good to know that you guys (who post ripping images) even have days that turn crap.

Arkenstone - I'll fire some up, but be warned they're quite boring. I'll post some back in here.

edit: images added.






Couple more on flickr

Just re-reading this thread to make myself feel better, a little self indulgent but hey, whatever lifts ya spirits.

Originally Posted by Lutze

I certainly can't bring myself to do as a friend does - fully auto, continuous shoot mode. "hurr, at least one of the buggers might out ok!"

Lutze - I did this (auto) and you wanna know what, I ditched them too. Perhaps I should have bought a tatts ticket.

I too have crap days.
this is a bit tricky when my fulltime job is Photography.
I dont like explaining to the boss why i didnt get a good photo.

had a good day yesterday, 2 jobs, great subjects, plenty of interesting stuff to shoot.
im not happy with the stuff i did shoot, but it was acceptable (acceptable = sharp and well exposed, although slightly boring)

There seems to be quite a few Melb photogs here, but I live in Sydney.
I'm looking for an excuse to come down to Melb with my camera in 2010 though.
Perhaps I can try and work that in.