What photography does to you

Ever since I picked up my first digital camera 6 years ago, I knew photography wasn’t just going to be something I wanted to play around with. I wanted to record. I wanted to create. I wanted to experience the world and capture the precious moments in life, and photography gave me the chance to do all that. Diving into the world of photography has been a slow process for me, and a very enjoyable one. I find myself loving this hobby more and more every day and immersing myself deeper into a whole new dimension, where everything is so new yet so…refreshing.

But then, photography does strange things to you.

It makes you look at a rock and think it is the most intricate thing in nature.

It makes you run around chasing a dragonfly for half an hour just to perfectly capture its beauty.

It makes you see reflections in the water in a different light.

It makes you feel alert to the sound of a scurrying chipmunk to estimate its next position, catching that mischievous little thing and winning in its own game of hide-and-seek.

It makes you find amusement in holes in leaves, rushing water current, and heart-shaped clouds.

It makes you notice your father’s aging eyes, observe your mother’s shrinking body, and marvel at your sister’s budding adolescence and sinking innocence.

It hones your patience, in the midst of much frustration.

It makes you appreciate the invisible and forgotten things in nature, every emotion shown on a stranger’s face, and all the neglected delicacies of everyday life.

It makes you realize your photography can never be “good enough”, and there’s always room for improvement, and thus pushing you to learn, learn more, learn some more, and learn even more.

There is certainly quite a learning curve involved in photography, but I wish to strive for the best and continue improving little by little with time. This week I went to Young’s Point – a hidden, unknown place near Peterborough – with my family as part of our annual fishing trip. Instead of fishing, I went around and took photos all day, even though I had been to the place at least 5 times before. It worked out as we only had three fishing rods anyway, so while my parents and my sisters fished, I spent some quality time with Mr.Nikon. The following is a small selection of the fruit of the day.

And yes, these pictures made me realize that I probably…okay, most likely would want to invest in a macro lens eventually…whenever that is. That’s another thing photography does to you…>_>

Intricate flower-like plant with many tiny sub-units (forgive my nerdiness, I cannot think of another suitable term for description) in its structure.

Purple flower with few petals left but a perfectly round core.

I saw this bug and couldn’t resist following it for a good 20 minutes as it crawled all over the white plant. The plant itself was already too interesting for words, and the bug made it that much more exciting. Here it is crossing from one side to the other, slowly and surely. I must have taken at least 50 pictures of the bug alone…

One of my favourite sightings of the day, this lovely red dragonfly was very cooperative when it came to photos. Unlike the blue one that I saw as well, this one stayed still long enough for me to take decent pictures of it. If only I had a macro lens…>_>

This little thing also surprised me because I didn’t notice that it was a bug at first. I thought it was a random green blob on a branch and only after magnifying the image did I realize that it had eyes and legs! Marvellous!

I don’t even know what this insect was, but it landed on our newspaper as I was taking a break. The details of its long body structure is so amazingly clear and well-defined. Awesome!

A few purple fruits hidden in the grassy fields. Purple is such a beautiful colour!

I saw quite a few of these thin vines lying around near the purple fruits, and the way they intertwined with each other was so complex yet elegant. They were almost like strings where if you just pulled on one end, you’d end up with a massive knot that can’t be untied. What wonders of nature!

The green bulb caught my attention because it was so vivid and so fierce-looking. It was almost as if it was saying, “Don’t come near me!” Reminds me a bit of the rose in The Little Prince…

I wanted to write about my trip to Tobermory with my girlfriends last weekend, or the places I revisited in downtown Toronto a few weeks ago, but these weeks I have been so bombarded with events that there’s barely any time to write. I hope I get to at least one of them before I head back to Europe, which is next Tuesday. Ahh, so soon! Is it “goodbye Toronto” already?