… there’s nothing wrong with the gear. Nothing wrong with poppies either but an opium addiction will probably sideline you pretty good.
—David duChemin on why photographers need to stop buying gear
Sometimes, the “sensible” decision isn’t the right one. It can be ok to follow your heart.
I’ve developed an aversion to writing in public. I now think it should be done only in private, like any other lavatorial activity.
I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear, he writes in a journal entry titled “Go Gently into That Good Night.” I hope to be spared as much pain as possible on the approach path. I was perfectly content before I was born, and I think of death as the same state. What I am grateful for is the gift of intelligence, and for life, love, wonder, and laughter. You can’t say it wasn’t interesting. My lifetime’s memories are what I have brought home from the trip. I will require them for eternity no more than that little souvenir of the Eiffel Tower I brought home from Paris.
—Roger Ebert on death
I am surfing the Internet, and being reminded that it’s full of bitter contrarians who have nothing to do except harsh each other’s joy.
Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life…You give them a piece of you. They didn’t ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn’t your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like ‘maybe we should be just friends’ turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It’s a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.
—Neil Gaiman (via spiritbear) (via cowgirl89)
Photographers. We’re strange, right? We can’t stop. We run when others walk. We work when others relax. We have no sense of weekends, holidays, time off, time on, or time in general, except as it relates to sunrise or set. When there’s a football game on TV, we aren’t looking always at the action on the field. We’re looking at the sidelines to see if any our buds are covering the game and how much of the long glass out there is black or white. We walk around like addled sumbitches, staring at strange stuff, hovering at the edge of human activity, aching to be accepted, dying for a moment, breathless in anticipation for that which mostly never happens. Curious behavior, at best. That’s putting it nicely. Most folks would just chalk it up to damn strange and tell their youngsters to stay away from us.
Happy Valentine’s Day to all. And to those who hate the day, I say this: Valentine’s Day is a Christian corruption of a pagan festival involving werewolves, blood and fucking. So wish people a happy Horny Werewolf Day and see what happens.
Kottke: Why is flying hard?
“When I got older, I realized that what made it so effortless was that my dad was taking care of the hard part, the 95% of flying that doesn’t involve moving any of the controls. What made it look so effortless for him, even when things got tough, was the 10,000+ hours in the cockpit of a plane, flying.”Yes. This is also the difference between a professional photographer and an amateur working for cheap (or, shudder, free). Why is my fee so much? You’re not paying me for the photograph I’m making, you’re paying me for the hundreds of thousands I’ve made in order to be able to make that photograph you need, perfectly, and on demand.
See also, the famous Picasso vignette:
“Legend has it that Pablo Picasso was sketching in the park when a bold woman approached him.
“It’s you—Picasso, the great artist! Oh, you must sketch my portrait! I insist.”
So Picasso agreed to sketch her. After studying her for a moment, he used a single pencil stroke to create her portrait. He handed the women his work of art.
“It’s perfect!” she gushed. “You managed to capture my essence with one stroke, in one moment. Thank you! How much do I owe you?”
“Five thousand dollars,” the artist replied.
“B-b-but, what?” the woman sputtered. “How could you want so much money for this picture? It only took you a second to draw it!”
To which Picasso responded, “Madame, it took me my entire life.”
The next time someone says “oh, $type-of-photographer costs so much; it’s ridiculous,” remember this. No it isn’t. Not if you want the job done right.
No one should stop doing what they love because of others’ negativity.
—Ben Templesmith, whose work is fantastic and weird and disturbing.
