England: a Wonderful Place to Visit

Well, I have returned from England with many memories to share with friends and family. I've come away with many possibilities for an album that I'm sure will be amazing. I can sound confident on this because I did take the time to follow some basic rules of engagement in photography. Some of them I've already shared with you; for example taking more than one picture of any given area or theme, changing my height or perspective and allowing for rules on a given area (like cathedrals or museums). During my travels I did manage to use all of these guidelines. Like most guidelines however; you also need to be willing to bend/crack/break them once in a while - but to also know when is appropriate to do so.

So how do you know when to "break the rules"? Well, for me it usually depends on a couple of things. One would be the mood I am in on a particular day and if I'm feeling like I just want to document an event or if I'm feeling quite creative (This sometimes happens within moments of each other). Going through my latest trips pictures I would have to say that over the course of seven days of touring that I have a mixture of both types of pictures. For example take a look at the following couple of examples.

This is part of Cambridge University, more particularly Kings College. I found myself taking more of a creative documentary type photograph here due to how the area was situated as well as the reflective respect it commands just by my standing in front of these buildings. Okay let's look at the next one... Here we have something a little more creative taken in one of the smaller pedestrian walkways around the corner almost. So you can see how one must go with the flow of the day, area and mood. Two totally different styles of photos taken the same day within an hour of each other.

Secondly I need to ask myself the question (and this is not limited to travel pictures but can be asked with any type of photograph you create): What message do I want to send to the viewer in my photographs?

To answer this question one does need to do a little thinking prior to taking their photographs. Could it be you aren't wanting to send a message at all and just want some memories for yourself? This is okay and please don't get me wrong here; but when you show your pictures to your friends and family in what ever media you choose, there is going to be a message sent intentional or not. For example if I just showed pictures like the above to people some might think that England is pretty stuffy or maybe even hard. Or some may think wow look how she captured how old the area is. Who knows, but wouldn't you like to encourage some emotion to the viewer and see if that was what you were going for? I once heard a saying that said this: "I don't care what the emotion is as long as people feel something in my work. When people stop feeling emotion in my photography then I will stop taking pictures". I agree with only part of this saying as I feel if people do not feel any emotion with my pictures than I've missed the boat and need to revisit why I took those photos in the first place. Take a look at a couple more examples here and see if you can see or feel anything towards this area of the world.

England is quite diverse. It goes from the extreme of pristine well groomed parks and yards to the overly busy streets of London to just having some fun. All of which could be missed if we went through life just looking down at our feet thinking only of what we needed to get done.

So until next time let's take time to look at the world around us and see if we can find something that some may have over looked
or that we ourselves have missed and allow ourselves the time to embrace and enjoy it.