To shoot or not to shoot? That is the question.

So for years and years and years I would not shoot landscape photography unless it was an overcast sky.  Reason being I didn’t want shadows in my scene, but in particular on my buildings.  I found them rather unsightly.  I also sometimes will take a portion of an image from my “library” and past it into another image for artistic effect.  Therefore I wanted everything in my library to have the same light falling on it – which in my case was soft light from cloud cover.

This was a plan that worked fairly well for me.  However, I’m now very close to my mid-60’s and the clock is running out.  I can’t afford to simply give up on a day of shooting because it’s sunny out.  Why miss out on all that joy I get out of photography?  I mean, frankly, I’m not selling these images to anyone, it’s just for my pure enjoyment, a hobby if you will.  So I decided to stop being so damn anal about this and shoot regardless of the light conditions.

Well the last (6) outings have all been bright sun with shadows.  Had I not chosen to shoot then I would have missed out on another day of photography as well as enjoyable time with my beautiful wife Cheryl.  Now, granted, there were some images that the sun/shadows totally destroyed in my opinion. I just couldn’t flex enough to use them.  However, by and large, I walked away with some really nice photography from those (6) journeys out.  In fact, there have even been some images where I thought the sun/shadows added value to the shot.

Photoshop is a big help. By shooting in RAW  and then taking the images into PS Camera Raw for editing I can soften those dark shadows and tone down those bright highlights rendering a much less contrasty image over all.

Now I’m mainly shooting in my home State of CT meaning that I never have to drive too far to take a shot. So if I found a scene I loved and wanted to shoot it with an overcaset sky I can always go back some time.  At least I seized the moment, got the shot, and enjoyed myself by not putting a kabasch on a fun day because the sun was shining.

So if you’ve found that you’re as anal as I was, (probably still am to a large extent), re-think how much fun you’re missing out on with your hobby because that scene had to be perfect.  Go out, get the practice, shoot it anyways!  You may just walk away with a great image.

Happy shooting to you all!