Photography and Golf

I don't play golf. Although I sometimes enjoy watching others, I really don't have the time to devote to the game.

A few days ago, I was looking at some of the files on my computer—doing a little housekeeping—and noticed, not for the first time, how many programs and plugins I have for image editing. I guess I haven't really thought about it much over the past months, but there it was, folder after folder, full of applications to help me get the best out of my photography.

When I shoot, my adage is always to always get "it" in the camera, not fix it later in the computer. So, why, I thought, do I need all these?

My housekeeping devolved into taking inventory and investigating my cache. I wanted to keep only those applications I thought really necessary, but should I go towards minimalism, keeping only what I thought necessary? But what if I need some of these later? Maybe, instead of deleting the majority of these assets, I should move them to a CD/DVD. Then, if I really find myself wanting a particular program in the future, I'll have it at hand.

This is where I see similarities between photography and golf. We both collect all sorts of items purporting to make our game better. From a moon-dust-alloy putter to digital film-grain enhancer-noise removal tool, all of these, I believe, take us away from the target—playing golf and taking pictures.

The question remaining is do these trinkets make us better or lazy? Are they sitting in our mind as crutches, which we use just in case we aren't as good as we thought? In other words, are they confidence drainers?

Remember when we were new to photography and all we had was the camera we had, not the camera we wanted? When we could dream of the pro model financially out of our reach. Then, we had to make good use of our limited resources and so we concentrated on making the best images we could. Photography was fun and we were able to discover methods to make images with only our beat-up camera, one lens, and a few filters and a tripod.

That's what I want to get back to; the sheer fun of discovery, pushing our limits to determine what we could get away with; to not play it safe!

So, did I throw away a small collection of files? I'm not going to tell you as I don't want to influence your thoughts—you're going to have to make decisions for yourself.

I will tell you I went out last weekend and hiked through Thatcher Park (near Albany, New York USA) and had a lot of fun, shooting for the sheer pleasure of shooting, knowing I had just what I needed and nothing more.