Things I've Learned 5-17-2007

Things I've learned
If you're reading this, chances are, you're my friend. As my friend, you have access to information such as I am a so-called photographer. I say so-called because to this day, I have earned a grand total of about 70 bucks and maybe 9 free lunches for the honor of photographing budget weddings and banjo concerts. I'm not bad at it; in fact I get a thrill of being an unprofessional professional - It allows me to wear jeans to the office where I intern. *Sigh* I digress. The point of this little ditty is to share with you some of the things I've gleaned over the years behind a camera, and I'm sure this list will be updated over time. Here are some of the best so far. 1: Baseballs and softballs are designed by God to seek out and destroy uninsured camera equipment. I am convinced that if I were to shoot high school ball games from the outfield, the average RBI would probably jump to .981. Number 2 and Number 3 are a combo: No one wants to pay for a print and parents are psycho. This is a joint venture because it's usually parents that will hunt me down and ask me to not only A. Shoot their kid, but B. Email them a copy. I only do this for friends. Number 4: I am apparently the go-to source for up-to-the-minute digital camera information and the guru of megapixels. Megapixels are a pain in the ass to explain because no matter what I say, more will always mean better, and my advice will remain unheeded as the dude will march off to Best Buy and purchase a camera based on pixels alone anyway. Number 5, and my personal favorite: by being a photographer, I am apparently the editor in chief at my current job. "Is my picture going to be in the paper?" is the number one question I get. I understand that people want to know, but I'm obviously shooting a ton people at any one event. On top of that basic fact, I just don't have that kind of power. Normally the editors just lock a group of angry monkeys in a room with all the photographs and whichever one is not covered in feces at the end of the day is the one that goes to print. Just kidding. And for the record, I'm not complaining at all, it's stuff like this that honestly keeps me going. On that note, I'll leave you with number 6: You can never park too far away from a high school baseball game. Foul balls = dented door panels. You can walk your ass 2 blocks from the Hummer to the stands, and I highly recommend it. Love the madness.