What's the longest you've ever waited for the perfect photo?

[bvukich]

What's the longest you've ever waited for the perfect photo?

And I don't mean wait in a general sense; I mean actively waiting, checking conditions, for the perfect photo at a particular location?

For me it's three and a half years and counting. There is a golf course that I drive by twice a day, that has a long perfect tree-lined fairway perpendicular to the road that has been calling to me. There's about a week window in late fall where the sun is in just the right spot for the picture I see in my mind. Golden hour, just as the sun is kissing the trees, long shadows. The conditions are never quite right though. Overcast, raining, snow, all hazards of fall in Wisconsin. I'll get it though, if it takes me another 20 years.

 

[Admin US West]

While I might go back to the same spot occasionally looking for that magic light and color, I do not have the patience to stand or sit in one spot for very long, say waiting for a bird to fly close enough and with the right lighting to get a BIF shot. I know that many will go out and sit in a blind all day for weeks waiting for a wildlife shot, 5 minutes seems to be my limit, so I do not get many good wildlife shots. We do not even have a real zoo within 300 miles.

 

[Grendel]

About a year. It was in a spot I would drive by to work as well -- an armchair dumped in a patch of small sequoia trees. When I finally did get a shot I wasn't happy w/ it and went back the next day; the conditions were just the same ! (After a year of waiting, two days in a row) -- just to find out that the patch got cleaned up that morning and the chair was gone

 

[bvukich]

About a year. It was in a spot I would drive by to work as well -- an armchair dumped in a patch of small sequoia trees. When I finally did get a shot I wasn't happy w/ it and went back the next day; the conditions were just the same ! (After a year of waiting, two days in a row) -- just to find out that the patch got cleaned up that morning and the chair was gone

Bummer.

I like decay and abandonment. There are several, what can be only described as ruins, on my way to/from work as well. Old, old, farm houses with nothing but the field stone walls left, old grain silos, various out buildings; all in assorted states of decay. There are tons of them throughout Wisconsin. Someday I'd like to tour the state and do a photography book of them. I even have a great title/tagline for it, "New world ruins in old world Wisconsin."

 

[distant.star]

I've given up on the "perfect" picture -- it's not in me. I'm settling for adequate these days.

Right now I've been waiting five months for perfect conditions for a sunrise/moonset image. There is a day when the full moon is setting over a mountain here in the west. At the same time the sun is coming up in the east to illuminate the golf course community in the foreground. It happens once a month, and for the last five months it's been clouds and rain and neither moon nor sun.

Rather than waiting for conditions to be right, my troubling problem is not taking the picture when the time is right. I'm either just not fast enough or I don't really see it until it's gone. That's more with people in the candid portraits and street photography that I prefer.

I guess those frustrations just make us appreciate good pictures all the more -- whether we're lucky enough to get them or someone else is.

 

[ronderick]

Slightly off the topic, but...

I recall reading an interview on a local <i>sensai</i>-level landscape photographer, and one of the questions was about the number of photos he believe were "outstanding works" from a location he visits on a frequent basis. The photographer noted that from his 40-year professional career, there were less than a dozen which he'd put in that category.

Though I suspect it to be an understatement, it does show that the wait for a "perfect" photo could be quite long even for professional photographers.

 

[motorhead]

The large format landscape photographer Joe Cornish claims to be still waiting to get the shot that he knows a location in Scotland will deliver. He has tried many times already, each time walking all night up mountain tracks with his heavy equipment and to my eyes has already achieved wonderful images from the spot. But he is not satisfied. His eye for a landscape image is second to none in my book.

That's true dedication. Another landscape specialist camped next to a Canadian lake for three weeks solid before getting the lighting conditions he wanted. I admire that kind of single minded (sheer bloody minded might be another way of putting it) but although I consider myself to be very patient, I don't have enough to match either of the examples I've given, but wish I did. It's what sorts the real tog's from those that only play at it.

 

[RobP]

I have one shot taken recently that I waited 4 years for. It is a location I drive past regularly, but have been wating for the right water levels, sun angle and clouds. It's not exactly what I had in mind, but is getting there.

(hope I've done that image link the right way)

I tend to keep going back to places until I get the image I can picture in my mind.

Rob

http://www.robpackerphotography.com/

 

[Canon Rumors Guy]

What's the longest you've ever waited for the perfect photo?

34 years and counting.

Although the journey to get the perfect photo is probably more rewarding than actually getting it.

 

[P7wbb]

What's the longest you've ever waited for the perfect photo?

34 years and counting.

Although the journey to get the perfect photo is probably more rewarding than actually getting it.

You beat me to that quote...great line!

3 y-rs and counting. I know the area however getting the right pix will take an early morning trip and having tried & missed a few times am not there yet.

 

[motorhead]

While I am proud of many of my images, none of them are perfect. There is always room for a better image.

I am deeply in awe of landscape 'togs like Joe Cornish who refuse to accept "good enough" and keep revisiting sites until that "perfect shot" is in the bag. I wish I had that kind of dedication to my craft.

 

[DavidD]

Thank you for the fun idea to think about.

A photojournalist friend said he admires how we landscape photographers can take minutes or even hours to get a shot. He says he absolutely cannot wait more than a moment to take a photograph or it drives him crazy.

There are some dozen photographs I’ve got queued up waiting for the right conditions in California – about half of them waiting for about 6 years. There are three images I’ve waited to take in Alaska for 3 years. And the longest wait is for two rare phenomena I first saw above the polar circle in Norway some 34 years ago – and fully intend to capture – and get them done well.

 

[Heidrun]

Im still waiting. And i am 47 years old

 

[rill]

I think timing really means everything in taking photographs! I am really impressed at how some photographers are willing to wait for like forever to get that perfect shot. I believe that it is not actually where but when will you take that perfect shot because even the nastiest looking places can produce the most beautiful pictures as long as you got the perfect timing when you took the picture. Capturing every second of it makes pictures speak a thousand words that is why is is actually an exquisite form of art as well.