I DREAM OF THINGS I SHOULD DO

The other night, I had a dream where I was playing around with shutter speeds on my camera. This is funny because I haven't gotten my Nikon out since that snowy Easter morning. You're like "that's not funny, Cindy." I don't really mean funny haha as much as I mean funny peculiar. If I had a band I'd name us The Funny Peculiars. Well...dream...shutter speeds...blah blah blah. Look, I'm going to tell you straight up that my days are pressed for time right now. I don't carry my Nikon with me every day because my backpack (yes, I carry backpack and yes, I know how old I am and yes I am wearing yoga pants) is already full with my computer and my iPad and my lunch. It is a heavy bag without the addition of the fancy pants camera. It is also added weight for something I'm most likely not going to take out of the bag to use. Sad but true.

The truth is, I've been too busy to be inspired. In those moments between being too busy, I've been to lazy to push for inspiration. Hey Chad, remember that time we got up before everyone else in the house and walked around the neighborhood taking pictures? It was cold and there was frost on the ground and all my pictures turned out too bright and technicolor looking. It's a moment in time I think about whenever I feel a little uninspired. Those pictures are in an album titled "Walkabout" in Flickr. I need to take more walkabouts even if my pictures turn out too bright. I need to wedge out some time in between journal writing and grocery shopping or maybe hold off watching CBS Sunday morning on Sundays. While I'm figuring that out, here's what I've been doing in the meantime. 

A fellow photographer I know through social media posted something recently about voting for one of his pictures to be selected for decoration in a hotel. His name is Rhys Martin and you should go vote for his picture here because he's really good and a cool person. Of course, I went and voted but then a lightbulb went on over my head as I thought "photo contests!" I could actually enter my pictures into photo contests. So I did a search on photography contests and came across ViewBug. It has various membership options ranging from free to paid. If you pay, you can upload unlimited pictures and enter whatever contest they are hosting. Free gets you ten uploads a week and limited contest entries. I'm just fine with free because I'm still testing this place out and trying to get a feel for how it all works. I have followers and I have many uploaded pictures that have garnished several peer awards. I don't know if I've won any of the contests yet because many of them are still in the voting process. I did win a photography course from Craftsy for something. I think maybe something to do with one of the peer awards. 

I'm still on the fence about ViewBug in general. A lot of the most popular photos on there look like they have been really edited and altered in Photoshop. There's nothing wrong with that. I'm all for editing. These photos though go beyond minor editing. This is not my skill set, nor do I have the software to do that. My philosophy is to try take a good picture without taking a picture that I have to make good later. So I try to follow like minded photographers. I do like that ViewBug feels more professional and less social. I'm not creeped out by any of my followers, unlike Flickr where I always have that one guy leaving comments like "Hey Cindy, this is a nice photo. I would sure enjoy more photos of you wearing a red bandana." Because girls in red bandanas are his fetish. I also really like that I've already won a prize. So it's not a thousand dollars or new lightweight tripod, but it is something that I could use. I chose a class on getting to know your lenses and so far I'm learning quite a bit.

I'm hoping ViewBug will give me that inspiration push I need right now. Maybe I'll stop dreaming about playing around with shutter speeds and actually play around with shutter speeds.