Recently, I have noticed my photography goals have shifted slightly. In fact, when I renewed this website for another year, I “downgraded” it because I recognized my desired outcome really is not booking clients regularly. Of course, if someone were to reach out to me and want to work with me, I would gladly talk.

Yet in recognizing there are so many talented photographers in the world ready to receive paying clients, I just came to the point that my joy in this journey is not about getting paid a lot of money for it. Quite the contrary: I wish to BE a photographer; to put in the work required of a thoughtful artist, not to become an Instagram influencer.

Thus, even this blog (which has laid dormant since last autumn) will shift to become a journal for me. It’s a photographer’s journal, documenting the camera/lens combinations I’ve used this week… where I’ve gone to photograph… what I felt made a photo work, and when it did not.

A couple notable items to document this week include the photo above: I’ve been recently shooting with the Nikon D800E. It’s a 36 megapixel, full-frame DSLR. While I still shoot on Sony mirrorless (and some 35mm film cameras), this Digital Single Lens Reflex (for those that didn’t know what that meant) is a “real” camera. Yes, my Sony A7iii is sort of a real camera. Indeed, for events that’s the camera for which I’ll reach. But this Nikon is the kind of camera photographers have used for years. It’s heavy, with an optical viewfinder that does not assist me in manual focusing. And yet, I cannot put this camera down. I am shooting with manual focus (vintage) Nikon lenses. This shot was captured at the Glacial Park in Ringwood, IL with the Nikkor-MICRO 55mm F2.8 manual focus lens. And what is also nice, it has the option in camera to crop to 5x4 format. It’s a different way of seeing, especially for landscape. This lens cropped this way really gives me a sense of framing. It requires my composition to be central–not in the center per se, but unmistakable. I’ll continue shooting with this crop and lens combination over the coming days.