2011 WEEK 32: Where's my Unicorn?!

The problem with being lucky enough to get lots of good pictures is that one often forgets the "luck" side of it. At least I do. After getting so many great pictures from the visit to the zoo the other week, my enthusiasm was high as was my confidence in my growing photographic abilities.

This week, not so much...

This week I feel like I suck. One would think a trip to Lynn Canyon would provide lots of inspiration - and it did while I was happily clicking away. How could one not be inspired by a suspension bridge strung across a dramatic canyon with waterfalls and rapids far below and thick forest clinging to the steep mountains on every side?

Maybe it was my hiking buddies distracting me. Or our general lack of direction.

Or maybe it was just a case of sometimes, despite our best efforts, good pictures are hard to come by. This is why I am still very much a hobbyist at this. Over the years I've taken many pictures of waterfalls and never been able to capture their power and scale. I've always blamed it on the camera in my hand but this week was no different. All together I took 150+ pictures and I don't have a single one of the waterfalls, the rapids, the mountains... Well I do but they're all completely average to awful.

Waterfalls are tough. With no point of reference its had to tell the difference between a sixty foot drop-off and a four feet drop-off. But hey, check out these trees!

Forests are tough to capture too. A lot of my pictures were flat and well... just a bunch of green. The pictures included here are the best of the day and none of them are really representative of how I was hoping they would turn out. Mmm GREEEEEN...!

What's lacking for me is the quality of light and the atmosphere. Forest pictures need beams of light cutting between the branches and something to give depth and contrast. Even better, they need something in the air to give texture beyond the leaves and bark be it dust particles, pollen and spores floating on the wind or mist drifting between the trunks. Perhaps that's why Ridley Scott built a forest in a studio for the movie Legend. Unicorns and Tom Cruise probably helped too...

Where's my unicorn damn it?!

Let's face it, even Bigfoot couldn't save these pictures. Ah well. Fingers crossed that next week either my luck will return or I'll get better at this. As we hit Week 32 of this photo project Week 52 is feeling like its a long, long way off...