The day I shot the photo in question, I had set out with my friend Roman to shoot some waterfalls. The days leading up to our trip, and even the day of,  we had a significant amount of rain. it wasn’t enough to break the drought, but enough to significantly increase the volume of water running down these rocks.

On the drive up, I had begun to feel quite ill.  My head was pounding to the point that I was nauseated. So, when we finally got to the trail, I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to make the very short hike to the falls. I didn’t feel well and it was still raining. Still, I decided that getting out and shooting would be better than sitting in the truck being  sick. I hadn’t driven two hours just to puke in the woods.

Quite gingerly I walked up the path to the base of the falls, setup my camera and tripod, and began shooting away. An interesting thing happened as I stood there with the rain dripping on me, and the water fall roaring in front of me: I forgot about my headache. It was still there, and anytime I had to stop to think and make a conscious choice about something, I could still feel it. However, when I was shooting, my actions were almost completely automatic. For the most part, I didn’t have to think about what I was doing. Composition, camera settings, everything just sort of happened intuitively. I don’t know how long I stayed there taking pictures, but I know Roman got bored long before I was finished.

I shot some of my favorite photos that day.

Then, about a month later, I drove down to Callaway Gardens to shoot some azaleas.  Some of the more popular spots were quite crowded with photographers, but there was one shot that I had thought about doing and wanted to make sure I got, so I was willing to wait my turn. Again I setup my camera and tripod and was composing my shot, waiting for the photographer in front of me to finish up.

I was just standing there in the garden, when something caught my attention. In my memory, I just sort of sensed something was there.  I looked down, and just on the edge of the creek, about 20 feet from me, was a snake with his head poking out of the water. I walked towards it for a better look and realized I was looking at a copperhead. He didn’t seem to notice me, though, and continued to swim through the water, just off the bank.

The photographer who was in front of me was lying on the ground with his feet nearly in the water. I let him know that there’s a poisonous snake headed in his direction. I’m not sure whether he believed me or not, but he stood and asked me where. I pointed it out, and he quickly packed up his stuff and left the area. The snake, too, went on his way.

In relating this story to my wife, she said I have a very keen survival instinct. Athletes call this being In the Zone. Psychologists call it mindfulness. I’m pretty sure it’s what Buddhists would call Zen. I’m not sure exactly what it is, but these seemingly mystical, higher consciousness moments are just one of the many reasons I love photography.

I’m not above mimicking other photographers, especially if they’re good artists. However, I think the act of copying another’s work is a very personal thing. There are dozens of different things about a photo that may evoke a reaction in me: light, color, composition, textures, etc. If I choose to copy someone, it could be just one or a number of those photographic elements that I set out to duplicate. The process of taking the elements that I like, then making the rest my own, is part of how I develop my own style. Eventually, I hope to get to a point where I’m no longer copying anyone, and all my photos have a consistent Marcus Taylor look to them. Making photos by following the advice of someone else’s interpretation of a photo I have never seen does nothing to help me personalize my photos. As I see it, the kind of advice this man was offering was more of a hindrance than a help to the budding photographers who actually listened to him.

THE RULES:
1. Once you are tagged, link back to the person who tagged you.
2. Post THE RULES on your blog.
3. Post 7 weird or random facts about yourself on your blog.
4. Tag 7 people and link to them.
5. Comment on their blog to let them know they have been tagged.

1. I have had plastic surgery. Granted, it was to reattach my face to my skull, but plastic surgery nonetheless.

2. I don’t like the Beatles. They just don’t do it for me. I respect what they did for rock ‘n roll, but I have to agree with Michael Stipe on this one. They recorded a few songs that I like, as in I wouldn’t change the radio station to avoid them, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to listen to them and certainly wouldn’t spend money on an album. My wife owns the white album, so I ripped it and put it on my iPod. Over a year later, and I’ve still never listened to a single song from it.

3. I follow election results as though it were a sporting event.

4. I like cold weather. Around my house, you will find bedroom windows open and fans blowing even in the dead of winter. The temperature has to drop to near freezing before we close the windows, and colder before we turn on the heat.

5. I am a very deep sleeper. My wife would probably tell you it’s easier to wake the dead than it is to get me up in the morning. It’s not uncommon for my wife to hit me two or three times with a pillow before I wake up, and that’s after an alarm has been going off for an hour.

6. I am one of the pickiest eaters most people will ever meet.

7. Heights freak me out. Just seeing photos of someone standing on the edge of a cliff, or on top of a mountain, makes me a little nervous. However, I have no problems with airplanes, roller coasters, or tall buildings.

I’m not going to tag anyone, but if you read this and decide to play along, please let me know.

While surfing last year I came across a Business Week article about Legos. Reading the article and watching the slideshow about how they are made, reminded me of a lifetime of enjoyment these little toys have brought me, so I thought I’d share.

The earliest I can recall ever having played with Legos was in kindergarten. My teacher that year, Ms. Barnhart, told my parents that she was concerned about my creativity and recommended they get me some toys for Christmas that would help get my creative juices flowing. That year under the tree I found my very first Lego set. I’m not 100% certain about the details of the particular set, I believe it was a fire station, with a firetruck, helicopter and all the characters you’d expect to find there. With the help of my siblings, I meticulously assembled the models. That Christmas, I spent hours playing with my new favorite toy.

The ability for Legos to transform into something else was a great boon to a kid who seemed to lose things easily. On one road trip with my family, my parents bought me a box of Legos to keep me entertained. Somewhere during the 1,800 mile journey I lost some pieces and was upset that I couldn’t build the model in the instruction booklet. However, I soon realized I could build all kinds of things with these pieces. And it was probably at this point that I really came to appreciate how much more fun it was making my own creations. Any time after that, all of my space Legos became deep-sea explorer sets. The space crafts transformed into submarines, and the mini-figures in their space suits became SCUBA divers, in their diving gear.

Over the years, I can’t think of a single year that has gone by that I haven’t acquired new Legos in some form or another. Just this last year I was given two new sets for Christmas, and my son got two sets for his first birthday and Christmas.

Today, I am employed professionally as a web designer and developer. I believe this choice of careers is due, in large part, to my experience playing with Legos. One of the most striking similarities is that web design uses a box model for laying out pages. Essentially, everything on a web page is a block, and you build pages by changing the properties of those blocks to get a unique look. There’s a lot more to it, but at it’s core, building web pages isn’t that much different than building with Legos.

Anyway, Happy Anniversary Lego! I hope they’re still going strong in another 50 years.

*Click the image for the full xkcd experience.