I always have a camera with me.  Which one you may ask?  Does it matter?  As many have said, the best camera is the one you have with you.

My wife and I recently took a six-week trip to France.  I did bring my Nikon and some long glass but used it only two of the days during our entire stay.  (I did make over 1,300 photos on the iPhone.) The first Nikon day was to photograph the white horses of the Camargue region at sunset and the second was to photograph granite statues at La Vallée des Saints (Valley of the Saints) in Brittany.   While my iPhone excelled at the day-to-day travel photography, I really needed a long lens to do justice for these two planned stops on our trip.  It was worth carrying the extra weight just for those two occasions.  I even brought my “Wellies” (Wellington knee high boots) for the horse photography. I photographed the white horses a number of years ago and since then have made it a point to photograph horses, especially wild horses, whenever I can…the herd in Theodore Roosevelt National Park and closer to home, the Onaqui herd in the Utah west desert. 

The trip to the Valley of the Saints was also planned and exceeded our expectations.  We are happy we went, I am very happy with my photos.  Also, there was an out door exhibit of black and white portraits of the sculptors made by Hervé Martin on display. The portraits were excellent and on equal footing to the work of the sculptors.  One thing I noticed is that the French do a great job of exhibiting photography everywhere…we saw many public exhibitions in towns across the country; sometimes in churches or old historical buildings, sometimes on fences erected in public spaces.

I like having projects in mind all the time and while I may be pointed in one direction, in the back of my mind  other ideas  lurk that percolate until I am either inspired to do something about them, or I happen across something I like that is related to one of my projects.

I guess I learned that from Simon Nathan.  Simon was a photographer (known for his panoramas and work on James Bond Films) and also a columnist for a number of photography publications back when I was younger.  The column I remember was “Simon Sez,”  which ran in Popular Photography.  I was his “gopher” (go for this, go for that) one summer in New York City (1973 I believe).  He always had some type camera with him.   Simon was always on the lookout for letters and numbers on signs no matter where he was and what he was doing, gathering a collection that showed the  unique shapes and patterns of letters.  He had collections of these that he sold (pre digital). So from that, I started carrying my Asahi Pentax Spotmatic everywhere when I ran errands in New York City; a habit I carried into my time in college and beyond. 

In addition to chasing horses, I keep the American flag in mind as a long term, never-ending project.   Whenever I see one in a unique setting, whether it is flying on a pole or painted on a building, I usually stop to try to make a photograph. 

Some of my projects are reflected on this website, others are more personal in nature and I don’t share them. 

Our local photography group, calling it a club is too formal, is photographing the American flag this month in honor of Independence Day.  It prompted me to go back to my Lightroom collection and review my flag photos over the years.  I just searched for “flag” and  over 1,200 photos appeared on my screen.  In the spirit of doing something fresh, I am looking at a large flag being flown over the Colonial Flag company’s building in Salt Lake City with the Wasatch mountains in the background at dusk.  I am in the process of researching if I can capture the moon rising over the mountains.  We shall see.

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