Beating Myself Up

The last few days, I took a trip down memory lane, picture speaking, and browsed some pictures I took at a wedding about a year ago.  I'm still bloodied and bruised from the beating that I gave myself.  I found myself slapping my head and saying "how could you under-expose that shot?"  I took a few more punches for the wrong lens selection, and when it was all said and done... I felt terrible.


I know I shouldn't do this to myself.  As a photographer and an artist, I try to grow and become better every time I pick up the camera.  The mistakes that I made that day would not be made today.  I've gotten a little better, and a little more confident in my abilities, and my understanding of the equipment.  I wish I could go back in time and do that wedding again.

After I've had a day or so to think about it, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was when I was beating myself up.  Some of the shots (despite the technical mistakes) came out pretty good.  When you take pictures of two people in love, it's hard to mess it up completely.

I found myself editing pictures.  A year later, there's no need to edit pictures of a wedding.  They've already been delivered to the client, and these pictures have been printed and hang on walls.  Why would I edit them now?  Am I obsessive compulsive?  While I was asking myself why I would be editing pictures... I continued correcting color balance, re-cropping, adjusting exposure and contrast.  I wasn't editing just one picture... or a few... I think I edited over 50 pictures before I finally pushed myself away from the computer screen.  In the end, it was therapy.  It made me feel better that some of the images were now properly exposed, and the  white colors were now white instead of grey.

It has been said that 'We are our own worst critic'.  Very true.  Each day is a learning process, and healing.  Ouch... I'm still sore.