This is not my best image. It is not my most beautiful image. It is not even a particularly interesting image. Though, I suppose all of that is relative in a sense.

However, what it represents is a fundamental shift in my understanding of photography. It is the first image in what was to become, ‘my style.’ Not that this is particularly important. In fact, I would encourage anyone interested in photography not to worry too much about style. It will happen all on its own.

But, up until this rainy May morning on the California coast, I had felt I was searching for something in my photography. I wasn’t sure what it was, how to define it, or even how to ask myself questions about it. I knew I wanted to make a certain kind of image, but I really couldn’t define it much more than that. For some reason, though, the task was compelling enough for me to keep at it… for years. When this image was taken, I was about three years into a more focused effort to improve my photographic skills. And by focus, I guess I really mean just time and effort. I really had no idea what I was doing or why.

Looking back now, I can see that this was less about improving my photography and more about my need for an outlet, for creativity, for an escape from my difficulties at work and with relationships. It was about being outside an office, about taking the world in.

And in many ways, that hasn’t really changed. In fact, as I’m saying this, I am now realizing how little the actual photographs mattered.

In truth, I think learning photography was the anecdote I needed for the general turbulence in my life. It was a way for me to cope with the parts of my life and myself that weren’t working.

As the years have gone on, the skill-building aspect has become less important. I’m happy with my photos. Sure, they are always improving, and I want to continue that journey. However, it’s barely about that now.

Every week I spend dozens of hours behind a computer screen. Photography has largely become a way for me to re-engage with the physical world outside without having to make an plans or negociate schedules with any other people. It’s just me and my camera, wandering around and looking at things.

It has become a meditative practice.

I’m reminded of an evening I spent with my camera on the side of a mountain in Kings Canyon National Park. A quiet drive up a mostly abandoned road with only maybe an hour of daylight left. Every tree, every fern, every leaf was taking on that incredible yellow gold from the low angle of the sun.

The place was absolutely still, not even the suggestion of a breeze. I passed a Mule deer on the way up. I stopped my truck right in front of it, and we just sat there and looked at each other for a while; I have no idea how long. Eventually, I parked my vehicle. For an hour, I wandered around the hillside, taking photos of bark, leaves, moss, pine trees, and a lake. And none of them were any good. Not a single one.

But it didn’t matter at all. The results were completely irrelevant. I was in a different world, a different place.

And so, while the first photo in this post represents the beginning of what characterizes my photography now, its true value is a journey that has not been about photography at all.

So, in a way, I’m not sure you need to care about how good your photographs are. I think the process of making them is enough.