remembrance of new

You know that feeling you get when you experience something for the first time--something new?

For some strange reason, I suddenly recalled what it felt like to still be fresh in photography, where every click of the shutter led to something new and wondrous. I was still so young in photography then--I still looked at everything with a different light, a different vigor.

I first started in the summer of 2008 when I got my first camera. Then, my eyes were peeled, uncertain of what to focus on. They skimmed over everything around me, took in everything, though unsure of what to find. I just took in what I got and rolled with it. When I looked around me and saw what I liked, I clicked. Minimal thinking on composition, lines, whatever. (Heck, I didn't even consciously realize lines were "important"!) It wasn't much different in 2009.

Now, it's a bit different. Not quite in a bad way. Just different.

I no longer feel the same sort of fresh feeling I did when I first started out in photography. But instead, I can now look around me and zero in on something decisively. It's hard to explain. Back then, I was new to everything, everything was great, couldn't focus, and I shot much more indiscriminately than I do now. Now, it's focus. It's more specific. It's more thinking. The process is not as minimal as before.

Things are different now. But it's nice to remember how I felt before, how I felt in the beginning.

As to why I remembered--I don't know why.

It happens quite often. Sometimes I'll just be sitting, and I'll be absentmindedly raking through my mind, and I'll come across a memory accompanied by the feelings, the emotions, everything--everything about that memory.

Some part of me asked why it seems that my approach at photography has changed over the two years. Right now, at 2:39 a.m., I do not have an answer. But I'm going to think about it over the next few days.

But in the end, looking back at these few photographs from the past--maybe I didn't start out half as bad as I thought. I think I already innately understood what made a photograph beautiful. I just didn't know as many technicalities (I only learned the rule of thirds and importance of lines in a photography seminar last year!) But the inherent elements--I knew from the start.