Photo Artistry

I was yearning to learn something new so I started the course Photo Artistry. Quite quickly I realized that it was so very technical and would require a lot from me. I remembered that I tried Lightroom once and had to admit defeat. Am I brave enough to stick with this? Am I willing to put in the work that it would require to actually follow through and create something that I am proud of? I went through some videos that delved into such photography and Photoshop issues such as resizing an image and downloading textures. It became overwhelming. I almost quit. Then I read a few essays that were written about how hard it is to learn something new. This particular part of the essay made me change my mind.

I used to teach guitar lessons for a living, back when I was a teenager (and when all I did was play guitar). When I took on a new student I always told them up front: "You are going to sound AWFUL for at least three months. Deal with it. Just accept it. Plan on it. It's going to take three months to get your left hand and right hand to work well enough together to listen to what the hell you are telling them to do and have it sound reasonably decent. Until then — it's going to be frustration and noise." Those three months are the make-it-or-break-it for most aspiring guitarists. MOST give up. They can't deal with even a month of it being difficult and sloppy, much less three months of that kind of struggle. And because they're not great at it right from the start (or even a month along), they find it difficult to put in the time. So ... they give up. They give up before they ever manage anything worthwhile. But the ones who stick to it and shoulder their way through those first three months, practicing every day — sounding awful, but practicing anyhow — those are the ones who break through and end up playing guitar for the rest of their lives. Those are the ones who fall in love with it.

(And the ones who take the most chances, have the most fun . They also end up with the best chance of actually getting really, really good.)

That really got me thinking. I am impatient and want immediate results. I know that about myself. But I also know I love a challenge and I love to learn. So today I started playing around with some of the concepts. And I found I liked some of the results. This is the one I liked the best.

And here are some experiments.