Are Most Photographers Lazy?

Shot from the rim 🙂

I constantly pass by photographers doing the absolute minimum to get a good shot.  This includes videographers as well, it’s not just camera folks.   They are always beside the road, or a short distance from the road.  Never deep in.   Never in a place that takes some creativity or some sweat.  So I ask you, are most photographers lazy?

I feel like what I am striving for is Ansel Adams-style of photography.  Getting out to the perfect place, at the perfect time, and taking the perfect shot.  Waiting days if I have to (lazy by Adams’ standards) to get the clouds, the light, and the place just right.  That’s my ideal.  It’s not what I do.  I’m usually rushing around trying to drive to the light or the sunrise/sunset.  Or, I’m backpacking trying to get all the good shots as I hike to my destination.

I am always out before dawn in a place that I scoped out the day before or I am out at sunset, getting back to camp or my car by headlamp, sometimes coming down off a mountain by headlamp.  I’m always alone.  There are never others around, even in very populated parks.  I’ll pass by gobs of them near their cars or on the accessible overlook as I hike out before sunrise, but I am always alone when I step 100m off the beaten path.

I remember Death Valley.  Tons of photographers at Badwater, all with their multiple lenses and carbon fiber tripods.  But they were all on the walk path 100m from the cars and mixed in with the tourists.  I took some shots amongst them, got some great shots, and then walked out on the salt flats to the middle of the valley.  About a 2 mile hike in over 100 degree heat on white reflecting salt.  It was amazing!  Awesome!  I got shots that put chills up my spine.  And I was alone after walking about a forth of a mile.

I remember Bryce Canyon, where the photographers angled in and out of the view at Bryce Point and Sunrise Point.  I was up there for a couple mornings and evenings, but my real goal was to know where I needed to go to get down into the hoodoos before sunrise and be in them when the sun caught them and lit them up orange.  As I was on the point shooting shots, I was planning where I would be the next morning.  Then, I took the day and hiked on down so I knew the route and knew the good place to be.  The next morning, as all the photographers (and a couple guys with video cameras) were setting up on the rim, my friend Rick and I were hiking down by headlamp to the perfect spot.  We were only about 15 min. worth of hiking down, but we were alone and it was perfect!

I remember last night, I went to Treasure Island to shoot the fireworks over in San Francisco.  I parked my car and passed gobs of photographers on the rails next to the cars setting up to shoot the fireworks also.  But on the drive over, I had seen are place jutting out that would require a bit of a hike and bushwhack, but would put me in a great position to view the fireworks with the Bay Bridge in the foreground.  No one was there.  Just me and a perfect view.  As I hiked down afterwards, I passed a number of photographers and started thinking about this blog post.  Is it easy to be a pretty good photographer these days because so many photographers are lazy?

On the drive out of Treasure Island, I came around a corner and avoided some guy with his tripod in the road looking down on a great shot of the Bay Bridge.  OK, I said.  Some photographers are crazy, that’s cool.  I’m not going to stop and get that shot…