Coloring outside the lines
This is a category that I enjoy writing in. Although most of my pearls of wisdom are created by yours truly, there are some that I have read and remembered over the years. To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure if somewhere in my teaching past starting in 1983, I didn’t come up with a lot of them myself…not that it really matters!
🙂
What matters here is the meaning of the phrase. I teach an online class with the BPSOP, and I also conduct my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops all over the world. I recently did a workshop in New York shooting in all five boroughs. We had taken the tram from Manhattan over to Roosevelt Island to shoot and as soon as we got off we went under the Roosevelt Bridge that connects the two boroughs.
Part of the class that was in the vicinity began shooting the skyline as the tram was coming from Manhattan. As I watched them I immediately saw that they were taking the predictable shot. The shot that I would refer to them as coloring inside the lines.
What I mean is that a couple of them walked to the right of the bridge, avoiding it, and started shooting the skyline. One walked to the left of the bridge and two more walked under the bridge to the edge and started shooting.
I moved to a position where I was directly under the bridge and waited for the next tram to come over.
My point here is to never take the road well-traveled. Always look for ways to color outside the lines and take the path less traveled. Look for different points of view, aka getting on your stomach. put on a lens you would never think of, etc..etc.
Visit my new website at www.joebaraban.com, and check out my upcoming workshops at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.
JoeB
