For me, I’m 60 now, I don’t have the energy or the motivation to put into something new. When I first started golf at 35, I put in all hours to get good and worked hard at it. When I came back from Hong Kong and struggled with my golf I didn’t have that motivation. It’s like my poor sister who would like to move to the UK but she says ‘Ann, I can’t start from scratch anymore, I’ve done it too many times, I just want to retire and start having a simpler life’. That’s where I’m coming from.Getting tired are we? Yes, it’s the instant gratification era. Nobody wants to put any effort into anything but expects great results. I want to be a virtuoso violin player in 5 minutes. And then I want to be famous and rich. It’s my right.
Messing around for hours with Photoshop is what people used to do in the old days. Now it’s just button tapping. Without even knowing what happens when the button is tapped. Keep tapping and tapping and maybe magic will happen, or not.
It’s just the same in the DSLR world. Everyone wants great photos with no effort. All I need is a better camera. I’ve met people who have spent $15,000+ on camera gear, because they dream of making great photos, but they don’t have the first clue how to operate the camera. The search for the magic instant masterpiece filter. People will buy every filter, every LUT, expecting it to make gold out of mud. Even when they know deep down there is no free lunch, they keep trying.
Ah, for the good old days of film. After you pressed the shutter there was nothing more you could do except wait for your prints or slides to be developed. What you shot is what you got. (Actually, there’s an app like that)
Wait, that’s the answer. Let’s abandon trying to make good photographs, that’s too time consuming anyhow, and make snapshots instead. Just like film. Press the shutter and you get whatever you get. Oh, look, another picture of my feet.
Oh, forget that. It’s too much work. Let’s sit cross legged, no that sounds too much like structure, let’s just slouch on the floor and contemplate the great non doing.
It’s fun to take these flights of fancy now and then.
Yes, 60 is young these days but if you have put in long hours all your life like I did and just about burnt yourself out, there’s a lot of joy in just making something a hobby and saying, ‘ah to heck with it, I’m just going to read a book’. It’s not about instant gratification!