Notice I'm writing shorter, more frequent posts?

A few months ago my mother sent me some books about photography that she had found at yard sales. She's convinced that if I just applied myself, I could be a professional photographer. That's right after I finish my degrees in engineering and law, of course, because the masters in journalism apparently isn't enough.

Anyway, the books are really meant for someone using an SLR camera, not an automatic, but some of the tips about composition and lighting and such could be useful. I put them in the basket next to my toilet (so I could ass-imilate the information via ass-mosis, dontcha know?) and have been paging through them when I have a spare moment. The information is very interesting, and I'm sure my photography would improve - or at least become more professional looking - if I was able to use some of the tips.

The problem is that the books are not geared toward the casual photographer - they're geared toward the serious enthusiast, or someone who is interested in photography as a career. The authors advise patiently setting up shots, bracketing exposures to make sure you get the shot you want, working with the locals to get intimate portraits. While I would dearly love to do that, it's just not possible right now.

Most of my shots have to be taken in the split second I have between when I see something worthy of shooting, and when my daughter tries to crawl off the edge of a cliff or eat poison ivy or do a faceplant in a parking lot. On our recent trip to Natural Bridge, Jason and I were constantly juggling the camera, our kid, a water bottle, and a backpack back and forth, and I was following in my mother's footsteps by asking Jason to take pictures and telling him what I wanted in each one.

Not that I really have to tell him what to photograph - he does pretty well on his own. I offer as evidence this shot he took after he had shot all of the standard "baby in the pool" shots the other evening:

And the fact that he managed to work around the slight lag on our camera's shutter to get these shots:

That first one is an example of why you shouldn't expect to see me in heaven when I die ... there's nothing more evil than squirting your daughter in the face with the hose, unless it's doing it on film. Stupid Gretchen.