For those of you that have been following my blog I have taken several portrait shots of Leo and I absolutely love every shot I take of this kid. Not only is he a cute kid but he definitely is very comfortable in front of the camera which makes for a great shot. In this photo, he had just got out of the lake from a swim and I took one shot before he ran for his towel. I love it!! Thanks again Leo.

I was having a fantastic day relaxing by a lake when this large dragonfly slowly approached me riding on top of the small ripples of the the lake.  It was definitely alive (and freakin large) but it didn’t really have enough strength to fly.  My friend’s son came to the rescue. He was able to snag the dragonfly with a plastic container and put it on top of a tree stump so that it could dry out its wings and rest before hopefully taking flight again.  I knew I only had a couple of minutes before it flew fly away so I took a few shots with my macro lens (good thing I brought several lenses on this day) getting super close to this beautifully coloured insect with the crazy looking head and eyes.  Sure enough after a couple of minutes and a few shots the dragonfly took flight.

I didn’t take too many shots during the rest of the day. Instead I enjoyed the the peaceful, serene setting of the lake while having a few cold ones but at least I was able to get one shot.  This seems to be my goal everytime I go out with my camera (unless it is a job of course). Sometimes you have to just enjoy your surroundings and not worry about taking photographs. A couple of years back, everytime I went out with my camera, I would get dissappointed if I came home without any interesting photographs.  Then I would beat myself up wondering why so few of these images worked. It was like I was trying too hard to find those perfect images and being caught up in that frame of mind, not only would I not enjoy my outing, I ended up with many images that weren’t as interesting as they might have been. I truly believe that if you are patient, absorb the atmosphere and vibe and just enjoy your surroundings, the opportunities for a great photograph will simply emerge. If not, there will always be another day or time. For me, getting one image that I could blog about and put in my portfolio makes for an excellent day. Anyway, enough babble, go out and shoot but remember to have fun first.