before your outing

Galen Rowell once told me when I met him that you need to visualize the image you want to create.

He said, before you go shooting, think about what it is you want to capture, how you want to capture it and the feeling you want it to convey.

I am wondering if anyone else does this?

I have been doing it ever since I met him. Sometimes with success, sometimes with pure luck, and sometimes with no luck at all...

I have been thinking all week of this one image I want to create this weekend...weather permitting of course....

just curious as to what your take is on this type of mental attitude!

A lot of what I shoot is dependent on scouting the area first. I might know general angles and really rough compositions based on other shots I've tried, but I think to get to the point where you know EXACTLY what you want to shoot, you have to have been to the spot in question several times already (Marc I'm sure can chime in on this).

I'm often in the camp of wanting to shoot, lets say for giggles, Lower Oneonta Falls with nice reflective water, lots of colorful pebbles and a few orange / red maple leaves in the foreground - but I might have to settle for an image without the leaves and only so-so reflectivity on the water. Or I'll compose for the shot I think I want only to find out I should have been 5 feet to the left when I get home. I'm figuring in another 20 years, I'll have it down to more of a science.

Bryan, I agree.

When I do this kind of a thinking process, its about places I have already been, and I am always hoping for optimal conditions....many a time that is not the case!

Now here I am, up and ready to go and the rain is pouring down....nevertheless, I am still going. Here in the Northwest you just never can be sure when the clouds will part and give you a chance to bring the camera out!

Oh I do it all the time. The problem is that the light doesn't cooperate as often as I would like to and that is where it gets interesting.

I've been trying to do this and most of the time I've come back empty handed.

- pradeep

I guess it's the mindset that's important to me. Thinking ahead and imagining sets a tone for me to be watchful and in the mode/in the mood for making photographs. Then I am not disappointed if I don't get exactly what I was looking for because I got myself into a space where I am ready also to be surprised and/or ready for serendipity.
My mentor actually does plan out shots for places he's never been and is quite successful getting exactly what he planned. But he allows for lots of contingencies too once he's on site: weather delays, lighting, all the same things mentioned in above posts. And the luck seems to be with him too! Hope that helps....

Fine Art natural landscape and especially Fine Art Color natural landscape Photography is much maligned. There is a belief in the general population on seeing a well made natural landscape Photograph that they themselves could have done it had they been there. This is not true and that can only be learned by trying. When working in the landscape the normal practice is to seek out locations and plan your timing to be there when the light is good. The natural landscape is often busy and confused. The Photographer seeks a pristine subject that will fit into the film plain in a fashion that meets the traditional or other rules of composition and the constraints of their tools.

Is luck involved? Maybe…But then again, as Louie Pasture said, “CHANCE FAVORS THE PREPAIRED MIND” The real issue is not the composition, or the exposure, or even the light, but it is the focus. As in all Photography, it is the seeing, the vision and the ability to express it that are important.

It is easy to point out what may be perceived as technical flaws but do they subtract from the expression? All artists must start with a vision and the desire to express it. A Photographer uses cameras, lens, and film as the tools to express their vision and strives to master these tools. Finding your vision and learning to express it is another matter altogether.

The best advice I can give to a new Photographer on this site is to continue to post your work for whatever comments you can get. More importantly however, is to see (rather that look at) the work of others posted to this site. Seek out those that you find expressive of your own vision. These will be easy to find because they will be the images that have appeal to you, the images that you like. Studying these photographs to understand why you like them will help to clear your vision. When you vision is clear, you can start to express it. Remember though, as you seek out your vision that because a given image does not speak to you is not to say it does not speak.

Doyle

It is easier to gain enlightenment than to explain enlightenment.
Supreme Master Ching Hai

I love to pre-visualize. However, I think a strength that all photographer (and musicians, by the way) must develop is the ability to improvise. Work with what you have and think on the spot to get the most out of the time in the field. Being a profesional musician first and photographer second, it's really amazing the parallels between the two professions. Killer songs are simple, focused with a clear emotion that is projected thru the whole song (of course these are generalities) and in photography, the same rules apply really nicely.

Most of the time I simply want to get outside with the camera. I usually have at minimum a vague idea of what I want to capture, yet leave my options open to whatever nature provides. Often though I head out with very specific ideas of what I'm trying to capture.

For instance, there is an image at Smith Rock that I've had in my head ever since the first time I visited there. I've spent many hours studying maps and the almanac at the US Naval Observatory website, trying to pinpoint when my best chances are. The shot is only obtainable twice a year. Unfortunately, so far, every time the calendar rolls around, something of a higher priortiy comes up, or the weather forecast doesn't make it worth the trip for solely this image, because Feb. and Oct. are the two months when the shot is possible, and I must have sunset conditions to get the shot.

I have many other such visions in my head and I often plan trips around the position of the sun and/or moon.

I attended a slideshow given by Art Wolfe a few years ago in Seattle. He displayed a sunset image from Africa that he spend 2 years planning.

I estimate that more than half of my best images were a direct result of knowing where to be and when. I'm always thinking about where to be and why - I woke up this morning 10 miles into the backcountry on a snowy, windy 7000-foot ledge that overlooks Three Finger Jack peak. I was camped there for 3 days, mostly in blizzards, because I knew the best shots would come between storm cycles or shortly thereafter.
But I feel that when it comes to HOW you capture the scene, and what the image will convey, is every bit as much a result of your personal interaction with the landscape at any given time.
Of course it's been said that luck favors the prepared - and if you want to reach the highest level with your photography you cannot rely on good luck alone. Galen often said that you must go to the image you want - you cannot always let it come to you.

That is correct Marc.

I agree with John - "ability to improvise." About 80% of my work are improvisations of something that I visualize for some time before the shoot, but the REALITY factor always comes in and changes everything. Therefore the “CHANCE FAVORS THE PREPAIRED MIND” is true as well.