Anyone who has attempted any form of photography knows quite well, unreliable objects are extremely difficult to take pictures of. We are not talking about your Chevy truck, we are talking about things you can't count on doing what you say. Such as birds, no matter how much one yells at them, they will NOT stay still. It is as if they are seeing who can look in the most directions within one second. By the time the camera focuses in on their twitching head, something scary comes into their line of site and they flutter off. Sometimes it crosses one's mind to go chasing after them, but when you run into a tree do to the fact that you were staring at a bird 300 feet in the air it becomes easier to ignore that idea. Trees are persuasive that way, and they tend to stay put, even when a 140lb object slams into them doing 7MPH. Stubborn things those trees... but a lot easier to take pictures of than birds.

Then there's deer. I have stealthily chased after deer many an hour just to get a stinking picture. I've often considered packing a gun so I can at least get lunch out of the deal. Most of the time I'll be about to take a shot and then some uncalled-for-event will occur to scare the deer off, leaving me with nothing but an obscure picture of its tail. While this may be better than nothing, obscure pictures of deers tails are just not the sort of thing to draw out an "Oh how beautiful!" from those who see it. This is very annoying, and usually invokes in me the desire to maul and destroy the object that acted out the uncalled-for-event that made the deer bound off. But as that object is generally me, it makes that a difficult desire to act upon. Mauling oneself being a hard thing to succeed in. Sometimes one can chase down the deer, as mentioned concerning the bird, but the same dangers generally apply. Deer tend to run quite speedily, particularly when being pursued by persons yelling "Get back here you dumb deer!". After a while the chase reaches speeds coming close to 20MPH. The human body not being used to running at such speeds tends to become unstable, and the danger of running into trees, rocks, and semi - trucks becomes quite considerable. Then the deer jumps a fence, a barbed wire fence. After viewing the deer accomplish this feat, it looks to be quite simple, so one may be induced to undertake it. This is not advised. Finally, when you are running through a lightly treed forest at 20MPH yelling "Get back here you dumb deer!" with tree bark stuck in your hair, a Mack Truck emblem in your teeth and a pair of jeans recently made shorts do to barbed wire, you may begin to think this is not worth a picture of something people runover on the road and cuss at afterwards. This thought is compounded when you see this same elusive deer calmly eating grass in your back yard the next day. At this point, you may be of the inclination to reach for the gun rather than the camera.

People are not exactly easy to take pictures of either. Not only do they not always do what you say, but unlike deer and birds, they concern themselves with how they look afterwards. Often becoming overly and violently excited when they cannot persuade you to trash a picture in which they do not look like Elvis Presley or Julia Roberts. This can become nearly as annoying as uncalled-for-events scaring off deer, and sometimes induces the mauling desire once again. But as your subjects are usually family or someone you enjoy some sort of good relations with, this desire is best left unacted-upon. My biggest problem is that people that I take pictures of tend to have strangely horrified expressions on their face, this may be do to the fact that I tell them to look at me for the picture. Almost as prevalent is the problem of people looking as if they are contemplating causing my death in the near future. This is more an issue with people that do not enjoy having their picture taken and think evil thoughts about any who dare take their picture. Evil thoughts are generally accompanied by causing-my-death-in-the-near-future-expressions. Another difficulty is that some have it in their head that they need to manufacture a smile for the camera, instead of laughing at the stupid jokes I make trying to get them to smile genuinely. Perhaps they think Elvis Presley and Julia Roberts never laughed at stupid jokes. Whatever the cause, this problem generally makes the subject to look like a half guilty lawyer who's just robbed his mother's bank. Upon realizing all these difficulties in taking pictures of people, I decided it is best to take pictures of people that don't know it. This can be accomplished either by simply taking a picture of the subject and suffer the problem of them not looking into the camera, or attracting their attention to oneself, and get a shot in before they realize the sneakiness of your actions. This not only avoids the horrified expression and faulty smile, but does not induce the causing-my-death-in-the-near-future-expression until later when it is not captured by the camera. If you can keep them from destroying your camera, you are thereby able to get extremely natural and pleasant shots without too much trouble.

I hope these writings have been helpful to any undertaking or desiring to undertake some form of photography. Experience is important, but luck does better. Happy shooting.

~Nick A. Crawford.