My copper bowl with fruit picture hit the big time on Saturday (well, in the limited world of internet photography addicts anyway). It got to the #12 spot on Explore. I was in such awe that I took a screenshot to share with all posterity.

My kids got excited. My husband got excited. I think the dogs even got excited (or else that was just the rawhide bone under my desk). I had a hard time wiping the stupid grin off my face, especially when I would hit refresh and see how many more views it had gotten.

The Follow-up

And then I had to take a picture for my #SundayStillLife entry. Cue the ominous music… Suddenly, I began to second guess everything. The arrangement wasn’t working. The lighting wasn’t working. It just wasn’t happening and I began to get frustrated.

The little kids, who had been playing on their own, began to flutter around and touch everything, knocking over the light stand and the fruit bowl. My patient husband (who was being a wonderful assistant) and I couldn’t figure out what why it wasn’t coming together. But instead of pulling back, we just kept plowing ahead.

What Went Wrong

When it was all done and we looked at the images in Lightroom we had several revelations about what had gone wrong. I blamed the guitar for being a difficult line to compose against. My husband blamed the white hydrangeas for being too bright. I’m sure we were both right.

1. Too much stuff. The number one problem was that there was just too much stuff on the table competeing for attention. Maybe if it had been more cohesive it could have worked, but certain elements just weren’t working together and we should have pared it down.
2. No lighting drama. I just had the light in the wrong place. We were so focused on the arrangement of stuff we missed the fact that the light wasn’t really adding to the picture.

Selecting & Editing

And then the agony began. After editing the select and getting it to where I sort of liked it, I began to doubt whether I should post it. It couldn’t stand up to copper bowl shot. Maybe that one was a fluke and just dumb luck and I would never, ever, ever, ever repeat it because, you know, I don’t really know what I’m doing after all…and on and on.

Mentally, I made plans to redo the whole session once all the little kids went to bed. I’d go to the grocery store and pick up some new flowers, grab some different props and try all over…

One Hit Wonder?

Then I realized I was being stupid. I had a decent picture and I should just post the dumb thing and get over myself.

So I did.

And…well, it was still painful. Trusting this process thing, getting out of the way of the work, not taking it as a reflection of your self-worth? That’s not easy stuff.

Someone once asked St. Thomas Aquinas how to become a saint. He replied, “will it.” In other words, do it. So do it, I will and hopefully one day I’ll be able to replicate that copper bowl shot.

In the meantime, I found a great canvas print deal and I’ll be getting that baby printed up extra-large!