That distinction has become increasingly important to me.
When I look at a photograph, I don’t want to simply see what the photographer saw. I want to experience something that goes beyond the image. I want to pause. I want to look again. I want to ask questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How did this happen?<\/em> And sometimes, the questions become much larger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why is there such beauty in the world?<\/em> Perhaps that is where photography becomes something more than the act of recording an image. When I first began photographing birds, I was primarily concerned with getting the photograph. I wanted the bird to be sharp. I wanted the background to be clean. I wanted the light to be right and the composition to be pleasing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But the longer I photographed birds, the more I realized that the photograph was only part of the experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The real gift was being there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Waiting quietly before sunrise. Hearing the first birds begin to call. Watching the changing light move across the landscape. Watching patiently for a bird that may appear for only a few seconds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And then, suddenly, it is there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A tiny creature with feathers so intricately designed that no two seem quite the same. An eye reflecting the morning light. A bird that may have traveled hundreds or thousands of miles to arrive at the very place where I am standing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For a moment, everything else disappears. I am no longer thinking about the camera. I am simply looking. We tend to become accustomed to beautiful things. We see a cardinal in the backyard and call it a cardinal. We see a butterfly and call it a butterfly. We see a sunrise and call it morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But perhaps familiarity is one of the greatest enemies of wonder. <\/em>Please don\u2019t miss that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Photography gives us an opportunity to interrupt that familiarity. A camera can make us stop and look at something we thought we already knew. It can reveal the delicate structure of a feather. The translucent edge of a butterfly’s wing. The tiny details in a bird’s eye. The patterns of light and shadow that exist for only an instant. And suddenly, the familiar becomes mysterious again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That is what I believe a great photograph can do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It can find the extra in the ordinary.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It can remind us that we live in a world filled with things we have stopped noticing. And for me, that has become one of the deepest reasons I photograph birds. I don’t believe nature is merely beautiful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I believe it reveals.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The longer I spend in nature, the more I find myself thinking about the words of Scripture: \u201cThe heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps a photograph cannot prove anything about God. But it can make us look. And sometimes looking is where faith begins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A photograph of a bird does not have to contain a religious symbol to be spiritual. Sometimes the spirituality is in the act of paying attention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To stop. To recognize that something as seemingly insignificant as a sparrow has been given a place in this vast and complicated world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus himself used birds to teach us about something much greater than birds. He told his followers to consider them – to look at them closely – and to understand from their existence something about the care of their Creator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Maybe that is what wonder does. It moves us from simply seeing something to considering it. And consideration can become gratitude. Gratitude can become humility. And humility can become worship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is why I don’t think the ultimate goal of photography is perfection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perfection is measurable. Wonder isn’t.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n You can measure sharpness. You can measure exposure. You can evaluate composition. But you can’t put a number on the moment when someone looks at a photograph and becomes still. You can’t measure the moment when an image causes someone to remember something they had forgotten. You can’t calculate the value of a photograph that makes someone feel connected to the natural world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And you certainly can’t measure the moment when a photograph causes someone to look beyond the photograph itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That, to me, is the difference between taking a picture and making a photograph. A picture records a moment. A photograph can invite us into it. And the very best photographs may even invite us beyond it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They leave something unresolved. Maybe that is why the photographs I remember most aren’t necessarily the ones that were technically perfect.
How did the light find this particular feather?<\/em>
Where has this bird been? Where is it going?<\/em>
How can something so small possess such extraordinary beauty?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
What am I really looking at?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
It becomes an invitation to see. Bird photography has taught me this in ways I never expected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And wondering. That sense of wonder is what I hope to preserve in my photographs. Not merely the appearance of a bird, but something of the mystery surrounding it. Because the more closely I look at nature, the less ordinary it becomes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To notice.
To marvel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They leave room for imagination.
They leave room for questions.
They leave room for wonder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They are the ones that made me stop.
The ones that made me feel something.
The ones that made me look twice.
The ones that made me wonder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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