I made a lot of mistakes on our South American Cruising Through Life workshop. It could have been that I was getting used to a new camera – Canon 5D Mark II. It could have been that I was out of my element and trying new things. Am I kicking myself? No. I’m learning from my mistakes. Sometimes I feel like I learn more from my mistakes than my successes.
Here’s one example. Shooting hand held bracketed bursts (one scene, 3 exposures, 1.5 stops apart), I often found I hadn’t set or reset the bracket function correctly. It takes setting the mode and then confirming the settings on my 5D Mark II. I often missed the confirm step. And if I got distracted, I often forgot to take it off auto bracket mode, which means single shots were varying exposure unexpectedly. After repeating the mistake several times, I’m now on alert every time I slip in and out of these modes. In fact, I think this camera and this experience has made me more vigilant about all of my camera settings.
Failure is only failure if you don’t learn from your mistakes. And making mistakes in situations where the pressure’s not on and stakes aren’t high is ideal. I recommend you make a little time to shoot and use it to become more conscious of your equipment and your habits.
Plans are brewing for future international Cruise workshops.
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Find out more about Cruising Through Life here.
Find out more about Vincent Versace here.
Find out more about my upcoming workshops here.