Confessions of a Photographer

I have something to confess. I'm horrible at getting pictures printed. I have thousands of images of quietly lurking on my hard-drive, just dying for the chance to be printed. I always tell myself next month I will send them off to the lab. Next month comes, slowly fades into the next and they are still there waiting.  

I know I've mentioned my love of film and how I love the quality and feel of the images. However, another reason I am so enamored with it, is that I can't see the pictures until I send it to the lab. When I do send it, there's also this nifty little box on the order form that asks me if I want prints. Super simple to check yes.  Of course I want prints. Who doesn't want a tangible object of an intangible adventure. But guess what I also get the digital files. The combination of the two is something that I've really come to appreciate. The jpegs aren't there nagging me to be printed. I don't feel guilty for having only digital copies. 

I understand why everyone wants digital. I really do. I love sharing my pictures on Instagram and Facebook. I want every one to see how cute my kids are (I'm a proud mama after all). I haven't been offering anything digital in my collections, because I so badly want you to have prints. For you, yes, but also for the future generations. Technology changes so fast. USB drives that work today may not work in 20 years. Heck it might not work in 5.  For some reason I got it in my head that there wasn't room for digital anything. ever. at all. 

After coming to terms with my love of both print and digital, I'm working on a way to compromise the photographer in my head with the mama of my heart. I want you to have the best of both worlds. Something to share in the here and now and something for the future. I'm not sure how that's going look quite yet. It's still in the planning stages, but I just wanted you to know that I understand.

I shot these pictures of my children this summer at my favorite place in the world, Beach Haven (you can read about it here), and on San Juan Island in the Puget Sound, on my Mamiya RZ67 proII. Yes it's film and yes I have the prints :). Maybe next month I'll get some of my thousands of jpegs printed. In the words of one of my favorite photographers, Jonathan Canlas, "Don't let your jpegs grow up to be jpegs."