
Snoqualmie Pass, WA
15 August 2021 :: Canon 550D :: f/2 2hr. 6min. integration :: ISO-800
Dear Stranger;
I was burning up vacation and I've realised I've been at my job for so long (you know, the one where I bang my head on my desk and airplanes that take you all over the world come out?) that I accrue vacation time faster than I've been using it. So a weekend or two ago, I decided on the spur of the moment to head out to my favourite dark sky spot and try a few things I wanted to try after self-critiquing and watching more how to vids regarding my earlier attempts at the North American Nebula (NGC 7000 for you fellow nerds out there). Granted this time around I was ready to start collecting data much faster than before, set up my tripod in a much more efficient and accessible manner and the usable frames were more in abundance than last time, so everything I had jotted down in my notes did yield improvements, but I only used about 2/3 of the frames I collected.
Because I forgot about composition.
See, the first 1/3 of the data I collected had the actual nebula framed to the far right of the frame, not really giving me much margin at my current beginner skill level. I forgot that when composing my shot it was important to imagine where the nebula was relative to the stars I was using as a reference (Deneb and surrounding stars that "cradled" the nebula) because typically it's not really visible through the viewfinder. Instead, my artsy instincts took over and I composed based on what I could see through the viewfinder and, well, I ended up learning something.
What's funny is that there really wasn't much to see, so I'm not sure what on earth I was thinking, so...
But I digress. What I found funny, after realising this part-way through the night, was that this really seems to be like a really good parallel to life (only killed 1.5 hours so next time I have my act together, I'll be able to get 3 hours of data at a time!). We learn, we screw up, we learn some more. We get better. Lather, rinse, repeat.
That's it. That's where I was going with this.
Fun-snarky aside, I'm trying to accept this cycle of mistake, learning, and improvement as something that is what my life should be (because it is) as opposed to this obsession with striving for crippling perfection because that's what was beat into me (not literally) during my childhood. There are places for this need to minimise risk and mistakes (commercial airplanes, for example), but one might be surprised at all the other places in life (and even to some limited degree in commercial airplanes) that imperfection can be acceptable. That's why we build-in tolerances in the things we engineer, work on resilience in ourselves with our therapist, all that stuff.
And that's my ongoing journey, really, and it's been a lot tougher to accept than I originally thought because in doing so comes a lot of discomfort early on, but if you take a look at where you are and from where you've come, all that work is yours. You can see progress–and don't forget to give yourself the permission to take credit for the hard work you've done.
This is my third try at this nebula since my first attempt in June. I've improved my setup routine, how I shoot my light frames, and changed how I stack and process the photos (mainly by using the software packages that I was afraid to use because they looked intimidating on the vids I watched). Little by little, though, we can learn where to focus our efforts, what we see, and really pay attention to the important things and then things really start to come out.
In a way, everything can probably be made into an analogy for life, I know. And you know what? I really like that.
What's new with you?
Magically,
-j
(Video from this session is here: https://youtu.be/ux1cNhfw0CY)