Sorting Through Old Photos

A Visual Reminder of Progress

Over the past weeks, I started sorting through my photos — an archive of thousands of digital photos I’ve taken over my whole life. It has been overwhelming and tedious, to say the least, but also fun. I’ve laughed plenty of times at how bad some photos are and wondered why I kept so many blurry photos from the zoo when I was little!

A blurry Ring-billed Gull eyes me suspiciously in 2010.

I got my first camera (a pink toy digital camera) in 2010. Its pictures were terrible and it’s not hard to see how my photography has improved with better gear over the years!

Visual reminders of progress are encouraging. As an artist, it can be frustrating day-to-day, feeling like you’re going in circles or not getting anywhere with your work: two steps forward, then one step back when a project doesn’t go as well as you hoped.

But when we step back and see the big picture of our work from year-to-year, we see a difference that inspires us to keep moving forward.

A much better Ring-billed gull in 2021! Not only is it clearer, but it also has more interesting framing at the bird’s level and captures a funny moment.

In terms of photography, certainly, gear is part of that improvement — but also attention to detail and light, composition, background, equipment settings and timing. Learning to edit over the past few years was a huge change for me (I’ll have to make a post or video someday comparing before and after editing photos!)

This peacock photo circa 2012-2013 captures the moment, but it isn't very exciting. The peacock photo from 2021 turns a moment into thrilling art!

Cameras ultimately don’t “take good pictures” — a good photographer can take a good picture on a little pink toy camera (though it may be difficult)! It is all in how we use the tools we have.

An alligator from 2010 and a Komodo dragon from 2023. The photos have similar compositions, but I was able to improve my new one with a zoom lens and digital editing!

I hope seeing these pictures (or maybe laughing at the bad ones and wondering why I kept them) inspires you to keep working at your creative craft: whether painting, poetry, music, or dance. Years from now, you’ll look back and be glad you kept at it.

It isn't always about how easy it is to identify the subject of a photo. The left (Great Egret, 2010) is easy to see, but uninteresting and flat. The right (Red-belled Woodpecker, 2018) is dramatic and intriguing.

I have thousands more photos to go through, so I’m sure I’ll find plenty more fun “then and now” comparisons. Goodbye for now!