When a mediocre picture does the job
I can be a photo snob.
While I'm nowhere close to being a pro with the camera--my sister Jill plays that role in the family--and don't even own an SLR camera, I usually have a decent sense of how to frame a shot. So when I see pictures that are wildly out of frame or otherwise poorly composed, it bugs me. And I don't like sharing my own photos of that ilk. But I'm learning, slowly, to get over myself--especially when there's a story that can come to life from even a crummy photo. (And let's face it, with an iPhone--which I used to snap the shot below--most photos are going to turn out crummy.) I'm posting this picture below of my son Amani from earlier today not because it's a technical or even an artistic thing of beauty--it certainly isn't--but because it captures a moment that made my day. He is giving me the thumbs-up sign (you can see this even better in the original version on Flickr) as he makes his way through the security line with my wife Stella for a mini-vacation flight to Orlando. Moments later, he also returned a here's-looking-at-you kind of point and then blew me some kisses. It was all at once cute, goofy, touching, and a reminder that he's still a happy-go-lucky 3-year-old. Plus, since he's always asking if he can go on the avión with me as I head out on business trips, I was just excited that his turn to fly the friendly skies had come (even though I couldn't go with him). When it comes down to it, the photos that I post to Flickr and other social sites are ultimately for giving family and friends a peek into my/our life, for starting "snackable" discussions (such as with my Twitpics or yFrog shots), and for documenting the stories I might want to revisit later. And most of the time, even a mediocre photo will serve just fine in accomplishing any or all three of those aims.
