Instantaneous Perfection 2020

8 min readNov 18, 2020

Instantaneous perfection. It sounds nice. There are many things that I would love to know or be able to do without the time, practice, or mistakes required to learn.

This quarter at my college, I decided to sign up for a nature photography course. Every week, we are tasked with going out to take pictures to bring back to the class to share and discuss. It was pretty unlike a lot of classes I’ve taken before. There were no tests or studying required, just the willingness to go out and take pictures and share your thoughts with other students.

Perhaps, I naively thought this class would take a lot less time than some of my other classes. Of course, as you may expect, that was never the case.

Several weeks into the class, I was struggling to balance all my coursework from my other classes with the nature photography course. I knew that I was pressed for time so I did not have as much time to go hike and take photos that week as I usually did. As such, I decided I would go to Randol Mill Park, a small wooded area and pond close to my house. I had been to the park before and had always encountered countless birds in the area. I thought I could just head out for a couple of minutes, snap a photo of some birds, and head out.

When I got to the park, I already noticed something different. The pond, which was a favorite visiting place for many water fowls and egrets, only had three ducks in it, which was relatively less than I expected. I headed towards the ducks to get photographs, but the ducks started to swim in the other direction right into direct sunlight. Not only were the ducks too far to photograph, they also had harsh light on them, ruining any photo that I managed to get.

Muscovy Duck

I really wanted to find another bird to photograph. The park was known for its birds so I knew I would be able to find something else. I headed into the wooded area and began looking around.

I heard tweets and chirps here and there, but I knew there were noticeably less birds in the area than usual. I don’t think there was any particular reason for this other than just chance. I just happened to come by at a bad time, which frustrated me. I really wanted to go in and out quickly, snapping a bunch of amazing photographs along the way.

All of the birds I did find were always too far away or obscured by a branch. Essentially, what I’m saying is that I wasn’t able to get as many great photos as I wanted. I managed to get some okay photos, but nothing that was amazing or I was proud of.

I knew that was just part of nature photography, especially as it pertains to wildlife photography. Some days are just not that great. Even though I knew that these days exist, I still felt pretty down, particularly since I expected to get so much done in so little time. That was my mistake. I should have known better. I understood that now and started to head home.

As I was about to exit the woods, I took one look back and see if I could see anything else. I glanced around for about 10 minutes, but I could not find anything. I turned around and just as I was about to leave, I heard it: a series of rapid tapping.

site:

I knew exactly what it was: a woodpecker. I looked around and tried to find the source of the sound. I managed to see the woodpecker, but it was deep in the thick woods. I tried to take a photo, but too many things were in the way. And just like that, the woodpecker flew away.

Downy Woodpeckers Behind Leaves

As I turned around again to leave, the woodpecker landed on a branch right in front of me, just a couple of yards away. I panicked, but was able to collect myself and raise my lens to the bird. As it hopped around, I took what felt like hundreds of photos. An opportunity had presented itself and I wanted to make sure I took it. After some time, the bird flew away, just as quickly as it had come.

When I finally got home and looked at my photos, I found a lot of them had poor lighting and were blurry. I was frustrated with myself. I was so excited to see the bird that I had completely ignored my camera settings. I scrolled through all my photos and then: there it was. The one I was looking for, what I thought was a close-to perfect photo. In it, the woodpecker’s back faces the viewer, as the woodpecker looks up to the right in search of food. I was so proud of this one photograph.

Instantaneous Perfection 2020

Written by Golden Bar