Seeing and looking, is there a difference?

The longer that I spend in this journey of photography the more I realize the difference there is between looking and seeing.  I'll try explain what I mean over the course of this post.

Very often I will walk around and my eyes just take in the world around me as one big blob. I struggle to see the smaller details of life, I think we all do to a degree.  When we were kids we saw the world with wonder and awe! Everything we saw amazed us and delighted our senses.

Now that I live further away from my workplace and cannot go home for lunch I am making an effort to take my camera and go for a walk every lunch break.  I don't have a specific scene I want to photograph rather, I want to give my eyes a work out.  I want to re-energize that child like awe I have lost.  I want to see things, shapes, patterns and colors that I normally miss or do not notice in the world around me.

Thus far it has been a really rewarding process!  It has helped take my time and really examine the world around me.  The areas I am walking around in I have walked through countless times but slowly I am seeing more and more, rather than just looking around me.  Prior to this exercise I would never have noticed these droplets of water on leaves, perfectly preserved despite it being midday.

Midday water droplets -  55mm;  ISO 100;  1/250sec;  f/5.6

I would not have examined these autumn leaves as intently either.  It also helps me think about how I could represent a relatively dull subject in a more exciting way, a few experiments lead to what I think is a pretty cool zoom blur effect.

Autumn Explosion  -  53mm;  ISO 100;  1/30sec;  f/22

This process has so far been very rewarding.  My eyes are starting to see more in the world around me and as a result I think some of my photography is getting better.  Try it, get out there and try and see things around you instead of just looking and seeing the same drab world you think you are seeing on a daily basis.


Thanks for stopping by!