Toronto Photography Meetup Group

Luck/Fortune favors the prepared.

I used to lug around Fm2s, F3s and F4s and needed drives, lenses, flashes, batt., etc. Today's stuff is light weight.

Hummm, maybe that's why some of us are used to carrying heavy bags. I used to carry an Elan II and an EOS3 with vertical grip/boosters and lots of batteries etc. I used to eat up AA batteries like there was no tomorrow.

on my 3 week china trip, i felt i was pretty serious. i brought:

a900
20/2.8
58/1.2
200/2.8
tripod, ballhead
flash

i left behind
a100
18-70/3.5-5.6
24/2.8
28/2.0
35/1.4
50/2.0
50/2.8 macro
85/1.4
75-300/4.5-5.6
3-way tripod head

I ensured i got a perfect fitting MEC hiking bag to carry all my stuff in as i knew i'd be doing some mountain trail hiking. i've learnt to be able to set up to get the perfect shot in about 2 minutes. like whkc said... f/8 & there.

and on my previous vacation, i brought only a900+58/1.2 with no tripod

equipment is only a small part of getting the perfect shot.

Luck is when preparation meets opportunity.

Nice one.

Like serendipity said, all the preparedness in the world won't mean squat if you don't have an opportunity to use it.

To me the shot of a lifetime is catching lightening striking a pink elephant in the middle of downtown Toronto. Its that freak occurrence that happens but once in a lifetime and if your extremely lucky your shutter just happened to be open at the right time, lens focused on the right cross point and camera settings just right to capture it.

A Pellican case filled with the best lenses, tripods, speed lights, pocket wizards and backup camera bodies isn't going to do a thing for you. Its pure luck.

If you have time to swap lenses or mount a flash your probably not capturing the shot of a lifetime. Your just taking a nice shot.

I guess it's all subjective on what "you" (in general terms) consider the shot of a lifetime. For some, that "shot of a lifetime" is as instantaneous as catching lighting in a bottle; a pink elephant flying past your window; Paris Hilton running into a Tim Hortons nekkid after being mauled by a man eating Persian cat wearing a diamond encrusted necklace with C4 strapped to it's tail.

For others it could mean heading up to a scenic lookout with the perfect cloud cover, the fall colours at its peak, not a breath of wind to be felt, the sun slowly setting and turning the sky into brilliant shades of violet. BUT you're still a fair distance from the clearing at the lookout. You've got more than ample time to swap gear BUT if you had only packed that 70-200 to crop in tighter to shoot the stand of trees in the distance so you could shoot past the unsightly obstacles that takes up a majority of your viewfinder with your 16-35mm lens on.

What I'm getting at is that not every shot of a lifetime happens within fractions of a second for everyone.

You'd be crazy not to take the shot if it was a rare occurrence like Jessica Alba pulling over to ask for directions and all you had was a camera phone.

Does opportunity favor the prepared? Do you play it "as it happens" and cross your fingers that chance finds you with the right lens etc at hand?

What if you took a week off to travel to some remote area to shoot a rare and shy bird that only visits that area once a year for only a couple of weeks. Nobody has managed to get a closeup detailed shot of it since it was discovered. A single photo of this bird could net you a $10,000. prize and worldwide recognition. It has only been seen 3 times the previous week but nobody has a clear shot. You trek all your gear to the site 5 of the 7 days that you've been there without any luck. The 6th day you decide that 500mm lens is too heavy so you leave it back at camp figuring "Heck I haven't seen that bird in 4 days!" I might as well just shoot landscapes for stock and only take your 24-105mm. You're at the site and that rare bird shows up with a mate and is doing it's mating ritual etc. for the last hour. The 7th day you have to pack up to head back home... Do you say "Oh it just wasn't my luck today."

When shooting large format where exposures can run into a few minutes, the "decisive moment" is when the wind stops blowing for a minute.