Thursday, December 01, 2005

Me and My Camera

Even though I love to take pictures and usually have a camera with me, I haven't taken a ton of photos in NYC because I have grown very self-conscious about taking pictures in public. I seem to have developed an inferiority complex where I don't want people to think I'm some stupid tourist. True there are a zillion people in this city taking pictures of everything and no one's going to notice one guy taking a shot here and there, but that hasn't stopped me from becoming extremely self-consicous about it. Where this has come from I have no idea. I'm sure a professional could offer some keen insight, but I'm not a professional and I don't have $45 an hour to spend on one.

Tonight on my way home from work I decided to swing by the library and see if a book I had on hold was in [it was!]. And then I remembered that last night was the lighting of the tree in Rockefeller Plaza. I had nowhere to go so I thought I'd walk a few blocks out of my way and see it. And I was determined to take pictures.

So there I was, standing in front of the tree and trying to take a picture of me and the tree together. It took about 8 tries to get anything even close to decent and I was beginning to laugh at myself. A guy stopped and asked if I wanted him to take the picture for me but I laughed and said "No thanks, that's kind of the fun of it." Plus I didn't want him to steal my camera.

On the way home I walked past the Rainbow Room, Radio City, and through Times Square and since I was feeling particularly camera-happy, I continued taking pictures.

Yea, I'm a dork, and I know it, but it was kinda fun to do something touristy. One of my favorite shots is in Times Square. I'm not looking into the camera but kind of up in the air. It looks a little posed and pretentious but actually I was looking at this huge statue of a man and all of a sudden a bunch of pigeons started to attack it and I got distracted. And that's when the camera clicked.

Thanks for tuning in to VH1's Behind the Pictures.

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