Field Notes: February 2025

I'm convinced February is the most uninspired month of the year. At least in the northern hemisphere.  I know from experience that February makes a better summer month than it does a winter month. But getting past the obvious question of how does the shortest month of the year feel the longest, I did sneak some lovely snow images and then promptly next morning I traded the snow for the turquoise waters of the Caribbean. And then came home to another snowstorm, so basically in addition to being the shortest-longest month it also gave me a bit of weather whiplash.

On My Desk

I find it extraordinarily confusing that USB cables all look the same but perform completely differently. I would bet a huge percentage of non-photographers don't care or possibly even notice, but when you are transferring large amounts of data between drives and charging camera batteries, the USB cable matters a lot. But since a "regular" USB-C cable and one designed for data/power transfer look exactly the same I kept buying good ones and then they would get mixed with the regular ones and  then I would get somewhere and try to charge a battery or backup photos and it would take 5 hours instead of the 1 hour I was expecting. So I finally got smart and went online and bought nice fast USB-C cables in bright colors and  now I can happily charge my devices and backup my pictures during dinner instead of overnight. Sometimes the smallest things make a really big difference.

On My Bookshelf

Still by Paul Sanders. I've admired Paul's work for years (I referenced it here), and his book is absolutely lovely. It's a book that you're going to want to read slowly, and savor both the words and images.

 A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. Bill Bryson lingered on my TBR (to be read) list for way too long before I finally picked up this book (and then immediately began At Home when I finished this one). This book is a unique mix of storytelling, humor, and rambling facts and history of the Appalachian trail and the states it crosses.

Watching

My 9 year old is super into photography and also national parks and while I did not take him to Yosemite this month like he begged me to, we have been watching the Kelby-One video series on photographing the national parks. These are fun, informative, and filmed in some iconic locations. We've made our way through Zion, Yosemite, and Yellowstone so far with more to go.

Working on

I'm teaching my youngest how to use Adobe Lightroom, and he just used it to make his very first photo book. That took more time from me than it will in the future since it was his first time through the process, but it reminded me of how much I enjoy the process of culling and sequencing images for a project like that. I  need to "take a page out of his book" and go work on some photography books of my own.

In My Camera Bag

I am usually a prime shooter, but I decided to do something extremely out of character and experiment with using the Sigma 20-200mm “Super Zoom” on my Leica SL-3. I love the simplicity of traveling with just one lens on this camera, and it makes walking around and photographing so simple. For travel the combination of the Leica Sl-3 with this lens + either the Q3 or the M-11 and a handful of primes is the perfect balance of size, versatility, and usability.

Using the Sigma 20-200 feels like basically the exact opposite of using the Leica M-11. In a word, it feels brainless although by brainless I, of course, mean on the equipment end of things, photography itself is never (or should never be) brainless. It's not as much fun to shoot with as the M-11 or even the Q-3, mostly because it's so easy  that it feels a teeny bit like photographing with my phone. Which if you aren't used to using either a fixed lens camera or a manual focus rangefinder might sound stupid, but when I'm used to photography being a game of restrictions, the freedom of the super-zoom feel almost limitless. It's great for exploring new places when I want to be able to shoot wide and close all at the same time. And it's phenomenal at the beach. Trust me on this one and then ask me sometime about my Fujifilm X-Pro 2 which I managed to both drench in salt water and get sand in the sensor all on the same trip to Monterey. That won't happen to my Leica because I can now shoot from 20-200 without ever taking the lens off the camera. Brilliant.