What Would be Your Response (Or, Why I often shoot "off the beaten track")?

[Tony Egan]

Really? All the Australians I've met have been laid back genuine nice people. And that's more than a few. Right now I'm actually considering taking a position and moving to Tasmania.

We used to criticise the "ugly American" tourists but we have some pretty ugly cases of our own I'm afraid to say. Our exchange rate has been overvalued for many years allowing lots more Aussies to travel (further than Bali). A friend just got back from Spain saying all he seemed to meet were other cashed-up Aussies drinking too much and talking too loudly!

Tasmania could do with a bit more class, so come on down Martin!

And yes, my response was ironic or perhaps sardonic. I have unloaded with some foul language against officious security guards on a few occasions much to my later regret. Regardless of the job or the power of the uniform, I should have been more polite. By making his post I think Bradley probably agrees.

 

[Tony Egan]

Concluding, the one remark here that really did piss me off was the one about the fact that I don't crop. You, Sir, are confusing a statement of personal preference/practice with what you seem to choose to interpret as dogma. I don't crop my 35mm work because I absolutely love the dynamism of the 24x36 format; I always have.

Sorry mate, that was me. My tongue-in-cheek response was intended to point out that we all think (and occasionally say) offensive things and have our own intolerances and snobbishness about other people and practices. I really don't think the non-croppers and rebate revealers are offensive and there are plenty of other posts on APUG where this has been batted back and forth. I won't repeat my views here other than to say I don't understand why "the picture" must always be forced into an arbitrary aspect ratio?
By all means we should take our photography seriously(even very seriously) but not ourselves too seriously!

Cheers
Tony

 

[Truzi]

Unlike many of my fellow carbon-based bipeds, I am not thin-skinned: I never take insults to heart.

That is good, but still, if I think you were wrong in _how_ you did something, I should not state so in the same manner that I thought was wrong of you (unless I'm specifically trying to start something ).

 

[moose10101]

(and yes I was jacked on coffee ((Two pots of Starbucks Guatemalan for breakfast and several Monsters as chasers)))

If you consume that amount on a regular basis, I'm more concerned for your physical well-being than I am about your overreaction (though it was massive).

I would never react that way because I'd rather not run the risk of being physically assaulted and/or shot.

 

[removed account4]

that coffee has very little caffeine in it. ....

 

[sly]

I would never react that way because I'd rather not run the risk of being physically assaulted and/or shot.

He was in Canada. Assault might have happened, but hand guns are not fashion accessories here.

 

[MattKing]

He was in Canada. Assault might have happened, but hand guns are not fashion accessories here.

Well he was in Alberta, so a shotgun is always a possibility:devil:

 

[Bill Burk]

I find that a few minutes out of my busy schedule of shooting really does not make ANY difference.

I missed a shot once by taking the time to talk to someone. At Mission San Juan Bautista, a group of tourists called up to me to say they had found a lenscap and wondered if I lost one. I stepped down from the rise and helped best I could. No, it wasn't mine, but there was another photographer there (I saw him earlier working a 4x5 where I asked him if he could still get film for that.) I directed them back to where I had last seen him. Later I found him shooting a Rollei and we talked... He actually HAD lost a lenscap to an LF lens, but by then the guy who had it was nowhere to be found. For all the helping and talking, I never went back to the scene of the animal drama I was considering... I believe a large cat had found its dinner of a very large bird. I wanted to shoot the bird's feet and feathers with a mission in the background.

I still don't have anything like that in my portfolio.

Sometimes it DOES make a difference if you stop to talk to strangers.

I lost a shot.

But I was friendly to the strangers and the photographer... I hope I never get so aggravated at stranger's behavior that I lash out. But I understand your space was invaded. You were brave to reflect on your behavior here.

 

[BradleyK]

Well he was in Alberta, so a shotgun is always a possibility:devil:

Actually, Matt, over there in "Yahoo Country," large pick-up tricks, assorted tools and agricultural implements, are more of a concern...

 

[BradleyK]

that coffee has very little caffeine in it. ....

Perhaps not in a single cup, but after 8 large mugs (12 oz?size) the effect is very definitely in evidence...

 

[batwister]

You sound delusional to me. Seek help before you hurt yourself or others. Unless you own the land and they were trespassing on land that you own, you showed a total lack of manners or respect for others. Like some crazy driver thinking that some one did something deliberate to you rather than perhaps and error in their judgment. JMHO

Agree.

The reiteration of "while I was working", in particular, sound very Jack Nicholson to me.

 

[Peter Simpson]

I think you overreacted. I wouldn't feel bad if someone wanted to see what I was doing, as long as they didn't keep me from doing it. Some of us aren't gifted artists, and a view through someone else's viewfinder can help us learn.

Granted, there's getting so close you're invading someone else's personal space, but that aside, did you really need to be so abrasive? I'm pretty sure you didn't improve those people's image of film photographers.

 

[jovo]

I'd like to share a couple of incidents that happened to me last weekend during a very quick trip down the Icefields Parkway between Jasper and Banff National Parks, essentially to gauge whether my response to either was a,ppropriate, reasonable given the circumstances, or out of proportion to the matters at hand...

Merely by framing these questions you seem to be willing and able to be self-critical, and even more, willing to listen to some pretty strong opprobrium. That's not easy to do in 'public'. So, while I don't admire your behavior in the incidents you described, I do admire your sense of conscience and personal responsibility. I also think that the next time you will wait an extra beat or two til the urge to verbally clobber someone dies down a bit. Good onya for sharing this.

For your penance, say 12 Hail Marys, and 10 Our Fathers....hehehe....!

 

[dunetraveller]

I often find people annoying. Reacting the way you did was probably not how most people would actually say, but they'd have thought it in their heads for sure! So all you are is guilty of not repressing a good opportunity to vent. No problem here.
What those other people would have done is be polite to the interlopers, then rant at everyone else they knew; thus being rude to their friends and nice to jerks. I would rather you rant at the offending people and be calm and reasonable here personally.

 

[cliveh]

I am surprised this thread has run on to 7 pages. You didn't need to ask this question, as you already know you made a mistake and over reacted.

 

[AgX]

I often find people annoying.

That's the price of being in public.

 

[pdeeh]

Or perhaps the price of being human. And those other people who are so annoying are human too ...

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

All I can say is that often I go shooting with friends. Even though we photograph exactly the same things, sometimes from very similar positions and locations, we end up with completely different looking prints.

My response would be to feel sorry for them that they don't have more imagination than that. Have to follow your heart, instinct, intuition, and emotions.

 

[BradleyK]

Really? All the Australians I've met have been laid back genuine nice people.

Another vote here for the Aussies: In 30-odd years of travel all over North America, I would rate the Aussies along with the Kiwis, Americans, Germans and Brits among the friendliest and best-behaved of the Touristas. An aside (photographically-speaking): Of these groups, Americans, Germans and the British have always seemed most interested in chatting about photography (film type, color or black and white, which camera, lenses, etc.); the Japanese and now the Mainland Chinese (based on my trips through the Canadian Rockies), just seem interested in checking out the camera you use (I get frequent looks when I have one of my F2s out (these folks check to see which model, look at the motor drive, check out the film holder etc., but never stop to chat photographic!:confused.

 

[Pioneer]

Wow! Seven pages! This topic certainly struck a nerve with a lot of people.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

Really? All the Australians I've met have been laid back genuine nice people.

Another vote here for the Aussies: In 30-odd years of travel all over North America, I would rate the Aussies along with the Kiwis, Americans, Germans and Brits among the friendliest and best-behaved of the Touristas. An aside (photographically-speaking): Of these groups, Americans, Germans and the British have always seemed most interested in chatting about photography (film type, color or black and white, which camera, lenses, etc.); the Japanese and now the Mainland Chinese (based on my trips through the Canadian Rockies), just seem interested in checking out the camera you use (I get frequent looks when I have one of my F2s out (these folks check to see which model, look at the motor drive, check out the film holder etc., but never stop to chat photographic!:confused.

Some of that is from a lack of common language skill I suspect. Although English is taught in Asian countries, it is still a distant second language, and unlike German, which has common linguistic roots with English, Japanese and Chinese have virtually nothing in common with any Western languages. The learning curve, therefore, is steeper, in either direction. I suspect you could have a long conversation about your more than just the camera itself if you responded to their inquiry in Chinese or Japanese.

 

[megzdad81]

If they were members of the US Congress, you should have started the sentence that way.

 

[Black Dog]

When I've been out with my mamiya c330, every other person I've met seems to have owned one! But no ITAH as yet for me....[sobs quietly]

 

[tron_]

Meanwhile I would be happier than a pig in s*** if someone came up to me asking about my camera

 

[DREW WILEY]

A couple years ago I made my usual midsummer tuneup hike up a particular steep goat path above Sonora Pass in the high Sierra, and propped up my
8x10 and Ries wooden tripod for a nice shot of a particular crag. The location is a bit of a grunt, maybe a 2000 ft grade to around 10,000 feet. But otherwise it's only a couple of miles, and one can actually see the road from there, way down there. Then a German tourist managed to literally stumble
his way up there. "Vere ish de lake? Vere ish de lake", as he tripped over one rock after another, then a log. The lake was right in front of him, but he couldn't see it because he was staring at his GPS the whole time. Then he spots me. "How dare you dessekrate nature wish dat big thing!" he angrily protested. I merely smiled and politely replied, "Nice GPS. Is that the model John Muir used?"