I just got back a couple rolls taken in Chicago last weekend-- Pretty pleased with most of the skyline shots, etc. ( I also ran into a wonderful Japanese gentleman in the art institute using an M3 who wanted to compare DR serial numbers). I am struck by a series I took of the Hancock building from right at the base with a voigtlander 15mm-- I was concentrating on the exaggerated vertical perspective. When I got the shots back, I realized the real shot was of a girl reading on the sidewalk, completely oblivious to the passing city. I just caught her at the bottom of a couple frames, and I cannot believe I missed her-- It would have been the shot that made the trip, and it feels worse to have discovered it in my own shots! Anyone had a similar experience? Best,

-- Marke Gilbert (Bohdi137@aol.com), April 21, 2002

Answers

This happens to me all the time. Normally i don't notice it in a picture of mine, but remember a scene day later. I have close to a photographic memory (not quite but close), and often think about photo opertunities in light of that. As an example, i was in a club in chicago taking a pictures (I figured i would use an example from the same city as you). I shot off about 2 rolls, and noticed a few shots i simply missed in the club because i wasn't fast enough, but i think this happens all the time to lots of photographers. The next day i was walking under a bridge at a particular angle and it brought image flashbacks to a scene at the club, where i should have taken a photo of the suspended walkway from a particular angle, because this one small group of people had been on top in the perfect compositional position and lighting... stuff like this happens to me all the time and is always frustrating.

-- Matthew Geddert (geddert@yahoo.com), April 21, 2002.

Aaah, the missed shot... I won't forget my worst single-image missed shot (that I know of!)... I was assigned to photograph the viewing of Nixon's casket right before his funeral in Yorba Linda, CA, and as before every assignment I can, I got there half an hour early with a 400 2.8 (pre Leica days) and a tripod. For visual reasons the best place to shoot from was a bit of a long shot to get the hoards of people filing past. I walked in and walked up to the position I'd chosen and was attaching the lens to the tripod when I looked up for no particular reason and saw a middle-aged couple who had obviously pulled out their hippie clothes from the 70's, and just as I saw them they both raised their hands and saluted the coffin with a peace sign... It was over before I mouth an internal scream... I sat there, waiting more than ten hours until the viewing closed for another similar incident but it never materialized...

Now I show up 45 minutes before such gigs.

-- dave yoder (lists@daveyoder.com), April 21, 2002.

Yesterday my Graduate Teaching Assistant told me that she had seen a man jogging completely naked through campus in broad daylight. Now, I'v got lots of pics of semi-nude women (Mardi Gras, etc.), but a shot of a lone nude jogger would've been funny. These stories are akin to the "fish that got away" tales that fishermen tell.

-- Douglas Kinnear (douglas.kinnear@colostate.edu), April 21, 2002.

Marke, using nothing more than a 50mm, (and being an Architect doesn't hurt), forces me to look @ details, rather than an opportunity to change lenses. Virtually same situation as you describe: Leitz M6, Elmar-M 50mm 1:2.8, B+W KR1.5 MRC, Fuji Sensia II 200

-- Glenn Travis (leicaddict@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

Photographing in Timisoara just three months after the fall of the Ceucescu regime, and some time before the horror of the Romanian orphanages became known to the world, I came upon a large building whose grounds were enclosed with barred walls. There were many children standing around or playing behind the bars, and some came over to watch me. "What's that?" I asked the young Romanian who was showing me around.

"An orphan asylum," he replied.

"Oh, okay," I said, and turned away to photograph an attractive pattern of shadows playing on the walls and windows of an ancient house across the street.

One of the great missed opportunities of my career. Serendipity knocked; nobody was home.

-- Dave Jenkins (djphoto@vol.com), April 21, 2002.

Dave, if you get a chance, read "Shutterbabe," by Deborah Copaken Kogan, a retaired (Leica/Nikormat)PJ who shot for Gamma. She shot a series on the orphans, and nobody would buy her photos, so apparently she turned the story over to a very well know PJ who later got a 4 page spread in the New York Times Magazine. But I'm with you, love those shadows on walls.

-- Glenn Travis (leicaddict@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

sometimes one sees the photo and as last writer wrote,not wanted! i remember somehow in photo oppurtunity with fashion model getting onto secured gold-mining property...A huge building nearbye was being demolished.The mine was closing but that was how the miners were housed at nearly all the mines.we looked in and saw where the miners lived and slept.it was pure horror!The poor workers slept on concrete bunks,in dreadful conditions.I handed these photos to the newspaper that always oppossed the Apartheid Regime.i was quickly sent on my way.. The Mines bought many pages all the time to announce their dividends. Sadly under the new Free NEW South Africa,i recently saw similar photos as mine (done 20 yrs ago)..See book "Directions" phaedon. so getting the image dont mean it gonna be seen!The demos at "G" Summits barely published in USA or Canada... Once going thru a contact sheet i found a photo i truly never remembered taking!It was the best on the whole sheet. All i could think "I took this!".

-- jason gold (leeu72@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

Please don't promote that book, it was so bad...

-- dave yoder (lists@daveyoder.com), April 22, 2002.

Glen seems to have produced a Picture of Paris, Beaubourg Centre?

Pretty nice. Xavier.

-- Xavier d'Alfort (hot_billexf@hotmail.com), April 22, 2002.

Missing stuff - exactly why I want a third body. The good things always happen while you're changing film or lenses. And the ones that got away are the ones that torment you.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), April 22, 2002.

Glen:

I suppose you put up the picture above either to illustrate a point, or to solicit comments. I am afraid, I don't see how it illustrates the point. As for comments, it strikes me as a "nothing" pictures -- and not in the good, Seinfeld, sense. Why would you bother to print it? This is not intended as a flame; I'm just puzzled.

-- Mitch Alland (malland@mac.com), April 22, 2002.

I shoot mostly live performances of orchestras, dancers, etc. and I have trained myself to push the button whenever a fleeting "perfect moment" occurs, whether or not I am sure of focus, framing, etc. There are no do-overs on these "moments," so I fire away and hope to record a percentage of them. If you don't fire the camera, there is no hope.

-- Jim Lennon (jim@jmlennon.com), April 22, 2002.

Mitch, your puzzlement doesn't surprize me in the least, but unfortunately I've got no answer for those of you whose IQ only seems to reach double figures.

-- Glenn Travis (leicaddict@hotmail.com), April 22, 2002.

Some people just cannot accept critisism,and yet take up web space.

-- Yossi (yosslee@yahoo.com), April 22, 2002.

It doesn't take someone with a triple digit IQ to know that that is a dull pic.

-- Yossi (yosslee@yahoo.com), April 22, 2002.

Marke, dont be too hard on yourself, you had a 15mm lens on the camera at the time after all and you were using a separate finder, small details are often overlooked for the "big picture" whenever i use this lens. The 2nd body and lens solution immediately on hand that is mentioned above is a good one when your out in a 15mm mood but suddenly need to bring yourself back into a more normal perspective.

-- Joel Matherson (joel_2000@hotmail.com), April 22, 2002.

Yossi,Yossi,Yossi....even though we hate each other and exchange e- mails of a 'heated' nature,I really must agree with you.

Right chaps,it works like this-When you get dressed up for a night out on the town you look in the mirror to make sure you look ok,you know,no crap in your teeth,shirt and tie match,hair brushed.....right? Please tell me you do.....? Anyway.You really need to be doing the same thing with your photos,look at them,do they really look good?

Be honest with yourselves and stop going out on the town looking like a vagrant......'nuff said,because most of you lot don't seem to own either a mirror or a pair of glasses.

-- Phil the Lovely (philkneen@manx.net), April 22, 2002.

TO GET BACK to Marke's original comment/question: (!)

I'm sure I've missed countless pictures/moments - some of which I've been aware at the time or later looking at film. But I can't name one right now (memory, not chutzpah!).

On the subject, however, I did get two really good tips that I've tried to employ since, at Rich Clarkson's PHOTOGRAPHY AT THE SUMMIT workshop a couple of years ago.

From Sue Drinker - "Whenever you're concentrating on a really good scene, with really good light, and a really good setting --- STOP! and turn around 180 degrees to check what's behind you."

From Sue's husband Dick Durrance III (ex-Nat. Geo.) - At the end of the workshop he asked me if I'd gotten what I came for, and I replied that I'd really hoped to work more on my 'people' photography, while the workshop setting (Jackson Hole/Teton National Park) turned out to be more suited to wildlife/landscape pictures.

He asked me if I'd read Carlos Casteneda's books about his encounters with the blind(?) shaman Don Juan and the peyote ritual - which I had, 30 years ago.

He asked, "Don Juan explained how he experienced the world - Do you remember that?" And I allowed that I didn't.

And Durrance wiggled his fingers outward in front of his belly and said "Don Juan said that he had TENTACLES which reached out to feel what was happening around him. The secret to people photography is to extend your OWN tentacles and them working, all the time."

Possibly two of the best bits of photographic advice I've had in the past 20 years.

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), April 22, 2002.

Glenn:

If you don't want comments on your picures, there's a simple solution: don't post any.

-- Mitch Alland (malland@mac.com), April 22, 2002.

glen the photo is a throwaway, definately. look at it carefully, and all your others placed here so far. money does not buy skill. does nothing for me, poor composition, lighting, etc. honest criticism, promise.

-- wanker (phil_the_brit_twit@hotmail.com), April 23, 2002.

Twit? That's not considered to be much of an insult here in the real world,why not try changing the 'I' to an 'A'.That will gice it alot more punch.

TWAT

-- Phil the Field (philkneen@manx.net), April 24, 2002.

who said it:

".....right to critisize...got that straight?" glen travis that's who.

what details are you talking about and trying to photo and demonstrate?

-- Steve (leitz_not_leica@hotmail.com), April 25, 2002.