What Truth Does My Photography Say About Me?

December 21 marks the day with the shortest amount of time we’ll get to experience sunlight in the northern hemisphere.

Some cultures, most notably practitioners of Wicca, celebrate Yule, whether through greeting the sunrise, burning a log, gathering and exchanging gifts, or other rituals and customs.

It’s also a day to reflect upon the past year as we get ready to welcome in a new one.

I’ve been following a few very articulate photographers who generously and unapologetically share their practice on TikTok.

One of them—Jared Tapey if you’re interested—talks about looking at your work to better understand the patterns that keep showing up in them.

Reviewing your favorite photos can tell you a lot about who you are when you get behind the lens that you may not be consciously aware of. Your truth, as it were.

So my spin on the Yule practice of reflection for this last blog entry for 2025 is going to be a deeper look into the galleries I’ve put together at my website over the last two years since launching it.

The truths about me that I don’t always speak in these blog entries but should.

Today’s share is from a trip to Burlingame State Park in southern coastal Rhode Island in early October.

The first thing to get out of the way is to admit to myself that I sometimes neglect to share my work or even avoid doing it.

In this case, I took another trip to the Berkshires in Western Massachusetts shortly after that outing. I came home with photos I liked better.

But it’s more than that. I at times quickly moves on to the next thing. Maybe too quickly even.

I’m not just talking about photography here.

I also don’t intend for this entry to be a confessional or a dressing down of myself. Rather, these are musings for me to consider and then be more intentional about going forward.

On to the photo itself.

I love fog. It figures prominently in some of my favorite photos over the last 15 years since I began my photography journey.

Fog doesn’t just create mood. In many cases, it strips the landscape down to the essentials.

It can also offer so much variety.

Here, we see curling tendrils dancing above the placid lake. They provide an interesting contrast between the calm waters, warm colored sunlight at top of frame, and chill autumn morning air.

Going through my website, I see that I have only shared a photo with fog one other time, in the inaugural post.

As that’s a collage I made into a sort of post card, this is really the first photo where fog is front and center.

It’s definitely a bit of a revelation to me. But I think the lack of fog in my photos is largely driven by living in an area where I haven’t had as many opportunities to capture it.

It is something, though, that I’d like to capture more of in 2026.

A second observation is that water plays a big part in my body of work.

Of the 20 entries at my website, including this one, more than half involve water in some form. And nine of them are of coastal scenes.

I’m not terribly surprised by this, being from the Eastern seaboard and having spent the vast majority of my life within driving distance of the Atlantic.

What I did note while going through my archive, however, is that I’m attracted to the textures and patterns we see emerging in the water or on its surface.

To quickly return to today’s share, there’s a bit of interesting play in the relatively small ripples between the gentle waves coming to the shore where I was squatting low to ground.

Two more quick things for me to keep in mind, as this post is getting pretty long. That’s okay, since it’s partly for me. But also, thank you for sticking with it if you’re still reading!

The kind of scene that stops me in my tracks and how I capture it has changed quite a lot over the last couple of years.

While I have a 24mm lens for my older camera setup and a 35mm for new my one, I have rarely reached for them and in fact have stopped carrying a wide angle most of the time.

I much prefer 50mm as the starting point, as I find that this better helps you to see what excites me as I see it in front of me.

I’m also asking myself as I write this entry if this says something about the kinds of features in the landscape I’m capturing. I’ll have to ponder that some more on my own.

Lastly, with some notable exceptions, my taste is shifting more towards brighter looking scenes.

Some still call for darkened areas, like the photo from September of the tunnel and the one from May of stormy skies above the lighthouse.

But overall I’m less pleased with darker values in the sky in particular than I used to be.

I also don’t think this is always necessary to capture the drama unfolding overhead. Sometimes all it takes is tattered clouds swiftly breaking up to suggest a feeling of unease or what have you.

I don’t have anything weighty to end this entry on. I will say, though, that stopping to examine my work was wholly worthwhile. I have a few insights to keep in mind before I ever get behind the camera that I didn’t before.

And I look forward to discovering more about who I am and sharing that with you in the year ahead. Have a healthy and happy end of 2025 and start to 2026, however you choose to celebrate.