As a nature and fine art photographer, why am I offering this advice? Because I'm guilty of having committed this very sin at both of my nephew's recent weddings. I was unschooled in the proper wedding guest photography etiquette, because I simply didn't know any better. I'm sure I got in the way of the official wedding photographer and I had no idea I was making their job harder. But in the last year, as I've gotten to know a wonderful group of local photographers, those who photograph weddings have expressed their frustrations with people like me (not with me in particular though!). I can't go back and change how I acted at those two weddings, but I can spread the word to others who might innocently commit the same sins as I did. Please learn from my mistakes!

My own daughter is getting married next June and she's already told me I'm not allowed to photograph her wedding. I think she felt she had to let me know this up front, so I wouldn't sneak my camera into the wedding and spend my time trying to capture it, rather than participate in it. She needn't worry- she's my only daughter and this is my only chance to be the mother of the bride. There's no way I'm going to squander this opportunity to savor all the details of the day and be there for her on her special day. I wouldn't have it any other way. Besides, it's their wedding and whomever they hire as wedding photographers has the responsibility of capturing all those special moments, from the pre-wedding preparation to their first dance as Mr. & Mrs.

One more thought- If you plan to use your cell phone to capture the ceremony, be prepared to put it aside too, especially if the bride and groom ask you to do so. Cell phones are so ubiquitous these days that they're turning up in pictures of weddings, to the point of being really annoying. People with cell phones also get in the way of wedding photographers, often spoiling shots of those special moments during the ceremony or reception. And think about it- even though cell phone cameras have improved a great deal over the years, you're still not going to get the same high-quality images of the couple as will the wedding photographers. I mean, do you really think the bride and groom will want copies of those pictures, once they've seen what their wedding photographer delivers? Maybe you could save the cell phone pictures for the reception and take some fun pictures of yourself with the bride and groom- after the wedding photographers have done their job for the couple.

At the beginning of this month, I somehow hurt my lower back, herniating two disks. Those two disks are now pinching nerves running down my left leg, causing pain and numbness. I can't bend at the waist or left knee, I can't sit in a chair, and I can't stand for too long. Despite taking plenty of prescription medications, sleeping is almost out of the question, due to the intense pain at night. I'm missing out on my day job, I'm confined to my home and I'm most definitely missing out on taking and editing any new photographs. Just this week, I missed two photography events with my local photography buds. I had to stay home and watch our Facebook group pages for their photographs, which were truly wonderful.

This is my favorite time of the year to do macro photography, with flowers, insects, and other interesting things all pretty much below my knees, where I can't get these days. I also can't hop into the car to go catch a beautiful sunset, nor wear my Spider holster weighed down with my heavy 70-200mm lens, nor walk around a summer festival with a monopod on my shoulder and snapping pictures with my photography buds.

While waiting for a doctor's appointment a full week away, I'm looking for 'safe' photography activities to do, to keep up my skills and stoke my creativity. I've thought of entering some photo contests, editing older images, and adding keywords to my catalog of images in Lightroom. I have to do my computer work at a modified, stand-up workstation I've made in my kitchen. Thank goodness I'm using a laptop for my photography editing, rather than a desktop computer! I also have dozens of photography books to read, when standing starts to hurt and I need to sit or lie down in a comfortable position for awhile.

Yes, cameras and lenses can be quite heavy and good physical health is essential in being able to use them. Photography requires having the ability to walk, stoop, bend, stretch, stand, and balance oneself, in order to get the best shot. Without good health, all that expensive, heavy equipment just sits in my camera bags, waiting for me to get better and get back out there, capturing nature's beauty. I hope I'm not out of commission for too long. It's hard sitting on the sidelines of life, not being able to capture it with photography.

When it comes to photography, I keep nearly all of my photos, even some of the more obvious bloopers, if they look kind of cool in the back of the camera or look like they might be salvageable in post-processing. When I recently overexposed a macro shot of a dahlia flower and made it bright white, instead of pale yellow, it was a hit with many of my Facebook followers. I took just one shot of the flower before I realized I had literally "blown it" with a high ISO setting (from the previous night's photography session). But I'm glad I didn't delete it in-camera, because it turned out rather cool and abstract, despite my mistake.

Another reason to keep some images that other photographers would delete is that either new software is developed that can be used to enhance the images, or new editing skills give me reasons to go back to older, earlier images and experiment with them. I did this with a picture I took of a barge on the Ohio River three years ago. The image was shot with an aperture of f/4.5, which made the depth of field too shallow for the distance the barge was from me. But the composition of the shot was still good and I was able to take that image and turn it into a watercolor painting in Photoshop, where super sharp focus wasn't necessary for a soft, muted effect in the image.

With storage getting cheaper and software getting better, it behooves a photographer to keep some of their borderline images, if they enjoy revisiting them in the future and applying new editing skills to those images. I don't regret keeping my "bloopers" and not-so-perfect images. I feel they will have a place in one of my galleries someday. They might be just the artwork someone is looking to buy for their wall.

Cheers!

Andrea Kappler

I live in Evansville, Indiana, which is in southwest Indiana, on the Ohio River. On a clear day, we can see Henderson, Kentucky from here- well, almost (haha!). Evansville is in a broad, wide river valley, which means there can be some pretty awesome sunset opportunities over the Ohio River, especially in the fall and winter. There are also several nature preserves, wetlands, and fish and wildlife areas within short drives from my home.

I've loved photography since I was a kid and I received my first camera, which was a Kodak Pocket Instamatic 110. I set about photographing everything I could, from my family to the family dog. My mom and maternal grandmother were photographers too, so I had pretty good role models in the two of them, although my grandmother was notorious for cutting off the heads of people in her photos.

I believe I've loved nature even longer than I've loved photography, having grown up in the country in Northern Indiana, near Elkhart. Every summer, I spent as much of my time outdoors as I could, exploring the 12 acres of land we owned. On that acreage, we had a barn with a quarter horse I sometimes rode, several chickens, a pet rabbit, a cat, a dog, a swimming pool, a wooded area with paths, and hilly fields with tall grasses. I haven't lived there in many years, but the place still returns to me in my dreams.

Today I find it very relaxing to get outside, away from the computer and modern creature comforts, and take my camera with me for a long walk or for a drive into the countryside. I enjoy walking in our state and local parks, keeping an eye out for everything from a dramatic, cloud-filled sky to the tiniest detail, like an insect in a blooming flower. My goal is to share those photographs with you on this site. If you like any of them, they're available for sale and they can be printed on different mediums and as different products. 

Cheers!

Andrea