I signed up for the Photo Safari to Big Sur, not knowing that 89 other people also did. It was by far the most popular field trip of the day which was not a problem, except that I had Vincent’s voice in my head. My mission was to get the photograph that no one else was getting. And this wasn’t easy when the bus would stop and 89 people would get out with lenses bigger than mine and each trying to take the same shot. I took some of the obvious ones (to show my grandma who used to live in Carmel) but also tried to get the shot less taken.
I went on a long hike with a tour guide at our last stop. The tour guide moved so fast that only five of the 20 people who started with him ended with him at the end of the hike. I was one of those 5. Our last stop was a small museum with these weird looking tools and pictures of a woman who looked like a witch. Then it came to me that I had been shooting the Blair Witch Project part 4. While I couldn’t match others perhaps in a unique composition of shots or superb depth of field with my Canon Powershot automatic camera, I could approach the material with a unique tone. I later cut it together in Final Cut as a strange little pseudo-horror clip. I had fun.
When Trang Lai saw it she said something like, “It’s always death and destruction with you, Mathew.” She knows my work from seeing Tales from the Yard, my horror film with first graders. I hope it’s not all death and destruction but she might have a point.
Our group project turned out well enough. Working in a group is, of course, about compromise. So I think we compromised well and while our project wasn’t quite my idea or their idea, we came up with an idea which had contributions from us all.
Our last night at the Monterey Bay Aquarium was an experience I will never forget.
I had been to the aquarium before but this was not a normal visit. We had the aquarium to ourselves and ate dinner under a 500 gallon fish tank. As I ate, giant turtles and Ocean Sunfish floated by. A steel drum band played. It was a truly awesome and special evening. So special I missed taking pictures entirely. I had my camera. Forgot my battery. Yeah, it was stupid. I hope someone else posts their pictures on Flickr for the aquarium. The experience will not, however, be one that I will soon forget.
