Hi again. Happy Valentines Day to everyone that reads this.

I’m going to go to a Lightroom 5 seminar this coming Monday. I am looking forward to going, learning, socializing, etc. I get around Lightroom pretty well. I’ve taken numerous online classes over at Kelby One. I did a marathon class over on Lynda.com that Matt Kloskowski taught on Lightroom 4. I don’t think that there is a feature that I haven’t at least explored except for maybe making and saving presets. I mentioned to a friend of mine that I was going to the seminar and she asked me why i was going. My response was why not. She said well… you know Lightroom better than anyone else I know so why go to more training? I’ve been thinking about that conversation most of the day.  My answer is still, why not. It’s true that I feel pretty comfortable in Lightroom and that, for an average user, I do pretty well with it. I expect the seminar to be fast paced and I don’t expect them to dig into the program all that deeply. However, I expect to learn something on Monday and if I want to rise above “average user” I need to be exposed to people that know the software better than I do. My expectation that I will learn something is so high that I am willing to lay some big money on the line and bet anyone that reads this a solid 25 cents, in cash, that I will learn something from the seminar. 🙂

But… how much training is too much? I don’t know. I don’t think that a person can over educate themselves. I expect to learn something new every time that I pick up a camera or process an image. I expect the learning process to last my entire lifetime.

This blog is about how much training is enough… but my trip to Houston on Monday is as much about being in a room full of photographers that are excited to be learning, as well as meeting Matt K. and whoever comes with him, as it is about what I may learn in the process.  I like the guys and gals that are part of the Kelby Media group. How can you not like them? They are successful, they seem to genuinely enjoy helping and being around people that are trying to learn the craft, not to mention they are pretty darn good photographers in their own right. And… they know that they are still learning the craft of photography. As good as they are they are still learning and having fun. What’s not to like about that?

On another note: I’m starting to get restless. I need a road trip. It needs to be a trip where all I care about is making an image. I love my “real job” but it requires a lot of mental energy. I think at the bit level 12-16 hours a day. Every day is a problem solving day and it wears me down. Photography lifts me up. I’m not sure when or where I’ll go but it’ll be soon and it’ll be west. Big Bend? The Chiricahua Mountains? Death Valley? I don’t know… maybe none of those. Maybe Caddo Lake or back to Shiloh Battlefield National Monument later this spring.

I’ve got 20 sheets of film loaded and a bunch of empty memory cards. It’s time to take them on a trip.

Oops, almost forgot the parting image:

I call this one Trees Sleep Standing Up