After a little more than a year of GAS I have developed a serious problem with GUD (Gear Utilization Dysfunction). It started last year with my upgrading from my D5000 to a D7100. Then I added the 10-20 DX Nikkor. Then I picked up a used AF Nikkor 35-105 which is primarily for my film FE but also works on the D7100. Then a late summer flurry which involved a full CLA on my Rolleicord III making it usable again, a cheap 500 Bower mirror lens for the FE (CAN be used manually on the D7100), a one month project acquiring a used Bronica ETRSi with 4 lenses and two film backs, the 40mm micro-Nikkor for the D7100, and finally a PhotoDiox adapter allowing me to use all 4 Bronica Zenzanon lenses on the Nikon FE or D 7100. AND an eBay pickup of an Olympus XA 35mm pocket rangefinder camera. I've stopped the GAS, but now... I've got a DSLR with a bunch of new lenses, a film Nikon SLR with additional lenses, the full Bronica 645 kit, the newly refurbished Rolleicord 6x6, and my old standby Pentax 6x7 with 3 lenses. So digital, 35mm SLR & pocket RF, and 3 formats of film MF. Sometimes it's random which camera I'll take out with me. It's become overwhelming. Beware uncontrollable GAS especially when it's in 4 different directions at once!

Thank you for your response, however, there are no experienced or knowledgeable folks involved in this church website. We are the great uninitiated (two folks) standing alone shoulder to shoulder in this endeavor. However, we have a lot of enthusiasm and are eager to learn from our fellow UHH Brethern. JimmyT sends BT

Not sure I understand your drift. Thanks for considering me as an artist. This is fairly new territory for me - I'm finally taking pictures I like, primarily for my own enjoyment, and to share with those that like my work. for years I was a "hired gun" taking pictures for others strictly for pay. Tremendous feeling of freedom.

As far as your drift - I take a fairly contemplative approach, when I have the time - as in landscapes and other types of images where you have more than a moment to capture them - and I try to bury my first impulse to trip the shutter - I take note of everything that is in front of me BEFORE I even bring the camera to my eye. Sky, wind (ripples on water or moving foliage), cloud positions, etc - all the while my mind is reacting to what is going on before my eyes. I decide whether I can do a pano, or if I should try and capture the scene as a single shot. I am often prepared to do either - when I go for landscapes/cityscapes I almost always have my PC-E lenses - 24mm, 45mm and 85mm in the bag. this process is as automatic for me as breathing or putting one foot in front of the other to get from here to there - I don't think about it much. Once I have made my gear and settings choices the rest is quick. It has to be, since in many situations, the lighting and sky situations, especially at dawn or just before sundown, can change rapidly.

The camera records my vision. The image I want is already formed in my head before I press the shutter. Often, as in the SOOC pano I posted above, I know ahead of time about how many shots I am going to need to get what I want, and I know through previous testing, what the threshold of highlight exposure is and how close I can get to it without blowing the important stuff.

I cannot imagine any scenario that can create an image like the one I posted within a camera, or with a SOOC approach. The fact that it is a 12,939x10,204 px - or 132 mp image - taken with a 36 mp camera is the first thing. Then the various manipulations to dodge and burn both color and tone into the shadows, and add structure to the sky - all local adjustments, would not have been possible, even in the days of film, at last not on a color image, much less a digital SOOC image. Cameras cannot be made to respond to the wide variety of tone and color selectively - with simple, coarse camera settings, or even with some very coarse editing.

BTW, this was my final image, which came after a first scouting trip a couple of days earlier. It took me a couple of shots to get to the composition I was looking for, but the sky was wrong and too distracting. I came back two days later and everything, including the sky was as I wanted it to be. Luckily this is about 40 mins from my home. See attached below.

.