Like I said on my Facebook page, I've got an idea. Now, I've been mulling it over for a few hours now, and think that it has real potential to make me a much more technical photographer.

With technology, and the ability to create amazing works of art on a computer, I think to myself, how did they create excellent pieces of art, say, 30 years ago? Even 20 years ago? They sure didn't have Photoshop, I can tell you that. They had filters, modifiers, remotes, Gels, reflectors and many more items to help them create the perfect photograph, the first time.

I fear that I'm losing a bit of touch being just another photographer these days - I mean, who isn't? Even point and shoot cameras can produce images far superior to mine, (not saying mine are top notch, but I don't think they're too shabby)with the help of this "Digital Darkroom."

My idea is simple. Not use it. For the first month of my trip (Until February 21st), I'm going to not use Photoshop, Photomatix, or any other sort of photographic enhancement software because I think it kind of interferes with what photography is s'posed to be. When we upload an image to the computer, and open it in Photoshop, we generally introduce colors, hues, contrasts that aren't there in real life. In a nutshell, we butcher nature, by capturing its beauty. Mind you, this is just a grand experiment, maybe it's a bad idea. Maybe I won't post a single photo to my site, or Flickr during that first month. But I can tell you this much: I will learn the technical aspect more than a book could teach me.

So, for those of you out there who are thinking, "Well, that's a stupid idea, Photoshop is a digital dark room!" - that's true. They, however, were not able to dodge and burn like we can. They didn't have a Ctrl+Z, or a Ctrl+C > Ctrl+V (Not without a price anyway). There is no "undo" button in film, so that's how I'm going to treat my images.

Take them for what they are, and see what I can come up with.