Playing with Koi
One of the things we just don’t do enough of as adults is play. Doing something just for the joy of it, and enjoying it so much that you get lost in what you’re doing and it doesn’t matter what the end result is or isn’t. There really is a sense of discovery and learning that can, but doesn’t always, come from play. Perhaps the closest thing we get to that feeling we knew so well from childhood is experimenting. As if that word gives us an excuse to fail, or to discover something wonderful, without matter or consequence. However, experimenting still falls short of playing, because there is some intention in experimenting that simply doesn’t exist with playing. I don’t know whether I was playing or experimenting, but I got lost in it recently and it was a good feeling.
The week before last, an old classmate from Ann’s mathematics studies called her out of the blue. They hadn’t seen each other for 35 years and he was in Portland, coming down to Eugene for a couple of days and was wondering if she’d like to get together. After a couple of exchanges, we suggested we meet him here and drive him back to Portland that afternoon so he could catch his flight back home to Iceland. Magnus from Iceland! That gave us (me) a chance to meet a wonderful person, have dinner at our favorite restaurant and spend the night so we could photograph the next morning at the Japanese Gardens.
It was a more successful trip than some of our recent ones. Several decent images. But the best ones came from a 10-minute period where I just started playing around with the koi. I equate it with play because there wasn’t very much about it I could control (fish are worse about taking direction than kids!) so I just set about pointing my camera at the fish, guessing what a good exposure time would be and pressing the shutter when I thought something interesting would result.
To put things into a bit of perspective, I took 42 distinct images during that short period where I got lost with the fish. Other than the koi shots, I made 12 other images. A couple were horizontal/vertical compositions of a similar subject, but for the most part it was a single composition with alterations based to capture different aspects of flowing water or depth of field. In all, 71 images saved after culling, 42 of them were of the fish.
It seemed like I was watching them and then positioning myself for pictures for an incredibly long time. I changed locations along a walkway a few times - often following the groups of fish - but they’d come and go as they pleased. It seemed like forever, but unless my camera lies, it was only about 10 minutes. The two images above were taken only one second apart. I guess that’s what happens when you’re just absorbed in playing - time stretches. Imagine, we used to play for hours as kids.
It’s the closest thing to playing I’ve done in a while. Just looking at the fish and having fun, not really expecting anything to come from it, but happy these did.