testmeat photoblog

i have a few self imposed rules that don't really make much sense when it comes to photography. for example i decided a while ago that every photo should be named after a lyric from a song that i like, which has led to many occasions where deciding a title would take me longer than i spent working on the photo itself. i couldn't think what to call this picture for some time until i randomly listened to an old arcade fire album and this song seemed to match the attitude i saw in this adélie penguin's pose. another rule which is far more problematic concerns how i shoot and crop my photos, which is almost exclusively in a landscape 3:2 ratio. i think the reasons behind this choice are because i started getting into photography in a technological era after digital cameras and before smartphones. i would edit and view my photos on my laptop, and that particular ratio always looked best on the screen. by contrast a portrait crop felt like there was something missing, so i naturally stopped creating photos like that. we're now in an era where i imagine most people view photos on their phones, and it's indisputable that a portrait crop works a whole lot better, but still the stubbornness inside me refused to adapt. in fact the last time i posted a photo which wasn't a strict 3:2 crop was over five years ago, and even then it was only slightly off. so this image is a very rare example where despite trying to force this 3:2 rule, i had to concede that the photo looks far better with a portrait crop. i think it'll be difficult for me to shake my instinct and start rotating my camera when i shoot, but this could be the start of a new era where my shots are cropped based on what works best for the image instead of obstinately following a nonsensical principle.

here's the original