[KGIII]

If you really like something, tell nobody. If you find beautiful waterfalls, don't tell anyone. A great fishing hole? Keep it to yourself. A great diner? Nary a soul should you tell.

I'm only slightly exaggerating.

In defiance of my above statement, I own this tree and it is my favorite tree. The forestry service cored it and it's at least 220 years old.

https://imgur.com/a/c2AVd

[fiblye]

Living somewhere that's increasingly being overrun with disrespectful tourists, I've been making a point of keeping my travels a secret as well. I've found loads of beautiful spots and I take plenty of pictures, but those pictures are all for my own memories. I don't show them to anyone since I know I'd come back to a trashed location later. I recently went back to a small town that had almost zero tourism not long ago, only to find hordes of tourists and "X ︎LOVES Y" messages carved into walls and trees everywhere.

[KGIII]

I can relate. I live in Vacationland. The nearest village largely exists because of tourism. I'm a bit more remote.

[throwanem]

There's a reason the photos on my site generally aren't geotagged. (Well, aside from the fact that my DSLR's GPS isn't any good.)

[KGIII]

Oh! That's brilliant. I usually carry a cheap camera instead of my expensive DSLR and it doesn't geotag as it has no GPS. It's disabled on my cell phone - usually. It re-enabled itself (that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it) at one point, so I manually edited the exif data.

I'm not a hugely private person (I've had countless internet friends visit me over the years) but I'm not giving up coordinates to my favorite fishing hole. As near as I can tell, only three people know about it.

I really am partially serious about telling nobody. That's how things get ruined - from your favorite diner to your favorite hidden beach. Pretty soon your favorite diner is always full and there's trash on your once secluded beach.

[throwanem]

I'm not entirely kidding around myself. A lot of the places where I enjoy taking photos, you'd need to be a Baltimore native or a long-time resident to find, and I have no desire to change that. But when it comes to photography, I'm more about making the most out of the everyday.

I mind me of a fellow who briefly set up, on the Fourth of July, directly alongside me on the north brow of Federal Hill - he unlimbered a pair of tripods, a sack full of lenses, and a setup based on a D7100 that cost more for just the body than I paid for my entire kit. Then, after five minutes, he tore everything down again and strode purposefully off, leaving behind only a vague complaint about how "the atmosphere was wrong". I'm not sure what he meant, and since those few words were the only ones he said to me throughout his time on the hill, I have no idea how his shots might compare to my own [1] [2]. No doubt they are much better, though.

Come to think about it, I haven't posted a new gallery since before the train wreck. I'll have to make some time this weekend and fix that!

[1] https://aaron-m.com/2017/07/05/inner-harbor-july-4

[2] https://aaron-m.com/2017/07/08/bonus-shots-july-4

[KGIII]

Those are fantastic. I don't want to derail the thread by going too far off-topic, so email is [e-mail] (if you're interested in showing more specific examples of your work or galleries).

[throwanem]

Thanks so much! I wasn't totally displeased with them. At risk of further derailing - everything I have that's worth showing, I put up there, albeit sometimes very belatedly. Contact info's there, or in my profile here.