Whenever anyone asks me what my favorite photo in my portfolio is, I don’t hesitate to show this one. My family took at trip down to Callaway Gardens last year on Memorial Day and as we were walking over a bridge, my daughter stopped to look out across the small creek. As she looked back at her Mommy in amazement, I captured this image.
This is what Cartier-Bresson referred to as a “decisive moment.” Cartier-Bresson describes this in his book the Decisive Moment:
“To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression.”
This image is my favorite for many reasons. The biggest reason being that this is my daughter. The other reason is that it captured a small moment in time that I will always remember. It captured an emotion, an excitement that I could not describe with words. Every time I take out my camera, I am striving to make images like this. And to be honest, they are very few and far between. This image is what photography is all about for me.
Absolutely beautiful picture.