That's not saying that taking a good photograph is easy; if it was then I'd always do it, which I clearly do not. But success depends on failures, and if an artist fails often enough, and creatively enough, then success is inevitable.
The problem is recognizing a good photo when I see it.
I used to think that good photography was about the things that were photographed. Then I thought it was about light, or form, or tone, colour, line, pattern; I even briefly considered the idea that it was about intangibles like stories or emotion. But that's not right, or at least, it's not enough.
Good photography is about knowing what a good photograph looks like.
It's editing, selecting, and discarding. It's the visual sophistication and discernment to recognize what has value. It's the discipline to accept that, out of my last thousand photos, maybe none of them are worth showing.
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