In the mid-1970s, I cashed in some savings bonds my parents bought when I was a baby to buy a Minolta SRT-101 SLR and set about making horrific photos—sometimes both slides and negatives from the same roll of film (yes, that was a thing). In addition to trying to capture some idea or mood, I found I was drawn to shapes, colors, textures and details in general, but I had no idea how to compose a successful image. I got frustrated and basically quit photographing.

Sometime in the late 1990s, after upgrading to a more advanced film camera and lenses, I began reading and thinking about how to improve my photos. I discovered, among other amazing things, that f/5.6 rarely provided the depth of field I wanted. I learned more about composition—still pretty basic concepts, however—and gradually discovered that capturing “postcard” views still left me unfulfilled.

About 10 years ago, my reading and research led me to the idea that planning what you wanted the photo to be produced stronger images. What a notion! Current digital cameras allow me to overcome many technical issues I had faced earlier—like insufficient depth of field—and my best photos (at least in my estimation) have come when I consider the full range of factors that contribute to successful images prior to pressing the shutter.