Have a look through your photographic equipment. Have a good look. Check through your cameras. Check through your lenses. Now the tripods, filters and flashguns. Check everything.
I'll bet there's things there you don't use. But more - I'll bet there's things there that you have never used - apart from when you first bought it.
Or worse - was given it. For the equipment we are the least likely to use is the equipment we are given. People mean well, and you should never look a gift horse in the mouth. But they don't understand photography like you do. And they understand digital photography even less.
This year, I was given a lovely book on landscapes. beautifully illustrated and written by someone that is respected throughout the world in landscape photography. The problem was, it was exactly the same as the copy sitting on my bookshelf. I also got some cheap lens wipes and a few other trinket accessories. I will never use them.
And don't go thinking that it's what others buy us that goes unused. I have plenty of stuff that has laid pretty much idle since the day I bough it all. Fisheye converters, extension tubes. I own three flashguns, only one of which I ever use. I have several tripods and several cheap lenses. I don't kniow why I don't part with them.
I'll bet you have stuff that you never get out let alone use. Can you part with it? Possibly, but for me, having this equipment tells me something about how I graduated in photography and how I have developed. But like an old favourite teddy bear, some things just have to be kept.
.... apart from my latest gifts from Aunt Audrey.
Eric Hartwell runs the photography resource site http://www.theshutter.co.uk and the associated discussion forums as well as the regular weblog at http://thephotographysite.blogspot.com
