I came home with over one thousand photos of my trip.  Landscape, buildings, sky (lots of sky) pictures.  Snap shots and more arty photo attempts.  Documentation of things that were unusual to me.  Photos of spaces that I wanted to reference for future art projects.  I realized at some point that it would probably be a good idea to try to include myself in my holiday pictures.  I have discovered a new word that describes me, farouche (shy in company).   So, being some what farouche and not a fan of being photographed, it was a bit of a challenge to have myself included in my travel photos.

The most obvious solution, to ask someone to take a photo, wasn’t going to happen.  Despite my adventuring spirit, I hadn’t discovered the fortitude to tackle my shyness.  Extending the camera at arm’s length or resting it on something and using the timer was another solution.  I did try a couple of pictures that way but, even when taking pictures of myself, I am still camera awkward.  My best solution to having me included in my photos of my travels was…

This shows that I actually had an opportunity to wear the shorts that I packed.

I think these are some of the best photos I have ever seen of myself.  It shows that I was there, and I don’t have the pained scowl or awkward smile that is usually part of a photo of me.  Of course, my shadow portraits relied on it being sunny.  I have absolutely no complaints about the weather in Scotland, but sunny wasn’t the prominent weather pattern.   The window of opportunity to take a shadow picture might happen daily, but might not occur when it was most convenient.  Admittedly, including myself in a photo was always an afterthought.