Photography needs a camera and I like photography. The other day I bought a new, bigger camera making me feel like a big-boy photographer. I took it out on a stroll and before the third shot, someone noticed my weighty device. They were art students asking me if I could photograph their installations. I did and it was fun until the sun set.

Zwischenraum by Maria Charlotte Bitzer, photo: Christopher Besch

But why did they notice me? Did they see my portfolio? Would they've noticed me if I had held my phone or a smaller camera?
Even though, the equipment really doesn't make a good photographer. A good photographer makes any equipment take good photos. And then she still uses the best equipment for her job because of course she does.

Equipment, actually, is something I'm afraid of. I'm afraid of my camera just being a toy I'm consuming. Oh that word, consumption, what an insult! This is creation, not consumption; this is a tool not a toy!
I don't want the camera company to do the real work. Like, pay them and they give you a device that is the photographer. The real work should be mine; the technical, the artistic act of painting with light.

I envy screenshots in video games. There's no equipment in video games; just the photographer, her skills choosing motive, position, angle and time of day. No matter how much money she threw someone's way, everyone could have taken the same screenshot.
In a video game photography is reduced to expertise alone.
In real life, however, we don't have that luxury. We're dependent on the likes of Sony, Canon and Nikon to build a real-life counterpart of the video games' F12 key. I want my photography to be as independent as possible, as much mine as possible. I want to be independent of my tools. Give me a Pentax, Olympus, analog, digital, mirrorless, smartphone or the F12 key and I want to be good at creating.

When I was shopping for my new, bigger camera, I asked online what camera would fulfill my wishes. And, to my surprise, a lot of what I wanted (better low-light performance, better colors) I could achieve with my previous camera. I didn't have to buy the new, bigger camera to do this; a little more expertise already does it. There were other reasons for a new camera so I went that way. I just told myself that the new sensor doesn't invalidate all my previous work.
But still, I can't help it. I love feeling the weight in my gloved hands, streaking over the bold brand logo. They are very pretty devices, made to do pretty things. I want to appreciate that, acknowledge that but be independent of it.