Keep Austin Beautiful!

I've divided my list of volunteer ideas by whether or not they are a one-time event. For the one-time events, I have ordered them by date. The first on the list of one-time events was the Keep Austin Beautiful cleanup on Saturday, April 5. I intended on emailing the organizers ahead of time to make contact with a specific group leader to see if it was okay to take photos. However, that email never happened. So why not just show up? The locations were listed on the event's website, so I picked one that sounded interesting and decided to go there the next morning.

Oh was I anxious over this. The night before I imagined being there and what it would be like. I imagined the people, the photos, the conversations... I decided to set my alarm an hour and a half before they were to start so I could get there early and talk to the group's leader. Despite not allowing myself all that much sleep, I woke up 30 minutes before my alarm was to go off. Thoughts about the cleanup ran through my head and I began feeling quite scared. What if they don't want me there? I've never woke up on race day feeling like this. Perhaps the closest feeling is what you might feel in anticipation of giving a presentation to a large audience. I laid in bed and talked to Jay for quite awhile about how I was skeerd! Finally, I had to get on the road, so I got up, stated "What's the worst that can happen!", grabbed my photography stuff and headed out.

I had nothing to be scared of.

I arrived right as they were organizing. I introduced myself to the group leader. He explained what was going on that day, and told me once I got my photos in, I was welcome to sign in and pick up trash as well. Later, he even invited me to the volunteer party!

The people I spoke with were very friendly. Many of the older folks were long-time volunteers. You'd never guess who has been the best at suggesting specific future volunteer events for the month of April. Volunteers!

As in my cooking blog, I'd like to start listing some lessons learned when appropriate. Sometimes these lessons aren't the first time I've learned them and neither will they be the last.

• Sofobomo specific: Get more contact information from people. I only got one business card from someone, even though I spoke quite a bit with four people. At a minimum get their phone or email address. I've been thinking about making SoFoBoMo specific "business" cards. I think I will do this, as it is the easiest way to give people the chance to reach me later.
• Check my camera settings before every photo shoot. (White balance, ISO, drive, auto-focus, and image format if you ever change it.) My ISO was fine; I was pretty sure it was. ISO is the one that usually gets me. My white balance was set incorrectly to tungsten making everything more blue than it should be. Easy Lightroom fix, but better to get it right in the camera.
• My camera sensor really needs to be cleaned. I already knew that. Maybe I just haven't truly learned my lesson yet.
• I wanted to take at least one strobist style portrait shot. I could have done this. I had the time. I wouldn't have been in the way of anyone. I had willing volunteers. I don't know why I didn't at least try. I was tired and wanted to keep things simple. Maybe now that I've accomplished this shoot, I can take it up to strobist level next time. (At least the reasons I missed a strobist photo did not include 1. didn't have the equipment or 2. didn't even consider it. That's a small step!)
• I don't need to over-think or over-plan this. I can still get great photos just showing up and taking photos.
• What's the worst that can happen? I don't get the pictures I want? I don't get any pictures? I get turned down by someone? How bad is any of that... really?