Choosing the best angle for your pictures

I posted a couple of photos on Facebook which I took in Pemba. The response from the few who commented was all in the line of "wow" and "you lucky fish". When we see beautiful pictures we all want to be there, plan our next holiday there, or wish we could permanently live there. We see pictures of tropical islands and wonder what we must do to sell everything and move to "PARADISE".  But where or what is Paradise?

Yes, the beaches in Pemba are extraordinary. It is beautiful and the pictures I took really give it the impression of a tropical paradise. But it is because of the angle I took the pictures from. Had I turned my camera a few degrees down I probably would've captured a few broken bottles or plastic bags on the sand;  a few degrees south and I would've included dilapidated houses and poor people who have no reason to believe that they find themselves in paradise right now.

I live in Cape Town which is considered by many to be a very beautiful place. Some might even call it paradise. Not everyone living in Cape Town necessarily see it as a beautiful place. Once you live in one of these post card picture places one thing you cannot escape from is reality. The reality of having to work to earn a living, or the reality of noisy neighbours, or what South Africans have to deal with at the moment, a government which is busy throwing the beauty of the country to the dogs. All of a sudden the pretty pictures of Cape Town don't seem to be so pretty anymore just because we see it from a "different angle".

So from which angle do you take your pictures? Where and what is your paradise? Is is it a dream on a post card, or is it a place in your heart? You can live in the most beautiful place, but is it really paradise? What makes a place "paradise"? Definitely not a beautiful beach alone. It is the way you see life, the people you care about, your contentment with who you are, where you happen to find yourself in life and the appreciation you have for your possessions, or the lack thereof. Once you have that then you can play around with your camera and only focus on the beauty around you. Then it become as simple as the angle you choose before you press the button....