I want you to look around your environment. Whether this is at your house, office, or walking down the street you will come in contact with something called photography. Pictures are seen on your desk, the internet, billboards, and your favorite cereal box. Almost everywhere you go you have been impacted by a photograph. You have either been the person behind the camera, the one posing, or the one staring at an advertisement in a magazine. The world of photography has changed dramatically in the past couple of years and continues to change. The cameras on our phones and the ease of uploading our photos to the internet have made the number of images in our world explode. Marvin Heiferman explains that millions of photographic images are seen throughout the world and the number rises every day. Photography impacts us to the point that it is an important part of our lives in some aspect even if it’s different from one person to the next. Photography's extensive depth of possibilities and the enjoyment and need of images are clearly amazing (12).  Each of us has done something with a picture even if we don’t see ourselves as a photographer. This shows us that photography is important.

We as human beings are expected to overlook some details of something. None of us can possibly take in every little part of a fast-moving sunset (Seger). Or take in every detail of a place you have never been before and maybe never will again. Sherlock Holmes may be the exception since he is known for seeing every little thing, but since we are not all Sherlock Holmes we need a different way to take in all the small details that make up our existence. We overlook the importance of photography in showing us these details. The camera is a recording machine that captures the best, worst, strange, and funny moments of our lives. Those moments make up our existence and the camera ties into that existence by recording the details of the moment. Each part of our life and the world is interesting and photography is an important piece that shows somebody else (and ourselves) the detailed moments of our life. While we concentrate on the overall view of our life the photograph we took will show us the small details we may have missed later. Photography is important because we can document something and have it forever. Photography lets us see something we may never have noticed otherwise. Photography is a way to express your ideas for others to see.