Do flukes count?

While at Bethany, I played a good number of games of pool. I won't go as far as to say that I'm good - but I improved. However, when playing pool with me, I would make a shot, sink a ball I had no intentions of sinking, or sink a ball completely on a rebound. If you have ever played pool with me, you have heard me say NUMEROUS times undoubtedly, "Do flukes count?"

Now, a few years later, it's been a few years since I've had my hands on a pool cue (ok, that's a lie - I played one game at graduation and one game at a pastor/spouse retreat), but there are other areas where I wonder "Do flukes count?"

I'm not going to go all spiritual on you. Cause if I did, then I *think* (not much thought put into this thought cause it wasn't where I was going) but I *think* I would say that spiritually, most often, flukes don't count.

However. For years, I have desired to learn how to capture images photographically. While I still have a LONG way to go, I do think that I am improving. But there are times when I get the *perfect picture* and couldn't tell you for the life of me why it worked or how to do it again.

For example, here is a picture I took while I was playing outside with the kids this afternoon.

While it's a pretty useless picture, the clarity of the subject and the unfocused-ness of the background is something I have tried to learn and have not yet understood. Yet I did it. Could I do it again? Here's what happened when I tried.


So my question is, as a photographer, do flukes count? When you take pictures, do you know what you're doing or do you just hope that you get a fluke and that it counts??

If you have any tips to tell me how I did this, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!!

(Another example of good picture that I was unable to reproduce)