Amateur and professional level Zhang Baotong 2019.2.17

I often hear people who love photography and singing claim to be very professional, but in fact they are not even amateurs. How can a person who has never even been to the Photographers' Association or the Conservatory of Music be called a very professional? And there is a very big gap between the amateur master and the professional level. I'll give you an example. In the past few years, we represented the Weiyang District Education Bureau to participate in the table tennis competition of the Xi'an cultural and educational system. One of the players in our team was a master of the Xi'an competition, but in the game, I met a player who retired from the professional team. When people were drinking and half drunk, they actually beat him 11:0. Later, he came down and said that you can't beat me 11:0, which makes me too shameless. Because there is an unwritten rule in table tennis, that is, you can't let your opponent eat 0 eggs. So, at 10:0, you have to deliberately give the other person a point. And the man said, I'm sorry, I've been drinking too much, and my mind is so dizzy that I don't know anything at all. From this example, you can see how big the gap is between the professional level and the amateur level.

We all know that to pursue a profession, it is always very demanding. For example, singing and playing ball, if you want to go professional, you have to practice from a very young age, some children start to practice singing from the age of three or four, and start practicing from the age of four or five, and they also have to pass many difficulties such as talent, hard work, conditions, opportunities, and learning. Those who learn to sing must at least be admitted to the conservatory first, and those who play ball must at least play in provincial and municipal competitions, and even national competitions. How difficult it must be for this alone! Then you will be able to enter a professional institution for professional training. After four or more years of rigorous training and training, you can be regarded as a professional.

Amateurs, on the other hand, just use their spare time to entertain themselves. Although there are many obsessives among them, they also have to practice every day. However, I don't know how many levels are different from the training methods and levels of other professional teams. I once watched the American movie "The Dream of Kuoqiao", and saw that the photographer named Robert Kimkay took about four days to shoot Kuoqiao. This puzzled me. I guess if I were to shoot, I wouldn't even want 20 minutes. However, later, I came across some books on professional photography and realized the true meaning of professional photography.

When a professional photographer goes out to take pictures, he or she needs to make a lot of preliminary preparations in terms of weather, routes, equipment, strategies, and warmth measures. However, how can ordinary photography enthusiasts know so many doors? They basically take pictures casually, that is, wherever they go and see the scenery they want to photograph, they take pictures on the spot. For professional photographers, in addition to sufficient preparation, they are also quite particular when shooting. In order to shoot a scene, they spend a lot of time repeatedly recomposing, reusing different lighting, and using different techniques to shoot until they have a satisfactory photo. After the pre-shooting work, it was done for amateurs. However, professional photographers will also retouch the photos in the future to make the work more beautiful. In addition to these basic techniques, professional photographers are also more aesthetically pleasing than amateurs, because they can find beauty that others can't find and capture scenery that others can't. If you see what a true professional photographer does, don't compare your hobby to someone else's level of expertise.

There are many amateurs who like to compare with the professional level because they don't know how high the professional level is. One of our golfers thought he was playing so well that he felt like he was on the same level as the pros. However, once a retired member of the provincial team came, so that the family could not find the north, and when they saw the professional team coming down in the future, they did not dare to fight with others again.

In fact, it is good for a person to have a hobby. Because it's a hobby, you don't rely on it to make a living and eat, just for leisure and hobbies, and there is no pressure. So, it matters that the level is higher and worse than headless. Just as we are annoyed teaching as teachers and afraid of going to work as workers, those who are engaged in professional work are also not enthusiastic about their profession. I know several players who have come down from the professional team and they seem to be bored with playing. We run to play like this today, and we run there to play tomorrow, and we often don't get tired of playing in the rankings, but as long as they come out, it is a sure thing to win the championship, and there are bonuses and prizes, but if you ask them to come out and play, it is like forcing them to do hard labor.

Studies have shown that hobbies can make people happier, healthier and longer, less stressful, more creative, and potentially turn a hobby into a specialty. So, no matter what the interest and hobby, as long as we like it, no matter whether it is high or low, as long as it makes us feel interesting and happy, it is enough. It would be great if our amateur level could improve day by day and get closer to the professional level.