Sing with ‘Hank’

I have been researching cameras and lenses to buy and am close to making my decision. As I look at cameras and lenses it is interesting how similar photography is to fine art. One of my accomplishments in life of which I am most proud is the paint system that I invented for airbrush artists. As an airbrush artist myself I was tired of the terrible paints on the market and I decided to try and do something about it. I worked for several years developing my own system and then took it to market. After many sleepless nights racking my brain and trying to come up with a name for it, I named it Polytranspar’. ‘Poly’ was part of the name for the paint system because it had a polymer base, and transpar’ was in it because it was transparent. This paint revolutionized the airbrush art industry and helped launch a very successful multi-million dollar business for me.

Without getting overly technical, the secret to my transparent paints was that the paints I introduced did not have pigment in them and therefore could transmit’ light without any of it being absorbed into pigment and then diffused as it came back to the eye as happens with normal pigmented paints. Diffused light makes color appear to the eye to be dim, muddy looking, and fuzzy. With Polytranspar, the additional light being transmitted back to the eye makes the painted colors and image appear razor sharp, clear, vibrant, rich, and beautiful.

To comprehend the importance of light to the artist or to the art viewer, one must understand that we cannot see color without light. Go into a completely dark room with no light whatsoever at night and look around and all you will see is black. Turn a dimmer switch slightly up and as the light is added, colors will begin to appear. First they will appear to be dim, dark, and dirty looking, but as more light is added everything seems to come into focus and eventually when enough light is added, the colors become rich and beautiful. (Remember this the next time you display a painting in your home. Never display a beautiful painting without first properly lighting it; because it will not do it justice.)

I find the same thing to be the case with cameras and lenses. They all seem to have zillions’ of features, but what really will make the best photos, (at least in my opinion), is the camera and lense combo that can transmit the largest amount of light the fastest, particularly in low light situations or when shooting fast action shots that require rapid shutter speed to capture something moving. If you shoot seven frames per second at dusk, capturing enough light to properly show an image is quite a feat of technology.

I was thinking about this entire scenario this morning on the way to work, and it came to me that this is similar to God and our lives. The Bible tells us that God is the “light”. When we shut Him out, our lives are black dark, dreary, fuzzy and out of focus. As we add His light to our lives we begin to be as He intended us to be when He created us, sharp, vibrant, rich, and alive. Keep adding His light and we become more sharp, vibrant, rich and alive.

Interestingly enough, we are similar to the items in the dark room described earlier. Everything in the room was there all along, but without the light was useless and could not even be seen. Without God we too are useless. Adding God’s light to our lives brings out the absolute best in us and as more light is added it keeps getting better and better and life becomes what it was intended to be all along.

Adding light also exposes flaws. We should welcome this. Every artist wants to do his or her absolute best work. No artist likes to work in a dimly lit studio as they are handicapped and cannot do their best work. Just as the lighting in an artist’s studio enables them to see and repair flaws in their work, God’s light exposes the things in our life that need to be repaired and corrected. We should all have the same desire to be our absolute best.

Add God’s light to your life today and just see if old Hank was right. Hank Williams wrote it all down for us in that great song: “I saw the light, I saw the light, no more darkness no more night Now I’m so happy no sorrow in sight Praise the lord, I saw the light!”

1 Peter 2:9
That you may
proclaim the praises of Him who
called you out of darkness into His
marvelous light.