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Comment by rqtwteye | Hacker News Reader

It's a big problem for photographers too. Especially with the rapid progress of mirrorless cameras there is always the next camera or lens you need to get. I have bought lenses and never used them. I have also spent more time on looking for accessories for my 3D printer than actually using it.

Not sure how to combat GAS. I feel for people with a full time job it somehow compensates for the lack of time working on one's hobbies

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> Not sure how to combat GAS

What works decently well for me is to avoid advertising like the plague. Adblock everything: browser, DNS, anywhere I can do it. Disable targeted advertising wherever I can't outright block it, if that's an option.

Avoid visiting websites where there's a lot of advertisement disguised as news or useful content; often enthusiast websites on whatever your hobby is will have a lot of that, so find better sites.

Don't watch regular TV with commercials. Only use streaming services, and always pay for the ad-free versions. "That's so expensive," you say? Not when you consider how much crap you'll buy when you're bombarded with advertising all the time.

You can never eliminate all advertising from your life, but the less you expose yourself to, the better. Adopt a mindset that ads are a form of psychological manipulation (because they are), and make yourself hate them. That alone will make you somewhat less susceptible to it (or at least I like to think so). Be deliberate about purchases. Seek out things that you know you want because you want them; don't buy stuff because you saw it featured somewhere.

Amateur photographers often cover a lot more types of photography than pros, which makes GAS even worse.

A pro might specialize in sports photography and buy some nice long lenses with fast autofocus. Or they might specialize in portraiture and get a nice wide-open 90mm equivalent. Or architectural photography, and get a tilt-shift lens.

For some reason, a lot of amateur photographers will dabble in many different types of photography, each with their own demands on equipment.

I avoid GAS pretty easily by the application of a simple method I've developed over years as a hobbyist photographer: Be Aware of Non-Optimality. That is, in bearing in mind there is no benefit to the expenditure of resources to obtain equipment that by itself will not meaningfully improve my practice - and too, that having gear I do not use will make me regret its purchase, further diverging from an optimal state - I find myself no longer with the urge to replace a perfectly serviceable DSLR with a mirrorless that may be newer, but is not really all that much better at capturing the exposures I care to make.

I'm probably not explaining it as well as I might, but I am happy nonetheless to say I've found my GAS very reliably cured by BeAN-O.

the opposite is also true however. I've been attempting to combat GAS by avoiding a home data server. In reality, I've been needing a NAS for a number of years and have changed my photography practice due to limitations and challenges with dealing with extra data. I just solved this and it's been liberating.

I solve my photography storage needs by treating SD cards as write-once consumables. When a card fills up, I just buy another one.

That would get super expensive if you shoot things like airshows, birds in flight or sports where you can easily shoot 2000 images or more in one day. Or 4K video.

2000 images fits on about $3 worth of SD card, depending on resolution.

Less than the time cost of going through and deciding which to delete.

I guess it depends on your equipment. 2000*50MB gets you up to 100GB. A decent 128GB card costs you from $20 up. A card that's capable of fast bursts can cost around $100.

Digital Photograph Acquidition Syndrome

I've been there as well.

In reality 99% of the time you don't need new gear. However there is also a delicate balance where a new piece of gear makes you excited to go out and do your hobby more and it's that going out more than makes you get better at it.

> I feel for people with a full time job it somehow compensates for the lack of time working on one's hobbies

I identify with this. Have full time job, some disposable income, a few hobbies but no real time for them.

This has led to a lot of gear acquisition, buying tools or equipment that are beyond my level of expertise and I don't have time to make the most of.

I guess there's worse things to burn money on but does feel like if I had more time to actually do hobbies I'd discover I can get by with far fewer gadgets.

I'm still on my A7R2, it still works great, and while I sometimes wistfully think about the ultrasonic wiggly massive resolution mode (700Mpix or something) on the A7R4, I cannot in any way justify upgrading.

OTOH, I also bemoan the loss of my 70s OM1n 20 years ago.

I haven't dabbled much in photography lately, but when I was active in it, budget was a strong constraint. These days my GAS is mostly for synths and budget is less of a constraint, thanks to the full time job you alluded to. I think this phenomenon of having money but no time leading to GAS is pretty common, from what I've seen. In my case, I often avoid it by challenging myself to use whatever I have at hand to try to recreate what I'd be getting with the new gear. Its often a fun exercise even if I don't succeed.

I feel this quite a bit. When I was young, I had a ton of time and no money to acquire the needed equipment. Now, I finally have the money to get basically whatever I need within reason, but no time to use it.

I am typically able to resist the urge to succumb to GAS, but I don't always. I still have an incomplete atreus (http://atreus.technomancy.us/) in my basement; I set it aside when I bought a house, and haven't had time to revisit it since.

My explanation is quite simple: cool toys are cool, and they give us the illusion of being better at our hobbies than we actually are. I sometimes indulge in some Gear Acquisition too -- but I try to be cognizant of the fact that if not done carefully, it only leads to a short-term happiness kick which quickly leads to another episode of GAS.

The good thing about lenses is that if you buy good lenses, they usually retain a lot of value, so you can sell them. And it isn't like you have to use them all the time. For instance, I rarely use my macro lens. And that's okay. But having it means that the 1-2 times per year I need it, I have it.

On the bright side I sometimes sell used camera gear for more than I bought it. A combo body and lens can sell more than the items separately if marketed correctly and when including sample photos.

That said, I still haven't bought a new camera body.

I (partially) sidestep this by buying gear that's already well behind the curve.

Yeah lmao I spent tens of thousands of dollars on my medium format Fujifilm GFX system. It just needs a couple more lenses then it will be perfected and I won't have to buy another piece of gear ever again!

I think a Hasselblad would enrich your life

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