National Photographic

I don't know about you, but I have a love/hate relationship with Instagram. On one hand I think it's spectacular: you have a chance to see virtually anything through the eyes of fellow smartphone users as well as share your own personal (albeit filtered) point of view with the world. While I'm by no means a professional photographer, Instagram lets me feel like one and makes photography an accessible and integral part of everyday life. Despite its good qualities, the app can be a tad obnoxious. Though you can see stunning views of faraway places, you're also subjected to photos of people's cats under the Hudson or Valencia filter, strange #hashtags and tilt shifted screenshots of Justin Bieber.

Insta-ambivalence aside, this week's post was inspired by another one of my closest friends and features what very well could be the coolest job on the planet: photographer for National Geographic. These guys are the real professionals, capturing iconic images from the most magnificent places on earth. You won't find any Lo-Fi photos of French fries gracing the pages of NatGeo, but rather a breathtaking scene from the French countryside that has the potential to stick in your mind for weeks after seeing it. In the words of Joan Miró, “You can look at a picture for a week and never think of it again. You can also look at a picture for a second and think of it all your life.”

This is a photo of the Japanese shoreline from NatGeo's archive. I'm going to go ahead and book a ticket to Tokyo.

I honestly cannot think of a better way to make a living than to be paid to swim with whales and travel to Machu Pichu in search of the perfect, most radical setting. In addition to cataloguing the most beautiful photos on the planet, National Geographic features online photo tips for all of us amateurs and Instagrammers who need a bit of perspective. Here's to the money-shot.