I’m no professional photographer; barely qualify as an amateur. But I shoot with a Leica M6 ttl 0.58. It’s mechanical and uses film. But I like the hands-on physical/mental “feel” of playing with the tradeoffs of aperture, shutter speed, film speed and hearing that curtain open and close over the aperture at different speeds.

It puts me in touch with what I’m doing.

Forecasting electric power system pricing, for me, is similar. I need to have seen that 15 year old power plant, how rickety are the lines coming out of it, see the fuel supply terrain and challenges, the people operating it, get a sense of the vitality of industrial users in the area; I need to see the new technologies up close, how big are those solar installations and wind turbines.

Only then do my mathematical models hold much credibility to myself.