Be honest- Do you love your own photography?

Brian Lewicki

Thanks for your thoughts

Afrofilmviewer

Quote:

I question my work all the time. However, I know I'm quite competent. There's a few people I'm jealous of their work and it's clear that models would easily pic them over myself.

I dislike seeing people making a certain type of fawning praise on them because of it.

Do you dislike the fawning, because it's unnecessary?

Unfocussed Mike

Thank you for being quite open about your life's struggles.

I'm going through a similar thing, ever since lockdown, which had me in very unsuccessful therapy sessions. My photography has suffered, but I keep up with the modelling because it's easier and I am with agencies, so some of my bookings are done for me.

MaristarOxley said

Unfocussed Mike

Thank you for being quite open about your life's struggles.

I'm going through a similar thing, ever since lockdown, which had me in very unsuccessful therapy sessions. My photography has suffered, but I keep up with the modelling because it's easier and I am with agencies, so some of my bookings are done for me.

I can definitely relate. I haven’t engaged in therapy but I have certainly been over-reliant on hobbies and interests to maintain my mood because lockdowns contributed to me being much lonelier.

It was interesting and valuable to think through in my reply that my feelings about my photography probably don’t have anything to do with photography.

Mitch Morgan

Quote:

, I realised that really my only aspiration is to be my favourite photographer.

This is a great outlook. Something I am taking away with me. I think I have little seeds of it with my photography, but not enough.

MaristarOxley

No. Makes it hard to work up too. Not a huge fan of approaching some models after you see hyperbolic praised placed on another photographer.

If that photographer is "the best photographer ever" it's not always not fun to follow up as "the rest". Can just feel shitty in comparison. Like following up a stand up who is on fire, makes you wonder "how do i build on that?"

*No Shade on the photographers

** This happens less these days.

Afrofilmviewer

Quote:

This is a key point. People picking up a camera and expecting them all to be bangers.

Keeps camera companies happy tho. Because then people wonder why they don't like their work then buy new gear.

I do see many photographers constantly buying new cameras.

I've always viewed the camera as a machine that documents what I am seeing. The perfect picture ( for me anyway) is not technically perfect because of the camera. The image in the whole can be imperfect in execution, but absolutely stunning.

Olga Karlovac produces beautiful images and only shoots blurred photos.

Edited by MaristarOxley

PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP. STUDIO

Quote:

, I find that my relationship with my images is always evolving. I don’t think I ever fully settle or feel "at peace" with them, and honestly, I wouldn’t want to. Each image is like a stepping stone in a larger journey of discovery, both technically and creatively.

A very healthy outlook.

Btw, I've suggested one of your wet plate images for fpi.

Those pictures are so interesting, strong and lovely 👍🏽

I love much of what I make for a few days after I make it. Yet very, very little of my output lasts any length of time in my own mind.

I think that’s ok: photography has always been ephemeral.

Unfocussed Mike said

I do, on reflection, like some of my photos. But it's my photography I don't feel I like -- if you see the distinction. Not enough cohesion, not enough direction, not enough purpose. I don't know why I do it anymore. But my biggest problem is that I don't know why I do anything anymore.

Time to seek help?

I've lost a lot of my enthusiasm in the last 3 years, since I lost my wife, and I feel I'm in a bit of a rut.

I've never been a technically brilliant photographer, and that never worried me because it was about the ideas. Now I struggle for ideas...

Stanmore said

Unfocussed Mike said

I do, on reflection, like some of my photos. But it's my photography I don't feel I like -- if you see the distinction. Not enough cohesion, not enough direction, not enough purpose. I don't know why I do it anymore. But my biggest problem is that I don't know why I do anything anymore.

Time to seek help?

I don't mean it in a particularly, er, urgently negative way. A lot of it is just middle age. And after freelancing for too long, I am kind of short on ambition or the ability to take risks and make decisions.

But thanks. It is a question I need to be asked. I am safe and I don't have any major life stresses now. Like I said earlier, it's an oddly self-indulgent anhedonia, but difficult to snap out of.

MaristarOxley said

I find it increasingly difficult to find models who know how to model, which is a skill. I shoot myself because it's somewhat easier.

I 100% agree modelling looks effortless but is incredibly difficult. I don't pretend to possess that skill I just stand in front of the camera and try not to let my RBF take over, posing is totally unnatural to me, but I'm sure that I love doing it as much as anyone does.

Allesandro B

I do look more towards IG accounts for inspiration and I find that I do learn from there more so than here. A main reason for the preference is that there's no to little criticism on there- it's there to view people's work and to appreciate, or swipe past.

It’s an interesting question. There is a few photographs I’ve taken that I love, in fact I love some so much I often choose not to upload them! But I also see them as pretty images rather than my full potential in expressing my artistic vision, sound a bit pretentious but this is the goal of any artist, to reach their peak potential in delivering something different  to the world.

recently though I’ve of a different mindset, I’ve a mental glimpse of the kind of photograph I want to take, something unlike what I’ve done before, it’s a kind of image that starts to put two fingers up to models emoting and making elegant poses, it turns away from cool outfits, so in many ways it’s rejecting many qualities that others turn to to make a powerful image. So in order to get to that point I’m having to make lots of baby steps into “rubbish image territory” then seeing if it works, if it didn’t, did I overcook the awkward realistic stance the models holding? Etc.

so I’m loving that mission at the moment and also the potential I can see as I slowly head towards that final goal. I’m also finding it fun working with models to create a kind of “anti modelling” new set of ways to pose, it fails more than it succeeds but it’s fun, and sometimes it involves going a bit closer to a modelling pose than I’d like and dailing it down a notch.