Being a photographer can be both a blessing and a curse. The blessing discovers itself in that moment when you realize that you have this gift called creativity and the eye for good moments and, if you try hard, the ability to create beautiful pictures. I started a few years ago with streetphotography. I was walking my streets and took pictures of things I liked. Or that looked interesting to me. Just for fun. And for practice.
I uploaded them to communities like Flickr, DeviantArt, Fotocommunity and was happy about the 200 clicks the better shots got.
Then I started to take pictures of beautiful girls. I improved fast. The number of my followers doubled and tripled and the clicks and faves per picture started to rise. A good picture of a nice girl gets ten thousand clicks. In one month.
That was amazing. I was really excited that finally something I did seem to work. So I focussed on people photography. The clicks and faves proved me right. But one of the results was that I followed that path, forgot about what I really liked to do and focussed on girls only. That was so terribly wrong.
I found myself in a corner of the so called photography industry that doesn't looked like the place I was heading for when I started to take pictures. I was stuck in the portrait corner. But I was to flattered and happy about the cheering of the audience to see it.
After more than one hundred shootings and about 2500 edited and processed pictures of beautiful girls the only feeling I had with my photography was boredom. I was tired of it. I continued, but the results declined in creativity and uniqueness. Instead of getting better I went downhill. Fast.
The curse, or one of it's symptoms, being a photographer, is success.
If you focus on what works, what your audience likes, you will probably lose the spirit of your own work. If shooting girls is what really amazes you and you do great and your audience loves you for it all is fine.
But what, if these pictures are not what your photography really is about? You will find out that you ended somewhere where you never wanted to be. And one day you will be so tired and frustrated and burnt out that you start thinking about quitting.
I am not in the position to advise others what and how and why to shoot. I can talk only for myself and what I did.
I stopped doing what I did for the last 3 years. Took my old camera, one lens only, went to a place I've never been before and tried to capture the essence of this place, my own personal essence and feelings I had when I was there, in pictures.
Like in the old days, walking the streets with a camera. I took pictures for myself only and don't even thought about a possible audience to show them. They are my pictures. And nobody has to like them. Besides me.
And suddenly I realized again, what it is all about. Slowly I found out that these shots are much more precious than all the other stuff I did in the last year.
I start to like taking pictures again. It's not the final destination and no happy end, but it's a station on the path of finding out what I really want. What my photography is about. Where I want to go.
Sometimes you need to go back, take yourself out of the system to see the whole picture where you are part of. Re-adjust your focus. Change perspective. To be able to see again, what was always there. And everything can start to make sense again.
