Well first off, I also think it’s important to self-review your work, particularly if you feel you may be stagnating. It’s tough to do but I applaud you for doing it and coming out the other side in the way that you mentioned.
I found for me, that when I got off Insta for a while, just stopped scrolling, I started honing in on what I really enjoyed shooting. It’s what you see mostly from me now and I’d say it’s night and day from a year ago where I was largely photographing people and street. It helped me to stop looking at so much work from others, as I was noticing that I was emulating it too much, even subconsciously. Now my photos resonate with who I am and what I want to see much more. I’m more excited to get out and shoot because of that and sooner or later I’ll probably have to self-review again but that’s the process.
I totally agree, it is so easy to just fall into taking aesthetically pleasing photos that doesn't really say anything.
I started in landscape photography and started feeling the same way. These days I try to shoot with more depth, like you. It is hard to change mindset, but I think it is worth it in the end. And your last photos really are lovely, you really illustrate the difference. Thank you and good luck!
Thank you Emanuel. It’s definitely hard to change the mindset for sure. In a way I feel almost paralyzed to even click the shutter button right now. But I know what I’m looking for now and of course will grow more confident as time goes on.
Thank you again for the kind words and good luck to you also on this journey!
This is a really honest and reflective piece Joshua. Thanks for sharing. I'm still at the early stage of learning photography but this is a powerful reminder that just taking a nice picture is not enough if an image is going to stay with you and a viewer.
Thank you Terry for reading it and I’m glad you got something out of it. It’s definitely not easy asking the hard questions but I think it’s important. Keep learning and keep growing!
damn i thought i was the only one who the felt somewhat the same. even though most of this resonates, i’ve been working on not being so self critical. anywho very good read brother.
I was in your shoes about a year ago or more. Also erased my IG images and after a while began to only share photos I am proud of there. I have a set of criteria to edit my work and test against. It helps me be somewhat consistent with my personal style. Always telling a story is a very high bar. Like you, I'm capable of creating images that solve the same formula. And I see people in my city churning them out. It makes me respect them less for posting dozens of uninspiring images. I'd appreciate some criticism from you if you were willing to.
It is a high bar and sometimes I just wanna take pretty pictures that I like haha. Sometimes I feel like as creative people we put so much pressure on ourselves to always have some grand idea or vision, can’t things sometimes just be pretty haha.
I love the idea of giving some of your work a look with feedback. Where is the best place to see your main body of work?
Hi Joshua. I'm not well organized. In my bio are two links. IG is where I show my curated street photography. Pixelfeld shows a wide variety of my work. So I'd suggest you limit your feedback to IG. Thanks.
Superb writing and images. We may not always feel what you feel, as we all may interpret an image differently. Sometimes, my joy of feeling is just seeing that an image is perfectly crafted--lighting, framing, content and more. All of your photos have this aesthetic depth.
Thank you for the kind words Robert and I agree everyone is going to feel different when they look at an image, I think that's the beautiful thing about art :).
You describe your sort of stuckness so well! I found street photography in 2012, when I had worked less than a year as a portrait photographer. It felt like I found the missing piece. Fast forward to 2020 and pandemia. I started doing more and more comms work, and finally lost the routine as a photographer. I didn’t know how important the routine was. When I shot more, almost every day, and no matter if it was portraits for clients or personal work on the streets, I nailed it more often. I took inages with a strong storyline more easily. As I’ve been starting to shoot more and more personal work now, I feel getting back to groove. It’s wonderful. Just posting this if you haven’t yet considered shooting more! Creativity is a muscle that needs a good workout pretty often.
Well first off, I also think it’s important to self-review your work, particularly if you feel you may be stagnating. It’s tough to do but I applaud you for doing it and coming out the other side in the way that you mentioned.
I found for me, that when I got off Insta for a while, just stopped scrolling, I started honing in on what I really enjoyed shooting. It’s what you see mostly from me now and I’d say it’s night and day from a year ago where I was largely photographing people and street. It helped me to stop looking at so much work from others, as I was noticing that I was emulating it too much, even subconsciously. Now my photos resonate with who I am and what I want to see much more. I’m more excited to get out and shoot because of that and sooner or later I’ll probably have to self-review again but that’s the process.
I totally agree, it is so easy to just fall into taking aesthetically pleasing photos that doesn't really say anything.
I started in landscape photography and started feeling the same way. These days I try to shoot with more depth, like you. It is hard to change mindset, but I think it is worth it in the end. And your last photos really are lovely, you really illustrate the difference. Thank you and good luck!
Thank you Emanuel. It’s definitely hard to change the mindset for sure. In a way I feel almost paralyzed to even click the shutter button right now. But I know what I’m looking for now and of course will grow more confident as time goes on.
Thank you again for the kind words and good luck to you also on this journey!
This is a really honest and reflective piece Joshua. Thanks for sharing. I'm still at the early stage of learning photography but this is a powerful reminder that just taking a nice picture is not enough if an image is going to stay with you and a viewer.
Thank you Terry for reading it and I’m glad you got something out of it. It’s definitely not easy asking the hard questions but I think it’s important. Keep learning and keep growing!
damn i thought i was the only one who the felt somewhat the same. even though most of this resonates, i’ve been working on not being so self critical. anywho very good read brother.
I was in your shoes about a year ago or more. Also erased my IG images and after a while began to only share photos I am proud of there. I have a set of criteria to edit my work and test against. It helps me be somewhat consistent with my personal style. Always telling a story is a very high bar. Like you, I'm capable of creating images that solve the same formula. And I see people in my city churning them out. It makes me respect them less for posting dozens of uninspiring images. I'd appreciate some criticism from you if you were willing to.
It is a high bar and sometimes I just wanna take pretty pictures that I like haha. Sometimes I feel like as creative people we put so much pressure on ourselves to always have some grand idea or vision, can’t things sometimes just be pretty haha.
I love the idea of giving some of your work a look with feedback. Where is the best place to see your main body of work?
Hi Joshua. I'm not well organized. In my bio are two links. IG is where I show my curated street photography. Pixelfeld shows a wide variety of my work. So I'd suggest you limit your feedback to IG. Thanks.
Superb writing and images. We may not always feel what you feel, as we all may interpret an image differently. Sometimes, my joy of feeling is just seeing that an image is perfectly crafted--lighting, framing, content and more. All of your photos have this aesthetic depth.
Thank you for the kind words Robert and I agree everyone is going to feel different when they look at an image, I think that's the beautiful thing about art :).
"Show don't tell"
You describe your sort of stuckness so well! I found street photography in 2012, when I had worked less than a year as a portrait photographer. It felt like I found the missing piece. Fast forward to 2020 and pandemia. I started doing more and more comms work, and finally lost the routine as a photographer. I didn’t know how important the routine was. When I shot more, almost every day, and no matter if it was portraits for clients or personal work on the streets, I nailed it more often. I took inages with a strong storyline more easily. As I’ve been starting to shoot more and more personal work now, I feel getting back to groove. It’s wonderful. Just posting this if you haven’t yet considered shooting more! Creativity is a muscle that needs a good workout pretty often.