Why you will Fail at Photography
Why you will give up photography
Ok I’m not trying to discourage anybody but I’m just trying to say what I know to be true. The deeper you get into the world of photography the more it’s going to cost you, the more time you will have to spend with it the more its going to take away from you. Some people say they really love photography and I love photography myself however there are times when I really don’t even want to touch a camera. So here are some of the reasons why you would want to give up on photography especially here in the Bahamas.
It’s quite simple. The natural progression of a person with a camera is simple, you get your camera and you are all excited and ready want to take photos of the world. You start with a few shots inside your house, testing the camera out. learning the buttons and just playing around with it. Sooner or later you’re going to take it outside and you’re going to start taking pictures of nature which is pretty much what’s in your backyard. A few flowers, probably a spider and a lizard somewhere or a bird or two. It becomes even worse if you have pets, you’re definitely going to take a lot of shots of them and you’re going enjoy your pictures and you’re going to have fun with As far as you’re concerned those images will the best in the world because you love what you just finished taking a photo of but there is a problem, you have so much more to learn and you don’t even know it yet. So it’s like the old saying says when you know that you know nothing that’s real knowledge and then knowing how much you don’t know is wisdom.
“The man who knows something knows that he knows nothing at all” Erikah Badu
So are you wise enough to know that you have a long way to go?
So what’s the next step that happens? Well you may go further and take more photos to show them to your friends. Sometimes you might print one or two out once in a while to hand on your wall. It’s very rare for a person to actually do that but it mainly the images you take you usually will have them on your phone to show people because you’re very proud of your work. Of course when you show someone a picture many people being polite, will agree with you on how good your photo looks. This is not helpful to you at all.
You friends will give you that praise because no one really wants to tear you down and then because you’re so in love with your photos even if someone gives you an honest answer you won’t even believe them. So this is a very delicate stage. Sometimes you run into persons and they tell you straight out that they do not like your photos, but you hold that internally you hate that person from there on in forever. Sometimes you can let that negative critique eat you up inside, especially if its someone who opinion matters to you. What happens during this time is that you quit and become one of the first set of people that give up on photography. So that’s just one challenge, their are other challenges that are on the way.
So sooner or later someone’s going to ask you to take pictures for them. It’s going to be a little gathering. So you know every picture I mean like the pictures that you take you pose them nice on Facebook or Instagram. Can you take the picture off my birthday my child’s little party and take a picture we’re having a gathering whatever it is someone’s going to actually take a picture of them even if it comes down to the point where they say it’s when you take some pictures and may want something else and you’re going to be nervous definitely you’re going to be nervous going to be very nervous in fact. But you’re still going to do it because you want to grow as a photographer you want to feel as if you know why people can call on you.
So you go and you take those photos and you do your best that you can do not photos you can last anywhere between 45 minutes to two and a half hours or so. But you know the time is running out so sometimes you try to keep it within that hour. And you know the images you’re getting are just not what you want. So it becomes very difficult. And most often what happens is when you take these photos just like you were shooting when you’re taking pictures of nature your flowers pets and animals or things like that you shouldn’t automatic because you haven’t fully understood the other modes of your camera how to manually take over control of your camera. So you shoot the pottery an automatic or you might put a little straight ahead and say you know what I read about this and it says this is good for Partridge’s and so you decide to take a picture of these people. But it’s just not going to be what you want it. It’s just not true this is going to happen because again you don’t know what you don’t know. And one thing you don’t know is that that doesn’t really work.
So you’re going to get images that you’re not proud of and you’re not going to like it but you know you’re going to feel comfortable with it. Sometimes you know if you
Really feel as if you’re good you’re going to really love your photos and then you’re going to feel really good. But they’re not going to look like what you’re used to seeing especially with those who’ve been around for a while. Even some has been around for a while. You know some of them are just not really as awesome but when you start comparing yourself and you start playing a comparison game that’s when you’re going to realize that you have a long way to go. So moving from not an understanding that might need to learning a bit more is going to come to you the next challenge is going to come into is OK how do I learn more. So the best way that most people will talk about learning photography go to school of YouTube and you go to YouTube and you pull up a lot of new videos on how to take better pictures how to take pictures of people how to use your camera.
All about my Nikon or Canon Pentax or Sony whatever it’s going to be. You get to go to YouTube when you’re going to start learning. Learning learning and just watching videos one after the other one off. And so what is happening now is the challenge you’re going to run into is OK. Is this enough information. You go outside and you try your new techniques out but you’re still unsure or you’re still walking in the dark trying to figure out exactly what am I doing.
How do I do it.
But the one thing that changes the room is silent is your confidence your confidence begins to grow. If your confidence doesn’t grow and you look at your image and you continue to do the comparison situation you’re pretty much going to just give up. You’re just going to go right back to shooting your little flowers here because you can do that.
It’s easy to put that in a flower or I’ll put it on the passport. You could get reasonably good shots. So that’s something you’re going to pass. You’re going to drop out. Are you going to pass it through. After you learning YouTube and you think that you’ve recently gotten some or are you going to now get better you know more jobs you might get a little shoot here with your cousin or your cousin’s friend or auntie or someone else in your family or your friends are going to ask you to do stuff even at your church and church loves x persons that do work for them. So you’re going to start feeling a bit more. And again you’re going to develop a style. But the thing is you’re still in a vacuum. So the challenge is getting out of the vacuum. When I say a vacuum I mean that. You are the only one critiquing your images. You’ve reached you’ve passed the comparison stage. And as far as you can saying you have reached a level that you think you’re pretty good but you’re still not there yet at this point. This is where I advise you to find someone who’s being photographing for a while. Someone whose work you really admire and you Oxnam for honest critique this is the hardest thing to do.
Not finding the person finding her isn’t as easy it’s just doing that critique because you have to be ready and just open towards what that person is going to tell you. OK. It’s not a reflection on who you are it’s just a reflection of where you are at that time. And if you want to move from where you are to somewhere else you have to listen to persons in your cheeks because they’re going to break it down for you. Someone who really knows photography who understands everything. I wouldn’t say everything but who understands a whole lot about photography and can actually critique an image based on composition and lighting and mood and other things like that. You want that critique if you’re not open. This is where you’re going to break. Because here it is someone you really respect an idol a mentor. It’s going to really tear you apart and you’re going to hate them. You’re going to be upset and you may or may not quit. Not switching over from amateur to dabbler to professional. As a professional photographer pricing and the amount of work that into with building your website and your social media presence and
Editing delivering files back and forth with so much work involved that you’re going to get tired of this after a while because you have to deal with so many different people. So your final challenge if you are going to quit will be to the point where you’re just tired of the up and down with photography with dealing with clients. Prisons will not satisfy people who don’t know what they want or know what they want and they say that you don’t deliver it and having to deal with this back and forth back and forth. And this is the point where if you made it other once this is one part where you just may give up on photography. Add