I feel kind of bad, I live in a really nice little town called Retford in Nottinghamshire, but when I go out to photograph it, inspiration doesn't come out and hit me in the face like I wish it would. I feel like I have the photograhers version of writers block!
I've started doing a little street photography recently, and enjoyed going to places like York, Leeds, and London; its great walking round buildings that we're not used to, sights and sites we haven't seen, and I assume its because there is a certain amount of anonymity in take street photos of strangers in towns your not associated with, because in my own town, I suddeny feel very self conscious, and worried there will be a post on the Retford Information page on Facebook stating, this weird guy was pointing a camera at me today, wo is he? whats he up to? Nothing nefarious I promise, just recording life and whats going on.
Maybe its also because I've happily lived there for 20 odd years now too, I'm not seeing things with fresh eyes. Maybe its my mood too, emotionally and mentally things have been tough lately.
I've tried to Google what happens when this occurs, inspiration not happening and come across various quotes..
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.” – Maya Angelou
“What moves me about… what’s called technique…is that it comes from some mysterious deep place. I mean it can have something to do with the paper and the developer and all that stuff, but it comes mostly from some very deep choices somebody has made that take a long time and keep haunting them.” – Diane Arbus
“I wanted to photograph clouds to find out what I had learned in forty years about photography. Through clouds to put down my philosophy of life – to show that (the success of) my photographs (was) not due to subject matter – not to special trees or faces, or interiors, to special privileges – clouds were there for everyone…” Alfred Stieglitz
“Photography for me is not looking, it’s feeling. If you can’t feel what you’re looking at, then you’re never going to get others to feel anything when they look at your pictures.” – Don McCullin
I've looked at the different suggestions too..
Leave your camera at home.
Take your camera everywhere
Start a project
Do something completely different
Set challenges
I've even given some of that advice too.
But I think, and I thought this yesterday whilst walking, don't try and take amazing award winning shots everytime you press that shutter. Reember why you got into photography, and sometimes just go out and shoot because you enjoy it!
And thats what I did yesterday, and I caught some shots I liked like the 2 old guys, but on the whole nothing hugely jumped out at me! But I have to remind myself that thats okay too. On the positive I got out the house for a walk in the sun (which to not do so on a sunny day is a crime, as my brain tells me); I had my camera with me and I took some shots for the sake of the fact that I enjoy taking shots. I tried different settings and some things worked and other didn't, and thats all okay too.
As a photographer I try to mix what I do in my shots, I've done still life, some macro work, lightpainting and I enjoy a good model shoot. If you'd like to check out any of my other work I'm on Facebook, or you can find me on Instagram under neilru75
Thanks very much for looking
Kind Regards, Neil