Abstract Wave Image Moeraki Beach, Otago New Zealand
ORIGINALLY POSTED ON GOOGLE+
I don’t usually give away photo advice – nobody seems to ask for it – and I don’t know if I can articulate the advice that I want to give. Photography for me is a mindset combined with some craft – it is golf with a camera.
At the recent Queenstown Photowalk #qtphotowalk +Scott Kennedy remarked to me that if 25 people are pointing their cameras one way – he will be pointing his the other.
I consider this to be great creative advice, although I apply it metaphorically, rather than literally.
I think that there is a lot to be learned by shooting the really popular photographic scenes – they are a fantastic creative benchmark.
Once you find that you can shoot the big popular scenes as well as your photographic heroes have (euphemistically called emulation – it is actually copying) it is time to move on with your skill set.
After a while you will actually find yourself copying yourself – that gets quite de-motivating. That’s when it is time to :
- Look within the scene
- Look behind the scene
- Twist the scene
- Mess with the scene
- Walk away from the scene
- Find a new scene
The real lesson is to not follow the herd.
This image was made pre-Christmas. I was tired and on a sales trip and my day had ended at the incredibly photogenic Moeraki Boulders http://bit.ly/xEDumk.
I was feeling completely demotivated towards re-shooting the boulders so I drove 2 minutes down the road to another beach and spent an inspirational hour taking nothing but shots of dark waves and dark clouds. It was awesome.
Enjoy.
Cheers – Todd
PS
+Chase Jarvis writes fantastic posts on his blog about creativity – as most of you will be well aware. If not put him in your reading list.
