Do you ever get those moments....

gothgirl

gothgirl

Suspended / Banned
Messages
1,589
Edit My Images
Yes
Do you ever get those moments where your photos are just not coming out the way you want them to?

And you get so demotivated that you have to go back over your porfolio to look at some of the photos you're happy with,
just to reassure yourself that you are actually capable of taking good photos ?

I'm having one of those weeks where I'm just not happy with any of my shots, because I KNOW I can do better.
 
Yes, and at various points in my career it has been better or worse.

Very recently I was spending a ton of time building out my website & trying to expand my presence on the internet - not really "want to take better shots" per se but it's similar - and I found I was losing interest in photography. I pinned it down to spending more time writing about it or shooting review images for gear than out shooting for me!

Since then I've started a new Fifty Two weeks project, a great way to kick start creativity and generate focus.

I think at one stage or another we all wonder if we've peaked!
 
No.
 
I just have the odd moment where my photographs DO come out the way I want them to....
 
gothgirl said:
Do you ever get those moments where your photos are just not coming out the way you want them to?
Click to expand...

in 35+ years of taking photographs, I think I've actually been happy with 3 of them. That's 3 frames BTW, not 3 years worth of shooting.

Really aught to find some other hobby really.
 
Last edited:
TheBigYin said:
in 35+ years of taking photographs, I think I've actually been happy with 3 of them. That's 3 frames BTW, not 3 years worth of shooting.

Really aught to find some other hobby really.
Click to expand...

The problem with taking a really good picture is that the pictures you took before suddenly all look worse and then you feel worse. So, all in all I think it's maybe better to never take a good photo. I took one once, and immediately deleted it.
 
My favourite photo of all I've ever taken is technically very, very bad. Blown highlights, harsh lighting and a very cluttered scene.

Why is it my favourite? Because it is a portrait of my uncle, who had been very seriously ill in hospital for months with parkinsons, when he was allowed out for the day to mark my late father's birthday. He looks very frail and dishevelled in the photo but there's a defiant, steely look in his eye that reminds me of my father and it gets me every time I look at it.

Thankfully he's better now and is living back at his home but yes, sometimes "bad" photos can be the best, and vice versa.
 
Last edited:
It's a great question. For many years I quite often had the same problem and never understood why.

I finally learned what the problem was in my case: I didn't know how I wanted them to come out before I took them. I was just seeing "something that I liked" and taking a picture of it. Now I've learned to ask myself "why do I like that?" and more importantly "what can I do compositionally and photographically to really emphasise that feeling?".

This may not be the answer in your case but it did help me. In retrospect it seems blindingly obvious that only once you've a vision in your head for what you want them to come out like, will you get them 'coming out the way you want them to'. And you won't see that vision just by putting the viewfinder to your eye - you need it in your mind's eye first.
 
gothgirl said:
Do you ever get those moments where your photos are just not coming out the way you want them to?

And you get so demotivated that you have to go back over your porfolio to look at some of the photos you're happy with,
just to reassure yourself that you are actually capable of taking good photos ?

I'm having one of those weeks where I'm just not happy with any of my shots, because I KNOW I can do better.
Click to expand...

Absolutely!

Recently I took a break from my gig photography, and picked up my teles to shoot some wildlife like I used to. Lots.

It turns out if you don't practise, you tend to start to suck at something, which considering what I know I have done in the past... sucks. So I'm getting there.

Last couple of weeks I shot a couple of gigs again. After a break. Remembered that thing about not practising...

So yea, I get what you say about feeling like my photos aren't coming out the way I want. Indeed, This week I have mostly reprocessed old ones!
 
It doesn't help that I've been confined to indoors , which means using my 18-55

When my 55-250 always takes better shots as it's the better glass
 
Imagical said:
I finally learned what the problem was in my case: I didn't know how I wanted them to come out before I took them. I was just seeing "something that I liked" and taking a picture of it. Now I've learned to ask myself "why do I like that?" and more importantly "what can I do compositionally and photographically to really emphasise that feeling?".
Click to expand...

While Pre-Visualisation of the final image CAN be a route to becoming happier with your shots, and it is the way I work, for pretty much all my "half serious" stuff - either still life work or landscape type shooting (I try not to shoot things that either move or have a pulse - as they get bored with how slow I am in setting up - I've spent over a hour just choosing the right spot to place the tripod before now... then add in faffing around with the film camera, lightmeter and all the other impedimenta, and no normal human being is going to sit around for that duration - and most animals would have wandered off to pastures new as well) - but I STILL don't get the final image to come out like it did in my minds eye. I'm not saying it's not a perfectly acceptable image, it's just that where everyone else sees the whole image, all I can ever see are the faults in it.

It's not exclusive to photography though - it's just a character defect in me. When I refurbished my Bike-Cave (a small room at the back of the kitchen, where I store my bikes, and all the stuff that's needed to keep them running ok) I stripped the walls back to bare brick, moved the electrical fittings around to exactly the right location to fit with the eventual decor, re-plastered all the walls, put down new flooring, painted, decorated and installed custom cabinetry to accomodate all my tools and equipment. Everyone who saw it said it looked great - some even said how much it'd have added to the value of the house compared to the mess it was before. But all I can see is the fact that I didn't get the plaster on one of the walls completely even and flat, and it shows in one corner that the wall throws "in and out" a bit. Oh - and that on another wall there's a couple of float-marks that I didn't quite get rid of before painting - because I rushed finishing the job and was working in electric light rather than daylight. I'm a detail obsessive. It can be a good thing, say if I worked in the Nuclear or Space industries, but it's sometimes a hard thing to live with being.
 
TheBigYin said:
in 35+ years of taking photographs, I think I've actually been happy with 3 of them.

Really aught to find some other hobby really.
Click to expand...

3 years worth of photos is a bleedin lot to be happy with! :exit:
 
Photo's, no not really. If I'm not happy with them, I usually know why and what to do better next time. Its not life and death any more, only a hobby!

One of those moments.....oh yes I'm not dead yet! Its just that they dont last very long now, and sometimes by the time I've remembered what its for, its past and gone!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top