Photography: Be Inspired!

I’m in a slump. I haven’t been able to shoot anything even remotely remarkable in the past week or so. The scene is great but the lighting is all wrong. The potential is there but I just can’t get the right angle on it. The subject is perfect but I’m rushed. Those conditions can lead to poor images or worse, none. It’s a struggle at times, to keep it fresh and going.

I need inspiration. How do you find inspiration? What is it that gets you out with your camera, creating images that upon view, just really please you? Isn’t it an awesome feeling to have made a photograph that wows you? I know that there are times when the perfect scenario blends into the perfect opportunity which makes a perfect photo. It’s breathtaking when that happens. I take my camera with me everywhere, in anticipation of capturing THAT shot.



I realize that these periods of diminished motivation pass. This too shall pass. I need to stir things up a bit. I recall that in the past, I have forced a change of scenery, whether geographically or mentally.



With a long weekend ahead of me, it would do me good to press the family for a road trip, to Acadia or Baxter, to Camden or Belfast. Day trips have, in the past, provided just enough of a geographical switch to keep me going for some time. Beautiful image feeds beautiful image. Flea markets, ice cream stands, parades always offer something new for my lens to take in.

Sometimes an assignment, even self assigned, can get me to view things a bit differently. The theme for this week at the 365 project is statues http://365project.org/discuss/themes-competitions/809/vote-statues. Pioneer Woman’s assignment for the week is “Coming Home.” http://thepioneerwoman.com/photography/. I’ve wanted to go out to the airport and shoot when the troops come in. I think I’d just cry, though, so perhaps not such a good idea.

I often look to other’s work to find a direction, however short lived, that may take me some where new. The assignments I just mentioned are one way. There are also sites like Flickr, where you can view the “interesting” shots of the past 7 days http://www.flickr.com/explore/. You can look to photographer’s blogs to see what others are up to. This is what my friend Amanda is doing these days. http://www.amandaproutyphotography.blogspot.com/. Miz Boushay is up to this http://booshay.blogspot.com/.

(Okay, now that’s two shots I’ve just seen of daffodils after the bloom. Perhaps the photo gods are trying to tell me to get down in the grass, let the sun shine through the seed heads, let the breeze blow and see what I get. One was even entitled “the clichéd dandelion. I guess this isn’t a new idea.)

My search for inspiration continues. The weekend could prove to be filled with photographic opportunities and I need to recognize them and sieze them. Perhaps I should view it like other things. Once you are aware that there is a problem, you can work to remedy it and find a solution. In this case, the problem is low motivation to photograph.


The solution is to look harder, closer, further, step aside, away, around, bend the light, cover the light, shoot into the light, work the shadows, find the blue, red, yellow, screaming purple and iridescent pink, tackle the texture, the waves, the dew and come out with something amazing.



I would love to hear how you find inspiration.  I have found that it sometimes comes from odd sights and changes in perspective.  That's what I propose.  Give myself a change in perspective.  Maybe even a laugh.