Photographic Mindset

I do. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It just might be the pathway, the portal, to shooting more interesting, compelling, and non-cliche images.

I remember being a senior in college and visiting the career placement office in the hopes of finding my destiny-a professional job. While there I and other classmates were told that job offers came in for students at a ratio of 1 job offer per 20 applications submitted.  What is interesting about ratios is that the ratio simply holds over time; upon acceptance of a job, the student will have submitted 20 applications for each offer.  That meant we might have to submit 40 applications before receiving 2 offers, or 60 applications before receiving 3.  The placement officer encouraged us to not take rejection letters personally and instead to collect them thereby marking our steps toward our job.

I took the advice to heart and collected my rejection letters.  If the ratio held true, as he promised, I would eventually receive a job-I just needed to submit enough applications.  So I collected each rejection as a badge of honor and used them to wallpaper my room, each one getting me one step closer to my goal.

The same can be said of cliched photographs.  I once heard somewhere that we all have 10,000 cliched images in us that we need to get out before we really begin to find our voice with the camera.  We all shoot our feet at some point; we all take self portraits in the mirror; we all take pictures of our coffee cups; and the flowers we bought and put in a vase; and the empty road in the middle of nowhere; and the moon; and the sunset.  It’s not that they’re bad images, per se.  They’re not.  You like them.  You took them.  Heck, we all took them at some point.  So enjoy them.  The only problem is that nearly everyone takes those images, so they’ve become cliche.  And to break out of cliche images as a photographer is challenging, takes hard work and discipline, and endurance!  We have to get those shots out of our system.  Our soul, so to speak, has to get used to speaking through our photographic medium and perhaps those cliched images are the vocabulary lessons.  Eventually the soul will catch on and amazing stuff will come out.

So don’t despair if you continue to shoot cliches, so-called snapshots.  We all do!  It just means we are one step closer to breaking through to using that camera in really creative ways and speaking in a really unique and personal voice.  Instead, join me in wallpapering your room with them (well, you wallpaper your room and I’ll wallpaper mine…), showing them off like badges of honor; one step closer.  And unlike my college dorm room, it will be pretty cool to look at.

It is said that change is the only constant.  A whimsical, paradoxical, and wise statement that.  And it is worth paying attention to.  Changes have crept into my photography and my creativity without my awareness, and I pride myself on some measure of self-awareness!

But it has happened and I am now able to take some stock and do something about it.  You see, my available time for photographing has dwindled significantly due to family and work constraints and I find most of my photographic opportunities centering around settings that require continuous servo focusing and fast shutter speeds: photographing my fast moving children.  At the same time I switched from shooting mostly in jpeg mode to using the Camera RAW format in order to have greater creative control in the digital darkroom.  And furthermore I switched from primarily using PhotoShop to using Lightroom to edit my images.  All of these shifts have changed how I work through my creative process and as a result have impacted my creative output.

Oops.  It is no wonder my creative satisfaction is down.  It is no wonder I am not really happy with the results of my photography.  No longer do images taken in black and white on my camera arise the same way on my monitor; camera RAW always shows up in color.  It is the raw, unprocessed (therefore not converted to black and white) image.  And I am less comfortable converting to black and white in Lightroom than I was in Photoshop, so I was drawn to creating images with a very different look.  As a result I created images that fit within my post-processing comfort range.  There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, it is just that the images don’t satisfy what my heart wants to convey.  And that is the rub, of art at least.

I’ve also found myself wanting more and more gear; a sure sign, at least for me, that something is stagnant.  If I don’t feel like I have something to point my camera toward, what makes me think a it will suddenly arise before a new lens, new camera, or be drawn out of a WaCom tablet (ooooh but the lord knows I want one of those!!)

So, what is missing?  I have been asking myself this question and waiting for the answer to arise.  I have also been trying different things.  I am basically searching out what my muse, that creative energy, wants.  And slowly, as I ask and make time to hear the answer, it has been coming.  More black and whites images, fewer cliched images, and more stuff that “feels right.”  One does, after all, have to pay attention to the muse; she’s pretty cold hearted if you turn a deaf ear.

(c) 2009 Brian E. Miller Photography

The other day I remarked during one of my posts that I was struggling a bit with inspiration. Family life and work commitments can sometimes (rightly, in my book) interfere with one’s movement toward creativity. They can squash inspiration. These times are difficult for the creative. Given to so much inspiration over the course of our days we can be stymied when inspiration fails to arise. What do we do now? This is strange territory and we can become confused and disoriented.

But all is not lost. We are not necessarily doomed to a inspiration-less existence, although it might feel that way. Much as the rhythm of breathing in and out (inspiration and expiration) this flow of creative juices might be going through its regular cycle and the flow of inspiration is sure to return just as each out-breath is followed by another in-breath.

But what to do in the meantime?

Well, this is where those creatives who have met success separate themselves from those that do not. This is the time to work.

I recently read a quote by Shin’ichi Suzuki, founder of the Suzuki Method for learning violin and proponent of humankind’s talent potential in which he said, “I want to make good citizens.  If a child hears fine music from the day of his birth and learns to play it himself, he develops sensitivity, discipline and endurance.  He gets a beautiful heart.”  I agree with this sentiment and would expand it to include all art forms for, after all, art is not just for seeing or hearing; it is for feeling.

So why this quote at this time?  Well, if we are artists and photographers and we are moved by something either inside of ourselves or outside of ourselves to create something we consider beautiful, then we have the sensitivity part down.  Perhaps what we now need to work on is the discipline and endurance.  Discipline is born of doing what we know we must despite not wanting to, and endurance is born of discovering that we can do something much longer than we had previously imagined.  Suzuki knew, from personal experience, that learning the violin is difficult and requires the development of the ability to practice more days than not despite not wanting to: discipline.  He also knew that learning the violin means hanging in there long enough to learn it, which itself is longer than the student had imagined at the outset, mostly because it is a life-long process: endurance.  He also knew that the requirements for learning the violin were also exactly what learning the violin would teach and these are beneficial in life.

I believe Suzuki’s thoughts are directly applicable to photography and these times of decreased inspiration are precisely the times when the development of discipline and endurance are developed.  And this looks like work.  There is a well known saying that goes something like, “success is a mix of inspiration and perspiration; 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.”  Well, this is perspiration time.  Much like a violinist will practice scales, fingering technique, and other rudimentary building blocks of the art form, so too must the photographer return to basics.  If you shoot more by natural light, learn the ins and outs of flash photography.  If you tend to shoot with wide apertures, begin to explore smaller apertures and deeper depths of field.  If you tend to shoot crisp and tightly focused images, try shooting something softer, or with slower shutter speeds, and even intentionally (gasp!) blurry.  Sit down and learn a new editing software, backup your images, update your website.  Go nuts and bolts on your photography, train your technique; from shooting to post processing to printing, train your technique so it becomes second nature and when inspiration begins to flow from the muse again you are so dialed you don’t have to think about technique anymore.  Then, much like Suzuki’s young students, the beauty of the photograph can be communicated through the emotional connection to the image and you can play with feeling again.

(c) 2009 Brian E. Miller Photography

Over and over, as I read books and blogs by photographers, I come across the word “vision.”  That’s not odd; photography is a visual medium.  I equally often encounter the term “openness” and this gives me pause.

Photography is an interesting art form.  Unlike painting, or drawing, or sculpting, or making music, there is a pervasive view among photographers that the art is “out there” and we must go “capture” it and we must be “open” to the external environment to do so.  Is that true?  Is our art really outside of us?  Stop for a moment and think about your approach to photographing; is what you are trying to say with photography “out there?”

What if it isn’t true?  What if photography were, like most creativity, actually and inward-looking pursuit?

It seems many of the successful photographers spend quite a bit of time discussing vision. One particular modern photographer (David duChemin) even released the third book in his Vision Trilogy this past July.  He spends a lot of time writing, speaking, giving interviews, and teaching people to develop their vision in their photography.  Another well known modern photographer (Trey Ratcliff, aka painting and drawing, often a decidedly inward looking pursuit, in order to advance his photography.  Yet another encourages his readers to “look to the writers,”  Do these professional and highly capable photographers know something, either consciously or not, that the rest of us do not?  Is this perhaps what separates the professional photographer from the amateur; is this what separates the “professional” artist from the amateur? (And I am using the term “professional” in the way author Steven Pressfield does in his wonderful book “The War of Art” as a mindset, not in terms of vocation.)

Lately I have slowed down my photography.  I have taken an artistic pause, as it were.  I am no longer posting every image on Flickr or on this blog.  I have become more intentional.  I have begun to ask myself, “what am I trying to say with this image?”  It is not that there need be a specific message in each image but rather I am asking myself what the theme of the image is.  I am attempting to discover what moves me about the image.  I am looking inward to see if the image is in line with who I am, what I hope to be, who I hope to be, and what my experience is.  You see, I want to present images to the viewer with intentionality and I think that intentionality is born from something deep within me, beyond words, which might be pointed to by my image.  I want to move something within the viewer that perhaps makes them think, “yes, yes, I know how that feels.”  And so the process of inward-looking has to match up with outward-looking (or vision, in my mind) to create intentional art.  I am not always successful, but when I am I think I produce better work, both for myself and for the viewer.

What do you do to become more open to the meeting of your internal experience and the outward, or external, representation of it?  If you are having some difficulty with this photographically pick up a copy of David duChemin’s new book, “Vision and Voice” where he maps out a workflow in photographic post-production to help you tell your story and express your vision through photography.

(c) 2010 Brian E. Miller Photography

I don’t think I’m all that different from others when it comes to photography, motivation, and inspiration.  I like to look at photography books, browse the web, click through Flickr, flip through National Geographic Magazine; I get inspired and motivated by all the amazing images, especially those from distant and exotic locales.  These images draw me to my camera wanting to make similarly themed images.  That can be a problem.

You see, I realized something yesterday evening as I watched an episode of Art Wolfe’s “Travels to the Edge” series on PBS: he travels far (and I mean very far) and wide to capture those stunning images of Bhutan, Nepal, Tibet, Patagonia, India, etc.  And I want to do the same, although without endless hours in an SUV over bad roads.  But I am constrained in my travels and wanderings by having a young family, something I would never trade for Wolfe’s lifestyle.  And that leaves me constrained photographically if I want to photograph exotic locales.  So, what to do?

Well, there is an old adage that says “happiness doesn’t come from getting what you want; happiness comes from wanting what you’ve got.”  Easier said than done, but that doesn’t diminish the truth in the statement.  And I think this adage applies to photography as well.  If you cannot go photograph what you want, go photograph what you have available.  For me, this means my kids, my wife, my backyard, and whatever stuff I have hanging around the house.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love photographing my kids.  But I have often considered those images snapshots and not really what I want to be communicating with my photography.  However,  I have learned a lot about photography by simply snapping images of my kids.  I’m much faster at setting my camera settings (I shoot a Nikon D300 which means I can’t just pop it on full-auto and snap away;  I have to manually set ISO, metering system, auto focus system, etc.) in order to keep up with a fast moving toddler, in changing light, in often messy environments.  I am also learning to work under direction more as my wife often prompts me to take “this shot”, “that way”, in “this setting”.  After watching an episode where Art Wolfe shows the production team at work behind the scenes I realize this ability might come in handy for me if I ever reach the same status.

I am also honing my post processing skills.  All the tips suggested by professional photographers on how to enhance images in the wet or digital darkroom still apply, even if the image is of a 2 year old messily eating the season’s first tomato.  I sit at my computer and ask myself, “what am I attempting to convey in this image?” “what is the theme here?” “how can I improve this image to draw the eye where I want it to go?” “what can I do to minimize the distractions in the frame, or eliminate them altogether?”

I may not be photographing Tibetan Buddhist monks performing prostrations in a monastery high in the Himalayas, the mountains of Torres del Paine in Patagonia, or classic American cars in Havana, but I am practicing my skills and my craft by shooting what I’ve got.  And that will make all the difference when I unfold myself out of the back of an SUV after a long bumpy ride, on bad roads, to someplace distant, and exotic.

(c) 2010 Brian E. Miller Photography

Last week I posted a blog post where I introduced my first photographic gig and how I felt and what I learned about the process.  In the post (which you can find here) I mentioned how nervous I was about the shoot and that my greatest fear was that my brother (who asked me to do the shoot) and others would now finally discover me for the hack that I am.

Coincidentally I had dinner that evening with my neighbor and told her about the post.  My neighbor, a published and popular author, stared at me, a little shocked, and said, “that’s exactly what I feel every time I send a manuscript to my publisher!”  We had a good laugh together, and we also commiserated.  Such is the life of a creative.

Being our own worst critics we often live in fear.  Fear that we aren’t good enough.  Fear, because we aren’t good enough, that we’ll be found out, exposed, that (well, in her case) we’ll lose our livelihood.  So each day, and especially when that project deadline looms, we must rise and face our fear.  We must create in spite of it.  That is incredibly difficult and is often the cause of many creative ventures coming to a grinding halt, or not ever being begun in the first place.

I wonder if there isn’t another way to look at this fear.  Is it not possible that we feel this fear because we know we are not the ones that create?  Is it possible we have indeed been imposters when passing off our creativity as strictly our own?  And therefore, feeling like we’ve taken credit for something not fully of our own doing, we fear being discovered?  An interesting psychological twist.

Author Elizabeth Gilbert has an interesting take on this phenomenon and finds relief and comfort in it. In Gilbert’s mind the inspiration for creativity comes from a spiritual place and while that can be the locus for the fear (after all, if creativity comes from the muse and I am just the vehicle, then perhaps I really am a hack!) it can also provide a sense of security.  Sure, we go through the motions; we sit and write; we press the shutter release button, process, and print our images; we apply the paint to canvas in our own way; but the inspiration to create a work of art comes not from us but rather the muse, or what the ancient Greeks called the genius.  The way she looks at it it doesn’t matter whether the art is successful or not because it that is not really our responsibility; that is the purview of the muse.  We are simply responsible for showing up and going through the mechanics of mixing paint, putting black on white, and pressing the shutter release.  We need to show up for the work and perhaps pray the muse shows up as well. And in being free of the responsibility to be “creative”, we are free to do the work without pretending, and without the fear of being discovered as an imposter.

Elizabeth Gilbert is a writer and author who had moderate success until she faced a life crisis, bore her soul on the page, and wrote a book (“Eat, Pray, Love”) that became wildly popular around the world.  Her thoughts about nurturing creativity come out of the challenge she faced having to write a book that would follow such rampant success.  Her thesis is available for viewing from the good folks at TED here.

(c) 2010 Brian E. Miller Photography

I know a person who owns a very nice camera.  It’s quite expensive.  But he does not take it out with him to make photographs, even when on vacation, for fear that he might damage it or it might get stolen.  It seems to me that he loves his gear more than he loves making images.  I have another friend who takes her equally expensive camera everywhere she goes.  It is always out of its bag, shutter clicking away, in all kinds of weather.  Seems to me she loves making images far more than she loves her gear.

This is something we all face at some point if we do something for the enjoyment of it.  We have to choose which we love more: the activity or the gear that is used in making that activity.  I’ve seen people struggle with this choice in sports, art, leisure activities, etc.  To be sure we often spend lots of money on the gear but something is lost, in my eyes at least, when we make it more precious than what it is meant to produce.  In cycling I’ve seen racers lose races for fear of damaging their bicycle and in the above example…well, that speaks for itself.  I understand valuing the gear, but should we do so at the expense of the experience or the art?

At some point, I suppose, we have to ask ourselves if we are willing to risk our equipment in service of our art: our life.  A well known photographer, David duChemin, likes to say “gear is good, vision is better.”  With that in mind, can you put your gear in service of your vision?  And if so, might you be willing to risk sacrificing your gear in service of your vision?

Note: The image above was taken while my 23 month old son and I explored a back alley near a coffee shop in our town.  If ever there is a risk to expensive photographic equipment, using it around a young child is it.  But you know, I wouldn’t trade any of the images I have made while spending time with him for the safety of my camera.  The camera is replaceable; the images and the memories are not.

(c) 2010 Brian E. Miller Photography

I just watched an episode of TED Talks featuring happiness expert and social psychologist, and author of “Stumbling upon Happiness,” Dan Gilbert wherein he describes the unique ability of the human brain to create happiness despite logical reasons not to.  He calls this “created” happiness (the happiness found despite bad stuff happening in one’s life and even as a result of bad stuff happening in one’s life) “Synthetic Happiness.” This synthetic happiness, he claims (and his experiments appear to bear out) arises out of limited choices in one’s life. That essentially, a person will develop a sense of happiness, at least with regard to specific aspects of their lives, equal to or surpassing another’s happiness if they are given fewer choices and most especially when choices are irreversible.

This is interesting stuff. Watch the video here for Dan Gilbert’s 21 minute explanation of this fascinating psychological construct.  After watching this I started to think: how does this apply to the creative person? What are the implications for the person drawn to artistic and creative pursuits? Well, I think it has direct implications? I’ll use an example from my own life to illustrate the dilemma.

When I first moved to Albuquerque from New York City, a friend who had moved here several years prior commented on the risk of living in an environment so conducive to outdoor pastimes.  She explained that there were almost too many possibilities each day: snowshoeing, cycling, skiing, hiking, backpacking, mountain biking, etc. She would often find herself stymied by which activity to undertake on any given day and would often find herself stuck at home unable to make a choice between several desirable possibilities.

The same is often true with the creative. When facing the blank page, when facing the prepped canvas, the writer or painter have infinite possibilities. The same is true for the photographer; lots of gear, many lenses, strobes, reflectors, barn doors, gobos, etc. can sometimes (or even often) lead to an inability to get started. What helps overcome this stymie-ness is the making of what Gilbert calls an “irreversible” choice. In my example above, my friend eventually suggested I get up and do the first activity that came to mind, regardless of whether it was the perfect choice or another equally good choice popped in my head.  She recommended making an irreversible decision to undertake the first activity I thought of.

In photographic terms this means grabbing gear, whatever gear, and heading out the door to shoot. We might lament the choice we’ve made for a moment, but once stuck with the limited gear we will produce something and actually become happy with it. Yes, we could have shot the subject differently with a wide angle lens, or a macro, or a telephoto, or whatever.  But it seems like we are able to accept the loss of the “possible” shot if we’ve committed, irreversibly, to our gear and what we can do with it rather than if we bring all our gear with us and then use it all in an attempt to get the perfect shot.  Or worse yet, not leave the house due to the overwhelming difficulty in deciding which equipment would be perfect for the day.

So what does this mean in our daily life as photographers? Well, it means that our creativity and our happiness with the results is bolstered, upheld, perhaps even dependent upon making an irreversible choice regarding our gear, the location, the timing, etc. Essentially, the psychology of this creative process calls for us to adhere to Nike’s famous maxim of “just do it.” Grab your camera, any camera, any lens, and walk out the door and do it! Commit to some project, any project, and see it through. Your happiness with the outcome of the project is dependent on your irreversible commitment to it, not on the quality or quantity of gear that you take along.  I would encourage you to grab your camera, with the lens it currently has attached, and head outside with just that equipment and go make photographs.  Your happiness might just depend on it.

And please share.  What images did you make?  Post them on Flickr, or Facebook, or whatever and post a link to them in the comments below.  I can’t wait to see what you come up with.