It doesn't matter what you do, if you do it well, you will be called talented; people will attribute your good work to a natural ability that you almost definitely do not have. But, not having a built-in talent is a good thing.
Although I am a fan of Aidin Robbins and enjoy and share his videos, my clicking of his most recent video — the one above — was akin to confirmation bias. In this video, Robbins discusses how talent is not what gets anyone anywhere, and moreover, presuming it is, can be dangerous to your progress.
I had often wondered over the years how much of a role "talent" plays. After all, some people are naturally better suited to some tasks than others, a point I'm not sure Robbins agrees with me on. That is, some people are more creative, some more logical, and so on. However, talent is never enough to achieve real success in a field, and on that point, we agree. My outlook on talent and work ethic changed almost entirely after I read one of the most important and impacting books on my life: Talent Is Overrated by Geoff Colvin. This well-researched and brilliantly written book has become something of a classic in its genre, and for good reason: it shows how talent on its own isn't enough to explain success.
I don't want to touch too much on Colvin's work as it's well worth your time hearing or reading his own words, but the premise of the book is summarized nicely when Colvin writes, "Great performance is in our hands far more than most of us ever suspected." Even the greatest performers you revere in any given area have put untold amounts of work into their chosen craft, and talent is only a supplementary part of a much larger journey.
A quote I saw on a sports hall wall stated "Skill is the ratio of intention to outcome". I have reached the conclusion that "aptitude", a word less loaded than "talent", describes the relationship between effort expended and skill aquired. The third piece of the puzzle is "motivation" to expend effort which is impacted by the behavioural modifiers described by Operant and Classical conditioning (As a dog owner I am sure you see these in action every day).
Yes, like when you have a musician who has been practicing for hours every day since early childhood, and people attribute their ability to talent. Mozart was a very rare exception.
Inborn talent will only get you so far. Eventually, without the proper skills, you will hit a wall that you can never get past. This is the truth with any endeavor.
Put enough time, effort and thought into an instrument and you will find a nuisance. Whether it's a guitar, piano, paint brush, camera, light or even a wrench, you will find something unique or even interesting.
That fall though! =P Thanks for keeping that in! Great video
I agree that talent is never enough to achieve success and there are many really talented people believing it is and refusing to learn/develop their skills further. It's a saddening thing to see, actually, because in the times of various Youtube videos and countless Photoworks/Photoshop/Lightroom related tutorials or online courses learning is easier than ever but many just fall behind thinking they don't need it.
When you do not consider yourself talented or do not have many people tell you that everything comes to you from hard work and it always pays off.
I think there are two things that get intermixed in such discussions. First is: can you sucseed (build a career) without a talent? The answer to this question is definitely yes. If you work hard and you have at least some aptitude you can sucseed. But to make something really unique, to reach level of masters (HKB and such) you must have talent. You have to be born with it to become a true artist, not a craftsman.And when you see real art you immediately understand that it different from "just good photos" becaue it's the vision, not technique that makes an art.