Today, I’d like to take a moment to focus on what has really mattered in my life as a photographer.
I’ve been writing a lot of product reviews lately. Like, a lot. This is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because I get first looks at many of the most exciting new technologies being introduced to the market. It’s a curse because, when you’ve been in the photography industry for as long as I have, you’ll know how minor a part gear plays in the overall picture. I’m not talking about the literal pictures. I’m talking about the entire picture of your career or your journey with the art form.
Career-wise, I’m in a very different place than I was when I first started out roughly two decades ago. Heck, I’m in a vastly different place than when I even started writing this column eight years ago. My career has reached heights I never expected. My focus and interests have shifted in ways I couldn’t imagine. There have been ups. And downs. Lots of downs. But, through it all, the ever-changing landscape has helped to keep life interesting.
As I enter yet another phase of my journey, I’ve been spending a lot of time picking through all elements of life. The good and the bad. I do this with all aspects, not just work. I think it’s important to reflect on things that are working and things that are not working. To ask yourself what activities are serving you and which are not. When you make this kind of reflection a regular part of your life, you’re liable to also pick up on another disquieting note. What served you well yesterday might not be serving you at all today. Or vice versa. And you might not even be aware of the existence of the things that will serve you tomorrow. That’s just how life goes. We learn. We grow.
So, rather than drone on about new gear again (don’t worry, gearheads, I still have more reviews coming), I thought I might take a second to identify the many ways in which still photography has served me through the last two decades and offer a bit of gratitude.
Escape
The fact that I felt the need to separately identify “still photography” in the last paragraph is a bit of a clue to my life. I began life as a filmmaker and still identify myself as such. Photography was a gift that came along at a time when I needed it most. It was a time when I had just taken a major swing to advance my filmmaking career that had not panned out at all. In fact, it had left me in mountains of debt and chained to a desk job just to try and get out from under it. I was seriously questioning my purpose in life and, based on the response to that particular project, my own talent.
I didn’t pick up photography as a way to replace my filmmaking. Rather, it arrived on the scene completely by accident after one of many ill-conceived impulse buys resulted in me spending cash I didn’t have on a camera I didn’t need. That camera accidentally ended up being one of the best impulse buys of my life. Suddenly I found my weekends filled up with impromptu photo excursions anywhere I could find a subject worth capturing. I got to know my city in ways I never would have approached had I not had a camera in hand. I met new people. I was introduced to new worlds.
It took my focus away, even if only temporarily, from the struggles of my actual career as a filmmaker. It gave me a way to create art on my own terms. To put whatever was going on in the “real world” aside and escape into the world I was creating within the frame. And…
Money
It gave me a career. Or, I guess, to be more accurate, it gave me a new passion to create my own career. Those photos I was taking for fun very quickly began to generate interest from clients offering me a chance to take photos for money. Not always a lot of money, mind you. But it was a far cry from the negative bank balance I began with when I first purchased my camera in the first place.
I had to correct myself to “create my own career,” because actually making a sustainable living, and doing so by taking the type of images I wanted to make, wasn’t the type of thing any camera purchase could offer. That would require an unspeakable amount of hard work, sacrifice, and focus.
So, more than the money itself, what the turn to photography really gave me was the ability to better understand the balance between art and commerce. Building a career in photography is about way more than being a good photographer. In fact, in my chosen field of advertising photography, being a great photographer is pretty much a bare minimum if you want to compete at the highest level. But to sustain that kind of success, marketing and business management are every bit as important as shutter speed and aperture. Becoming a professional photographer taught me how to run a business, not just be an artist. And that’s a skill that has extended into all areas of my life, regardless of which phase of my existence I currently find myself in.
Identity
This last one is the trickiest. It’s a double-edged sword. Because we live in a capitalistic society, we are trained to base our personal value on the amount of money in our bank account. Even if we consciously decouple ourselves from this concept, it's hard not to at least occasionally fall into the trap of thinking that you are what you do. Doubly so for overly ambitious people like myself.
It’s no mistake that my surge in interest in photography coincided with a low point in my film career. One career was (financially) unsuccessful and, thus, the source of embarrassment and pain. The second, photography, where I found early success financially and creatively, allowed me to root my identity in a success story rather than feel the need to put an asterisk on my career choice and, by extension, my life. Predictably, as that validation grew, so did my interest in photography.
Not to say that any of this is a negative. The accidental escape that soon offered me money had also given me something else I desperately needed at that time: a feeling of self-confidence. I proudly announced myself as a photographer to anyone who would listen. And, this time, I had the awards and campaigns to back it up. In short, photography allowed me to shift my identity from one of struggle to one of success. It helped me to rebuild my self-confidence at a moment when it was beginning to wane.
To be clear, one should not base their identity on financial success or outside validation. This will only lead to disappointment in the long term. But, in that short-term moment, photography was exactly what I needed in order to get my life headed back in a positive direction. It helped to remind me that if you work hard and continue to believe in yourself, you can achieve the life you’re dreaming of. It put me back in control of my own narrative. And, for that, I will be forever grateful.
Okay, that’s it for now. I promise I’ll return to writing up gear reviews and doing brick wall tests for you pixel peepers soon. But I wanted to take a moment to speak to what has actually mattered in my life and in my career behind the camera. Hopefully a few of you will be able to relate.
