Just go out and shoot!

I’m a professional photographer. I make a living from doing what I love. So let me ask you this. Why aren’t I out there shooting? Like right now!

I don’t have a camera in hand because at the moment I am penning a blog, or more rightly chucking 0s and 1s onto my hard drive. And so it goes. I run a photography business with all its supervisory responsibilities, accounting, tax forms, bills to pay and invoices to send, setting up photo adventures for my clients, reading, running workshops, lecturing, researching and doing myriad other things. How about you? How many of you photographers out there, amateurs or pros, find yourself in the same boat? Aha, I can envision you shaking your heads.

I’m luckier than most in that I have an assistant who hammers me over the head if he sees I haven’t lifted my camera in days or, heaven forbid, weeks. My wife begins to avoid my crankiness and urges me to get outside and shoot something… photographically, that is.

Lately I have been doing just that. Even if it’s my backyard or the nearby park, I squeeze time to shoot. Maybe I’ll practice on my go-to camera-lens combo, or try a new technique. Perhaps the sky is threatening so I run down to the Chesapeake Bay near my home for a quick shoot before dinner. Or in the following image, trying out a focus stacking technique, not very successfully!

I find that I need to keep up my skills or I get rusty and sudden challenging photo situations glob up my mind as I struggle to figure out what to do in the excitement of the moment. I hate that feeling and so now I see keeping my photo skills sharp as part of doing business. I am often out on assignment or leading tours for weeks at a time. I have to feel that my equipment is second nature, as close to an organic part of my creativity as it can possibly be.

So, I’m urging you to do the same. Make time to go out and shoot. Hone your skills. Sharpen your photo mind. Try new stuff. Experiment. Bond with your equipment. And, please, stop reading this - NOW -and just go out and shoot!