a co-worker friend of mine asked me to shoot his reception this last Saturday. it was a fantastic experience, and it reaffirmed my intentions of not becoming a people photographer. i do not have anything against people, it is the amount of work that it takes which is insane! it was the first time my hand was CRAMPING towards the end, my camera battery started to run out, i had 25 photographs left on the card (with almost 700 shot), 2 sets of batteries for the Nikon flash (SB800) have ran out (*) and i was exhausted. (wow, Firefox 2.0 spell check is AWESOME!!).
it was great fun, and i am eternally and immeasurably glad i have had the chance to experience this.
one of his friends wanted to talk to me about taking some family portraits. i am not sure if i want to do that.
i do feel that i want to become a) product photographer b) art photographer c) journal photographer? (as long as it is not journalist – tried that, and its FUN but, MAN it takes over your life like nothing else. i guess maybe that’s not that terrible).
opinions, guys? where do i move from here?
(*) the flash is awesometastic, but eats batteries too damn fast. i expected it to last a night on one set! but it is still awesome. if i ever DO move up to a studio i am getting 3 of those, instead of those vivitars. it is genius in terms of calculating output, etc.
It would seem obvious that your pasion for traveling and photography can and perhaps should merge. The only downside (if you can call it one) is that you’re away from home a hell of a lot and your time in locations isnt the same as the time in them when you’re not working. For example, you have tight schedules and trips become more work than a vacation, if you will. It’d still be awesome, though.
Product photographer is cool, but i think you’ll grow tired of it rather soon. It seems rather limited when compared to the other choices.
Art photographer seems general and vast. You’ll be sure to find lots of material and scenarios that work with it, so it seems cool.
And journal…..but not journalist……kinda like food…….but without nutrients…. Not really sure what you mean by that, though.
And yes, i imagine that shooting a wedding is hell. Can you believe that I was offered a job to be a children’s photographer? A bunch of people here saw a few shots I took of my cousin and they offered me the job. I’d have to be the photographer that goes to the school and takes pics of the kids. I imagine getting fired from that job within 2 weeks. “Now look over here…..now sit upright…..UPRIGHT! YOU FETUS! I SAID UPRIGHT! I WILL SLAP YOU BACK TO DAYCARE!”
i think you should continue trying different styles of photography, i.e. product and such, and see if it’s something you would want to do every day. cause you’ve done a lot of it as a hobby type thing, but professionally it will feel different (you know what i mean).
journal photographer meaning like national geographic type stuff? that would be awesome but sounds very hard to get into. you could try sending photos to smaller mags like explore or other more specialized places. but i think this one would be the most interesting.
and you better not have been using regular 99-cent alkaline batteries for the flash.
yup you definitely have to do what you love. photography is the kind of job you do because you enjoy it, not because of the money. you can really see a certain lack of something in the work of photographers who do it just for the money. on the other hand, sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do as a “sacrifice” so you can spend the majority of your time doing what you love. just make sure the balance is right :)
it’s so awesome that you’re moving towards making photography your job! like wow
aaand lets see some photos from the weekend!
oh and if you get a studio, don’t bother with those little camera-mounted flashes. get proper studio strobes so you can have modeling light and modifiers like softboxes and grids.