I don’t know about you, but I go on a regular rollercoaster ride as far as being interested in picking up my camera for reasons other than a job. Sometimes I am really into it but other times I just get burned out!

This happened to me a couple of years ago, and I knew I needed a kick in the butt to go out and shoot some work that was not job related.

I had been teaching at Art Center College of Design for over 15 years at that point and really had never taken advantage of the “free class” I get each term while teaching there. Well a good friend of mine, Wynne Wilson, was teaching a portraiture class that term and so I opted to take it.

Not so much to learn something (which, I’m sorry, but you can’t help but learn SOMETHING!) but more to give me assignments to shoot since I was just mentally fried at the time. It was a great experience. It gave me a structure and deadlines by which I had to produce something. It was also just nice to be in a creative environment with little or no stress.

I missed a few classes due to being on location for a couple of jobs but it revitalized me while I was there and I got a few shots that wound up in the portfolio! So overall it was more than worth it.

I even pulled out my 5×7 view camera and made a portrait of my favorite instructor from when I attended Art Center (who was still teaching there) during a class shoot that we had one week.

I say all of this because I think at times we each need to hit the “Reset Button”. That is different for all of us and could even be different for each individual at different times of their life…

But if you think taking a class might just kick you in the butt…. DO IT!

(see also yesterdays entry!!)

One of my assistants made a comment the other day that reminded me of how I used to struggle with imagery for my portfolio. It took me way too many years to figure out something that seems like it should be so amazingly obvious. But because we are more often than not way to close to our own work, I couldn’t see it.

Plain and Simple?

SHOOT WHAT YOU LOVE!!!

In the early half of my career I was obsessed with shooting what I thought people wanted to see in my portfolio, rather than what inspired me. I tried to be all things to all people and anticipate any and every possible scenario. AND… I didn’t get very far.

One day while having a conversation with a colleague, she mentioned how her book was all fashion and portrait and that she was getting all of this product work from agencies. At that moment the light bulb went on and I realized that much of the work I was getting was not representative of what was in my portfolios….

With that realization I thought why am I shooting all of this stuff that really doesn’t interest me, only to have people hire me for completely non-related projects? So I started shooting what I wanted to shoot and what I thought was interesting. And the jobs came. Slowly, but they came. And I came to realize that regardless of how hard you work or how much you try, your passion (or lack thereof) comes through in your imagery. And if people don’t see it, they are not going to hire you. And when you shoot what you are passionate about, folks will see it in your work and will be drawn to it and those of like mind (which are the ONLY people you want to work for ANYWAY) will hire you!

I have confirmed this over and over and have talked with so many others who experience the same. So the moral of the story is simple. Do what you love, and they will come!