Going through phases...?

elven

I noticed up at the botanics yesterday that I was drawn more and more to groups of flowers, rather than the individual flower macro that I was previously fond of shooting. I'm also currently rather fond of much paleness, which is a bit of a contrast to both my dark shots and the bright, contrasty stuff.

Does anyone else notice they get the inclination to shoot in a different way, depending on their mood/the weather/the season, etc etc etc...?

There must be something inside us that determines the very first creative decision we make - choosing a subject - and the rest follows on from there, I suppose.

Sorry, just balancing up the huge amount of 'which camera should I buy' threads...

440Hz

Absolutely, I find this happens to me all the time. Right now I seem to be have a black and white flower phase!! Which is a regular one for me. Im not really sure what instigates these phases, I guess I just feel drawn to certain subjects at various times. I usually find that I shoot flowers when Im having a photo drought, which is most of the time, hehe. It must be some intrinsic sense we have to satisfy our mood with "our art". I find the same with music, as Im sure most people do. I'll go through blues phases when I'm feeling pensive which is a fairly obvious connection. But then there are times when the association seems less obvious, like I find if Im feeling very sad about something I usually some arias or art songs which don't require much feeling at all, which I find a bit odd, for me anyway.

I guess I go through phases with photography in the same way, even though most of the time I dont understand them. If I think about it now, i think I tend to go for opposites, maybe I do the same with music. I go through beach phases in winter, mountain phases in spring and droughts in summertime!! heeeheee!

I think you are totally correct Julie, but I also think that sometimes, there just are no explanations for these phases, its just something inside that comes out in way we don't really expect it to I guess.

rymus

elven wrote:

Sorry, just balancing up the huge amount of 'which camera should I buy' threads...

Thank God... that saves me having to do a hugely messy megamerge.. I hardly ever find myself altering the way I shoot... Primarily I suppose because I'm becoming set in my ways and increasingly grumpy about trying/learning/doing new things as the years fly by. Possibly, and only possibly mind you.. the weather and season will have influence on your mood and frame of mind so that'll have some affect.

If our environments didn't constantly change our perception, then surely all art would be somewhat similar? Also, and at least for those landscape/macro (generally outdoorsy) photographers, the weather and seasons will change the environment, which will then in turn change your perception of that environment... Presumably...

elven

You said the "A" word! Sshhhhh!

I see your stuff having gone darker and more sinister recently, now I come to think of it. I won't comment on the relationship between that and signing up for a huge mortgage, though

rymus

well... me being left handed does entitle me to be sinister

Maybe I'm just in a darker than normal mood lately. I don't think the mortgage has anything to do with it, more being screwed around by the various utilities :mad:

ThOnda

Photography as a creative art is way how you express yourself, your feelings and your vision of the world into some product. In your occasion it is picture (on display or in print).
If you hadn't had difference stages and moods, you would be dead or you'd be producing trade junk always in the same way, very predictable and very boring for us on Boards :-)
At least you can find here some excuses for your unpredictalbe behaviour ;-)

gandalf

Well tbh what is effecting my photos is my lack of time and taking up Airsoft as a hobby, so at the moment I am combining the two. (Although Airsoft is taking away alot of the new lens fund!!)



Normal service should be resumed mid September after all the moves etc have been sorted.

rymus

going a bit Willie O'Dea there on us gandalf

leinsterman

Thank heavens your back ... I was beginning to worry we were doomed to only having "what kit" threads to discuss ... we missed the Friday thread ... honest

In my case I rarely get to do the things that inspired me to take up photography ... especially lately ... the upshot of this is I'm not getting enough time to shoot the things I like most ... i.e. travel and culture ... so I've noticed my work has suffered as a consequence of a lack of an inspirational environment (or perhaps more appropriately too much familiarity of the environment I'm living in) ... most of the images I've produced this year have not really worked out for me ... this is quite frustrating ... on the good side I defintely feel my ability as a photographer has improved as a result of hangin out with the boards crew ... but the images I am producing have been somewhat random and largely uninspiring ... with the exception of some portrait work ... I need a mission, theme or a project to give me better focus ...

Hopefully a weekend at Valentia's summer place on the island of the same name will serve as a shot in the arm inspriationally ... plus there is a possible business trip to Montreal the following week ... but I'm planning a trip to India and Nepal in November to sort out the wider issues ... this is what really gets my creative juices going ...

gandalf

rymus wrote:

going a bit Willie O'Dea there on us gandalf

Take that back, I have never grown a moustache !!!

rymus

Well... I was going to say "Full Metal Jacket" but I'd consider comparing someone to Willie is ever so slightly the lesser of two insults

Muineach

For some reason I'm stuck with setting up really "dark" (mostly black) shots for macro's, before that I was stuck on bird's (avian type)

Borderfox

I find I go in cycles, at the weekend I was working for other people shooting showjumping, all day Saturday and Sunday. By the time I got to Monday I was on my way in to work and stopped near the Crown Plaza in Santry and took some shots of the lovely park they have there and it cleared out all the cobwebs from the weekend and I felt fresh again. Its really nice up there by the way, well worth a visit. Nice shot Gandalf

Calina

Welcome back.

I find things tend to go in cycles a little bit. Also, I think - given you've been on holiday - this tends to have an impact on how you look at the world...I know mine has changed a bit in the past few days (seriously) although I haven't taken a photographs since I got off the beach on Friday evening.

Sometimes I think it's just like a spring lever - you go away and look at something different if only to give you a different perspective on your...how do I put this - bread and butter stuff, you know the stuff you can reliably do.

elven

Calina wrote:

Welcome back.

Why, thankya I see you've been gallavanting as well!

Calina wrote:

You go away and look at something different if only to give you a different perspective on your...how do I put this - bread and butter stuff, you know the stuff you can reliably do.

You have to go away to realise what you wanted was where you started - Paulo Coelho, 'The Alchemist'. Indeedy.

Calina

Considered picking up that book in Portuguese as part of my "how hard can it be to learn Portuguese" and then decided the problem with Portuguese was aural rather than written.

It's an interesting concept though. Does this mean you'll be back at single details sometime soon as soon as you've exploited the groups of flowers enough?

Fajitas!

I really really just want to shoot fashion at the moment.

I find that my processing goes through the most phrases though. At the moment, am loving the cross processed work, but going for blues rather than the usual greens and yellows. And also going for very lightly saturated photographs as opposed to B&W, which I'm finding quite annoying at the moment.

Must be the new lens.

thebaz

in a word -- Yes

I think i want to re-invent myself , stick more to the rules , that i so hate , be less random -- last week i fealt like packing the whole thing in, then following the unlikely advice of oriel (so thanks) , i got back on my bike , and started again --

i have finally got Petersons book on exposure, plan reading it , and implementing it, using my SLR more than the more portable p & s .
That i suppose is the great thing about photography you have choices , b&w, filters , landscape, urban and street, art , macro ... i guess its all about change and moving on ... oh and i want a new lens lens but it costs 6 big ones , the IS 18 -200 Nikon (thats the bad thing about photography)..

leinsterman

thebaz wrote:

in a word -- Yes

I think i want to re-invent myself , stick more to the rules , that i so hate , be less random -- last week i fealt like packing the whole thing in..

I am in a phase a bit like that too ... there are days when I just want to pack it all in ... but I don't ... I have definitely been getting more out of it this year ... and my skills are improving all the time ... I am starting to believe that you need to understand the rules before you can break 'em ... so I focussing on developing my basic compositional and camera skills for a while before I start expressing myself the way I want ... it can be a bit frustrating ... you need to give yourself little projects to keep you motivated ...

Paulw

I have to agree, that we all go through phases.

There have been times when I put the camera aside and it just gathered dust for a month or so. But, in recent times, the camera has been out almost every weekend. I think this summer I have taken more photos than the previous 6 months.

The type of photos taken has also changed.

I don't know if I have a style yet, but I personally feel that my photography is improving. Now, I'm not sure others would agree, but sure that's a different issue. LOL.

Change is good for us all. It gives us new perspective and can also give you an injection of new ideas.

Anyway, the important thing is that we keep at it, and try new things.

elven

Calina wrote:

Does this mean you'll be back at single details sometime soon as soon as you've exploited the groups of flowers enough?

You got me there!

It made me think - there is going away to come back, but then there's moving forwards - or maybe sideways, where we develop our technique - because we don't, as so many people have pointed out here, stay the same as time goes on.

Sorry no general conclusion, just another little observation. Generally, we don't notice these things while we're doing them, only when we look back from where we are to see where we've come from. I think it's worthwhile, at least now and again.