Thursday, June 23, 2011

What to shoot?

Like most things in life, if you get three photographers together in one spot, they all find something different that catches their eye.  That's part of the fun of a Photowalk as I mentioned yesterday.  I also mentioned Scott Kelby's WorldWide PhotoWalk.  For 2011, they're looking at the weekend of Oct 1-2.  Mark your calendar!

So what does the new photographer shoot?  There's a million photographers out there that will give you differing opinions.  Instead of telling you something that, not knowing you may be totally wrong for you, I'm going to make a suggestion.  Carry a camera with you everywhere and shoot.  Shoot a lot!  Then show your shots to as many people as you can.  Those that are deemed to be the best of the best, get prints made and then show the prints.  Not all computer monitors are made equal and with prints you know people are looking at the same thing.  By doing this, you'll learn two important things.  What you enjoy shooting the most, and what you are best at shooting.  You may find they're one and the same, you may find you like shooting children's portraits and people think your landscape shots are the best.  The only caveat to this approach is to stay away from, or ignore the opinions that go to the extremes.  If you post on a site where you notice that the only thing posted about all images is overly positive, then you're probably not getting good feedback.  There are sites like Fred Miranda's where you can get critiqued, but I would only post your very best work and be prepared for some very exacting criticism.  They look at every pixel.

So in a nutshell, shoot, show and listen closely to what your audience is telling you.  If you decide one day to go pro, some of that audience will most likely be the beginnings of your customer base...

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