Lately, I've been in a bit of a creative rut - I just haven't been feeling it and it's a bummer. There seems to be a sort of negative energy in the air around social media and despite some great new opportunities and exciting projects coming my way (I will elaborate on this very soon!), winter just tends to bring me down. My purpose for having this blog is to brush up on my writing skills and be more comfortable speaking about my work on a frequent basis. The goal I originally set was one post a week, and I've certainly missed a few as of late. Without rambling on much further - this week's post has a bit of a different flavor. I'm hoping it will be the catalyst that pulls me out of this funk.
I've become a frequent attendee of local Portrait Meetups and have nothing but good things to say about my experiences. The energy at a good meetup is palpable; the excitement I get to edit and retouch a whole slew of new images has almost become an addiction... to the point where I think I started to burn myself out. I have so much work that I'm about a month behind on posting it all, which I thought at the time was a nice problem to have. Now I'm realizing that it's put me in a position where by the time I get to sharing the work, I've lost that initial excitement. Unfortunately this has taken a little of the fun out of it. I'm not giving the meets up cold turkey, but I'm pumping the breaks a little.
There was an actual moment that caused this turning point, although I wasn't aware of it at the time. It was at the Girl Magic Meets Galentine's Day mini-meet. (Try saying that five times fast - I'll abbreviate as GMM here on out.) Don't get me wrong - it was a fantastic meet and I love how empowering this community is... but I totally phoned it in that day and I regret it. It was a rainy Sunday afternoon at an indoor location, which meant using strobes was a must. I had already spent the entire day prior shooting at a different Portrait Meet that was also indoors, and after using my speedlight for a majority of the day my sad little out of shape arms were tired. At the GMM I tried to take the easy way out by being lazy and leaving the speedlight in my bag. I ended up wandering aimlessly knowing why none of my shots were coming out great but not doing a damn thing about it.
I had put in the effort to sign up for the meet, drive 40 minutes to the location, meet all these new creatives, and then essentially gave up at the crucial moment. We were given an awesome opportunity to shoot in an old movie theatre in between showings. It was clearly too dark for anything without strobes, but I was too lazy to grab it out of my backpack. What were easily my best photos from the day are now unusable due to noise. I've easily spent at least triple the time it would have taken me to walk over and grab my speedlight out of my bag trying to save them in post - and there's no saving them. I'd like to share the images here anyway because as much as I'm disappointed in them, I've learned a valuable lesson from the experience. From now on, if I'm showing up - I need to be there 100%.
Grace (@graciedrinkwater) and I shot some awesome images together and I wish the quality was good enough for me to use in my book. You can't tell just how noisy these low res versions are, but trust me - there's quite a bit. Let me know what you think; noise and all, are they still worth posting on IG?
Normally I try to keep my blog posts more positive, but felt that sharing this could be helpful for some. It's definitely been a learning experience for me. First of all, if you've made it this far reading, thanks for sticking with me! Second, if any of this has resonated with you, I'd love to hear about it. Onwards and upwards, my friends! There are a lot of great things on the horizon, and I can't wait to share it all with you.