Common Fears of Photography
IshanPathak
Feel free to drop any comments/ criticism anytime....
There is nothing such as bad or good subject. Its just how you see it and capture it.
-My Experience with Photography
Common Fears of Photography
12 Nov 2014 5:38PM Views : 723 Unique : 516Fear can be good when you're walking past an alley at night or when you need to check the locks on your doors before you go to bed, but it's not good when you have a goal and you're fearful of obstacles. We often get trapped by our fears, but anyone who has had success has failed before.
-Queen Latifah
Luckily, nervousness or fear in photography can be overcome with practice and patience. Especially Patience. Dont expect results from day one. It can even take years to get a significant result from your images.
I have listed some common fears among photographers and ways one can learn to overcome them.
1: No clue what i'm doing!
Sweating like anything on your first official shoot? Feeling lost with all the new technical controls of your new equipment? No idea how to manage with the complexity of exposure, composition? Or maybe just having a fear of making a careless blunder while shooting?
Very common fears and are especially faced by beginners in this art. There’s a lot of somewhat technical information to absorb and it can be frustrating to understand new things.
How to fight it: Accept it that you are no superhuman. That you will make mistakes. Your photographs are going to be criticised in the initial phase. I'm sure every photographer here had a point in their lives when they didnt know how to operate a camera. You will keep learning as you go and naturally make mistakes along the path. Dont worry, youll have great successes too. All in the course of time. Point is to keep going with determination.
2: They wont like it, im sure!
The fear of rejection. Probably the biggest and most common fear of all. We all struggle with the fact that some people simply will not like the work we produce. Art is very subjective. The viewer will view the piece with their own eyes and will make their own judgement. And it wont be what you would like all the time.
When i had started photographt nearly a year ago, every little appreciation which i used to get on my pictures, made my day. But when a photo which i admired a lot, was disliked by the public, i got disheartened to such an extent that i was thinking of quitting this beautiful art. This will happen at some point in your career.
How to fight it: As painful as it can be, failure is an essential learning tool. Seldom do we gain new knowledge only from our success. The thing is to give your best in your work and show it to the world. The rest is out of your control. So no point in fretting about it.
3: I dont have the equipment!
The envy of professional gears . That nagging notion that if you only had this lens or that filter or if you could afford the newest whatever you can become a successful photographer- we all experience it. Atleast to some extent.
How to fight it: Just go with the thinking that you can never have the best gear simply because it hasnt been made yet. Just google it, and youll see new cameras and equipments being launched every next day. Forget what you dont have. Think what you have, study it to the fullest, see what it can do and what it cant do. Study your equipment to the fullest ( whether its a PNS, Cellphone camera, or a DSLR ) Dont leave any stones unturned. As i always say, theres no point buying a top range DSLR/SLR when you dont have any clue about the basics of photography.
Sweating like anything on your first official shoot? Feeling lost with all the new technical controls of your new equipment? No idea how to manage with the complexity of exposure, composition
Surely if you really feel this way you should be cancelling the shoot until you are at least reasonably competent.
Quote:Surely if you really feel this way you should be cancelling the shoot until you are at least reasonably competent.
Thanks for the response.
For the first official shoot, i was just talking about Sweating like anything on your first official shoot? And i really think one will be extremely nervous on their first shoot. Rest were for general basis.
Ishan
Quote:1: No clue what i'm doing!
Sweating like anything on your first official shoot? Feeling lost with all the new technical controls of your new equipment? No idea how to manage with the complexity of exposure, composition? Or maybe just having a fear of making a careless blunder while shooting?
Very common fears and are especially faced by beginners in this art. There’s a lot of somewhat technical information to absorb and it can be frustrating to understand new things.
How to fight it: Accept it that you are no superhuman. That you will make mistakes. Your photographs are going to be criticised in the initial phase. I'm sure every photographer here had a point in their lives when they didnt know how to operate a camera. You will keep learning as you go and naturally make mistakes along the path. Dont worry, youll have great successes too. All in the course of time. Point is to keep going with determination.
I understand the point above that Alan is making, and also what I think you were trying to convey with this first fear. I think the problem is with the word 'official' ... that gives the impression of someone who has been commissioned to undertake a paid photographic assignment - i.e. someone who isn't starting out in photography and at least knows something about how to go about it.
How about rewording it as follows:
I don't know what I'm doing!
Has someone asked you to take pictures of their wedding/baby/engagement or other event? Are you beginnning to sweat because you feel that you don't really know how to use your new camera equipment? Do the complexities of lighting, exposure and composition keep you awake at night? Or are you just worried about messing something up and leaving them feeling disappointed in you? This is a very common fear for new photographers - but just remember that everyone makes mistakes in the beginning. Photography can become a very technical hobby and it can be frustrating trying to learn and understand new things.
How to fight it: Accept that you're just starting out on your photographic journey. You could always decline, politely, and say that you don't feel ready to to it. Or you could tell people that you're not an expert, that you're still learning and ask them not to have too high an expectation of you. That way, if the photos turn out far better than you expected, then you can bask in their admiration. And if they don't? Well, you did warn them ...
How does that read to you?
Tanya
By the way are there any other fears that i left. I just wrote about what i have faced in a year.
Ishan
That one's connected to really 'seeing' what's around you, and not just 'looking' at it. I found it useful to carry an old slide holder around with me (the sort that we used to use to display slides in, back beyond the age of digital 
). It was always in a pocket somewhere, and if ever I was out without the camera, by holding it up to various scenes it helped me visualise things like whether the scene in front of me would make a good image and, if so, possible ways of using the slide holder to try and compose it within that little square ... an odd thing, maybe, but it did work!And if someone doesn't have a handy old slide holder to hand? Well, a couple of L-shaped pieces of black card overlapped can be just as good; you can always then use that to try different ratios as well - square, letterbox, 4:3 ... that kind of thing.
You can't beat DIY-photograhy, sometimes
(Mind you, that then does tie in quite nicely with the 'not having the latest equipment/camera/etc etc etc' (no. 3) on your list. Yes, the camera's important but as you rightly point out - so are the eyes! In fact, without those the rest of it sort of becomes a moot point 
T
Quote:ou can't beat DIY-photograhy, sometimes Grin Grin Grin
I think ill try it this weekend..
) so though to write some articles. Dreading to face it all over again after weekend ( Monday blues : ( )You completely recovered from that cold, i hope?
Ishan
I guess you go real attraction to colds
( or the other way round )
