Category Photographer

Are you Brave in your Photography Journey?

@carriehanrahanphotography 2 Comments

Are you brave in your photography journey? I don’t mean like jumping off a cliff into the ocean brave, but if that’s your thing by all means go for it. “Brave,” as defined by Merriam-Webster, is having or showing mental or moral strength to face danger, fear, or difficulty: having or showing courage. As a photographer, you are probably brave and don’t realize it. I often find that photographers often have difficulty in one or more aspects of their photography journey. This can be anything from choosing gear to camera settings to determining when the light is right and so much more.

I have had many roadblocks over the course of my photography career. I have struggled to learn new equipment when changing from Sony to Fujifilm. Learning how new equipment works is both scary and daunting. I have had many frustrating days trying to understand why my images haven’t turned out how I wanted, and I learned that it was crucial that I take the time to dive in and really understand my camera. Every day is a new challenge, but I have faced it head on and have found the challenge to be fun.

Being brave can also mean trying something over and over again until you get the image you want. I love flower and bird photography, but admit that I struggle with getting the right focus, lighting and composition in my images. I decided to invest my time and money in a KelbyOne subscription (https://kelbyone.com/) and took courses on bird photography. I knew that without some training I would just continue to take subpar photos and be frustrated, so I decided to be brave and invest in myself and keep trying over and over again to become a better photographer. By the way, I have no affiliation with KelbyOne, but have learned so much through the website that I just needed to share it.

You can be brave in so many areas of your photography. Choosing what to shoot is always a challenge for me since I really love to take pictures of everything. My head is always spinning around when I’m hiking in nature or driving in a city. Everything to me looks like a picture that needs to be taken. Being ok with taking pictures that you love, but others may not is definitely being brave. As someone who sells their work I am always thinking about what my customer may like, but that doesn’t stop me from also taking images that speak to me. I am always hoping that there is someone out there that enjoys all the unique and quirky images that I create.

Working outside of your comfort zone or even your zip code can be a scary concept for many people. I feel brave every time I decide to travel to a new place or in a new way to create my images. I recently chose to travel to St. Kitts and it was the best experience ever. I was able to see incredible scenery, meet wonderful people and experience a part of the world that I hadn’t seen before. This has sparked a new desire to see more of what is in the United States. To embark on this journey, I have decided to take multi-week journeys to different areas while camping along the way. While this could be scary and intimidating, I chose to be brave and jump right in to explore and create incredible images along the way.

So, are you brave in your photography journey? If you have had the mental or moral strength to face danger, fear or difficulty while learning and pursuing your craft you are in fact brave. Be proud of what you do and celebrate the warrior in you! Please share your times of being brave in your photography journey and help keep us all inspired.

What’s my photography genre and do I really need one?

@carriehanrahanphotography 4 Comments

I recently had the opportunity to photograph two different genres outside of my comfort zone, a baseball game and bicycle parts. I certainly don’t believe these to be a part of my regular shooting style since I consider myself to be a landscape, travel and wildlife photographer. I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed taking a chance and seeing what I was capable of with these new assignments.

I have a problem though, I really enjoy shooting all kinds of different things. Is that an issue for a photographer? It sure can be when I try to market my professional work and it covers so many genres. I struggle to niche down to just one or a few areas to sell. You can’t shoot a little bit of everything and still be a professional, right? Most people would say no, but I’m not so sure. On my journey into making photography my life, I find myself struggling over and over again with “what’s my photography genre and do I really need one?” Should I have a particular subject type that I am known to photograph and if I don’t will I get lost among all the other photographers out there?

From research I have done on this topic, I have come to believe that having a niche as a photographer is important for promoting your work. If you want to monetize photography then it helps to be known as a specialist in a certain genre of work. A hobbyist has the luxury of shooting all the things they enjoy and have a great time doing it. As a professional be sure to narrow down your niche to something that you love, not just because it will sell. If that’s the case, then you may find yourself not enjoying your work in a year or two. If you really can’t narrow it down, then start researching different avenues to sell your work. You are able to have multiple niches if you are using them in different ways.

To solve my problem I have started to stretch myself beyond fine art photography to find uses for the large variety of images that I like to create. There are a number of markets that if you are willing to put in the time and effort may be worth your while. Over the past couple of years I have been putting images on stock photography websites https://stock.adobe.com/contributor/209346323/Carrie. While these may not be big income sources, it has given me a place to market photos that I hope others can use. I supply a large variety of images to https://rvlife.com/magazine and have also started to write for www.rvdestinationsmagazine.com as a travel photographer. While writing isn’t my strong suit, I was willing to put myself out there and give it a try so that I could share pictures of the awesome places I travel to.

So I return to the question I started with, “What’s my photography genre and do I really need one? I know that I can’t stop shooting what I love, which happens to be almost everything. I will continue to photograph different subjects that push my creative mind knowing that I can find different outlets for my work. I will always be a fine art photographer first, but am thrilled to have found other ways to use my photos. I am happy with my working plan for now and can’t wait to see what the future brings.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject. Please post comments below.