Beginner photographers are often overwhelmed with inspiration. So many people to learn from. This does settle after a while. There’s often that Dunning-Kruger time when they feel they know everything and have little left to learn. They simply don’t know what they don’t know.
At some point, they see or hear something that makes them realize how little they really know. This can lead to disappointment in their work and despair at ever improving.
We look at the work of the greats and put our cameras down because the gap between our work and theirs is too great. The gap between what we want and what we can do is too much. This is the creativity gap. Ira Glass talks about this. It’s our taste that drives us. ‘Our taste is killer’. What’s the solution? It’s simply practice. It’s getting out there and doing it. Every shot counts.
Looking at the greats in any way other than admiration will kill your inspiration. Comparison is the thief of joy. You will not be inspired if your thoughts lead to that creativity gap. There is only one comparison that counts. And that is you comparing today's work with yesterdays. You are your only competition. You are the one person that you need to be better than. And it’s in competing with yourself that you will find joy.
That taste that Ira talks about is what makes us disappointed with our current work. But that taste is what drives us to be better. We know where we want to be. So what’s the secret for you to improve? You make deadlines. You plan trips. You get out there and create so that every week that goes by, you create something new. And time will pass, and you’ll look back and see that today’s work is better than yesterday's. And yesterday’s work was better than last week's.
You’ll get to the point when the work you visualized before shooting matches what you have from the shoot. Or better. Because your taste is also improving because you’ve taken inspiration from the greats. Be better.
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