Why I Love Photography
(And why you might enjoy it too!)
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I am going to start this with a caveat… this pursuit, like so many others, if you’re not careful, can end up being an absolute money pit; you have been warned! (But also, it doesn’t have to be that way).
I came to photography quite late. About six years ago, shortly after I had moved to London and got some lovely feedback from a few friends and decided to give it a bit of a go; things have just snowballed from there.
Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
But what attracted me to it in the first place? Ultimately, I am a bit of (a lot of!) a nerd and photography certainly scratches that itch. I’ve always loved a nerdy hobby - I have studied music since childhood and play the trombone and piano (both nerdy!), I used to DJ (yes it looks cool, but it’s also massively nerdy!) and play the odd round of golf here and there (nerdy with a side of frustrating!). Selling my DJ equipment financed my initial foray into photography and I haven’t looked back.
My first equipment was my Canon 80D with an 18-55mm f/4 kit lens and the cheapest tripod I could find on Amazon. I also got a bag to carry it all in and off I went. You can have a look at the gear I am currently using by checking out the ‘My Gear’ page. You’ll see that the 80D is still there!
I started out whilst I lived in London and got really into night photography, long exposures, light trails and playing with depth of field. The result of this was that I got really good at taking photos at night, but was hopeless at it during the day - both styles are very different beasts.
This leads me onto the next thing that I love about it - you are always learning. In the real world I am a teacher (Music if you’re wondering) and place real value on being able to teach young people a new skill, but also an equal weight on learning new things so that I can pass this on as well. Moving to the lakes has presented whole new set of challenges and means that my passion for the medium has developed further still and I am constantly learning and adding new skills to my arsenal.
YouTube is a great resource for learning about how to use your camera and how to post process in applications like the Adobe Creative Suite - find someone you like and who interests you and then go and put it into practice. Try to not end up down a rabbit hole though, if you spend too much time here, you won’t have time to go and do something with the learning you have done. You will learn more by going out and making mistakes than you will if you sit in front of a screen watching someone tell you how to do it.
I also really like being outside.
My current location, right next to the Lake District National Park really helps me to want to get out there and the air is a bit cleaner than it was in London, but all the same, getting out and about in all weathers is something which has always and will always appeal to me. Being able to do it in such beautiful surroundings is just a massive bonus, but again, it’s another learning curve and I’ll write a blog about that in the coming days; let's just say it’s a big difference to shooting in the city.
People have always been a big factor in my love for photography. I have met some awesome people who are incredible photographers whilst I have been doing this; I will link some of them at the bottom of this post so you can check their work out! Being out on your own can be really liberating, but having someone else to bounce off is always a great way to get out and shoot - you also never know when you’re going to need a model!
I’ve also managed to build out a nice little home studio; this happened during lockdown when I got really into Still Life and product photography. This is probably where the most investment has gone. Lighting isn’t cheap and decent lighting even less so. Then there’s backdrops, props and space to store it all. It’s a great place to retreat to after a busy stressful day!
The nice thing about being in the studio is that no matter where you are, you have (almost) complete control over the light, you just have to make sure monitors are properly calibrated!
Once you’ve taken your photos, you’re going to need to be able to edit them (God-tier nerding). You’ll need something like Abode Lightrom and/or photoshop which will require a subscription (there are free programs available, such as Photopea, which can be quite clunky but will get the job done) and then you might want to think about posting them on social media which is a time investment and then printing on top of that. If you then start shooting in a studio a lot, you might want to think about CaptureOne, which has awesome live capture abilities and really helps me to nail the compositions.
All that said, you shouldn’t let cost be a barrier to getting into photography. Find a decent secondhand body and lens from somewhere like MPB.COM and then get out there and see what you can do! And if you don’t want to do that, then we all have cameras in our pockets these days anyway…
Check out these photographers mentioned in the blog: