It’s been almost 7 days since my last update. It feels so strange to go from making an active attempt to write something personal and meaningful every single day to this “just whenever I feel like it” attitude. In a way, I’m glad November is over so that I can not write and not feel like I’m a “quitter”. On the other hand, making this personal outpouring on a regular basis was real therapy and filled with enlightenment. I’m starting to have the same feeling about my “self study project”:http://djamesphoto.com/arranginglight/category/selfportrait/.
Each image I create, regardless of how “good” or “bad’ it is, is filled with personal insight. Sometimes, that revelation is represented directly in the image (as it was in “two”:http://djamesphoto.com/arranginglight/2006/12/03/two/ and “five”:http://djamesphoto.com/arranginglight/2006/12/07/self-study-five/), other times, it is represented only in my knowledge of what the image took to create (as it was with “six”:http://djamesphoto.com/arranginglight/2006/12/08/self-study-six/ and “eight”:http://djamesphoto.com/arranginglight/2006/12/10/self-study-eight/). Regardless of how it comes, it’s always beneficial.
Yet, I’m also starting to feel burdened by it. One interesting, personal, polished image is hard to come by each day. Editing an image and publishing it certainly take some time, but that isn’t even the problem. The problem is taking it. Since I have to take the image myself, a tripod is basically required and that makes it all the more difficult.
I skipped last Saturday. I didn’t mean to, it just happened. I got up and edited photos all morning. Then I hit the malls until late in the evening. Then I met some friends for dinner, went to a party, headed home, and crashed. I would have made up for it Sunday morning, but Jess and I got up early and headed straight to my parents house to help paint. A photograph of me in the mall, my hands full of bags, with people all around me would have been great. But, I didn’t exactly drag a tripod shopping with me. My hands were already full enough.
Yesterday (Monday) was a different story. I woke up and started working from home. Being the only one “in the office” this week, I’m doing the work of four people. Needless to say I was quite busy. When quitting time came, I started editing photos and did so until 10:30 or so at night when I finally forced myself to go to bed out of frustration. The only photograph I could have taken would have been of my messy desk, my computer, and me, unshowered and still in my pajamas. Not only is it not all that interesting to look at, it’s hard to frame a mess in a way that even merits being worth looking at.
Just like writing (or, note taking, really) I need to find a way to weave photography into my life instead of having it always be an event of its own. I don’t want to force myself too hard, because I just get frustrated. But, at the same time, I don’t want to be too easy on myself as I’ll just not do it at all. Feedback and interesting activities are the best encouragement, and you all have been great in both cases so far. I just need to learn to let it flow.
So far today, I’ve got nothing.