NOT comfort zone

eddie said:

Thomas- I need to learn how to draw (sort of) for my next set of no camera/no lens photos. The failures are piling up, but so are the revelations.

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I keep trying, Eddie, to get out of my comfort zone. I shot some casual portraits of two great friends back in August, and I was moderately happy with this frame. The rest were more failures than revelations...

Valerie said:

I completely agree!

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+2 !

I find portrait shoots challenging -especially where the person's uncomfortable with their own selves or body (or with a not-so-familiar face shooting them).
But it's fun nonetheless, to try and show someone in a light they dont usually see themselves in.

Street is good - when I shoot either candids or get close enough to people to talk to them - pre or post shooting. In-between gets a little iffy - and is something I avoided after a couple of confrontations (and now, typing this out has made me realise, I could go past that issue)

Architecture is challenging. You cant move the building - despite whatever Archimedes supposedly said; your speedlights are about as useful as candles in the daytime.. And just when you think you have got it right you'll get a photo bomber interested in seeingwhat youre upto and messing up your shot...

Sent from Tap-a-talk

Before we beat ourselves up over discomfort with specific photographic genres, it's important to remember that (by choosing analogue) we're working outside of the comfort zone of 99% of the world.

Film has become an alternate process. :eek:

Thomas Bertilsson said:

I keep trying, Eddie, to get out of my comfort zone. I shot some casual portraits of two great friends back in August, and I was moderately happy with this frame. The rest were more failures than revelations...

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That's pretty cool actually.

Pioneer said:

...I doubt it takes a very big leap to understand that photographing nudes is so far outside my comfort zone it is unlikely to ever happen.

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Me too, I just would not be able to keep my mind on the task.

eddie said:

Before we beat ourselves up over discomfort with specific photographic genres, it's important to remember that (by choosing analogue) we're working outside of the comfort zone of 99% of the world.

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It may be that photographing anything other than "selfies" and "tonight's dinner" is outside of the comfort zone of 50% of the world.

eddie said:

Before we beat ourselves up over discomfort with specific photographic genres, it's important to remember that (by choosing analogue) we're working outside of the comfort zone of 99% of the world.

Click to expand...

I have a new way of explaining to people when they ask why film. I say "because it is cheaper". They look at me confused, then I explain - if you want to use fiber based paper for your prints, digitalizing the jpg's will cost you 200€ for 4 pictures, and Leica M Monochrom cost 6800€. Usually they don't ask further .

Some two decades past, I shot the wedding of an ex-girlfriend (the candids, actually). We remained good friends post-relationship, so I agreed to the shoot (normally, I would rather be dragged naked through broken glass, doused in gasoline and set ablaze and thrown out of a plane at 20,000 feet without downtown Vana parachute than shoot a wedding...). The "outside the comfort zone"? The overt hostility of her mother as well as a number of the exes friends. Nonetheless, I hung in for several hours and shot away.

About a year-and-a half ago, I ran into her and her (still husband) at Granville Island, just outside downtown Vancouver (I was slumming around with the Leica on a Saturday morning). We chatted for a good hour. Over the course of the conversation, she made mention that a number of my candids (shot on HP5 and Kodak Vericolor II - the color illuminated by my still-used Vivitar 283! ) were still on display in their home...