If I think of a truly driven photographer, I do not think primarily of behavior such as that above but rather of someone like Annie Leibovitz, whose extreme single-mindedness has certainly paid dividends in career terms. There are indeed people who lock themselves away and practise various artistic disciplines in a highly obsessive way - these people are virtually certain to be completely indifferent to what anyone else thinks and, as someone else has already remarked, are unlikely to respond to a thread on APUG (or even look at APUG, or communicate with anyone). These people have a perfect right to do whatever they want - it is my personal belief, however, that extreme obsession does not lead to the highest possible artistic achievement, having a life is more important. but on the other hand in the field of hard news, for example, it takes vast dedication if not obsession to be a James Nachtwey.