Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Hopelessly a photographer

My buddy Martin, a marketing guru in my opinion is not going to be happy with this post!
I just turned 41 which should not be a big deal but somehow it feels huge. I have been living my dream for a while now with only a piece missing - my aspirations to be a working photographer.
If I had known that making a living as a photographer in Israel would be so hard I would have thought twice about it cause the alternative as I see is is BS.
Maybe I am being an idealist about it but through my blood I am a photographer. Every time I say to my self " I can live without my photography" six months later I find myself saying " I need to make images". The balance is just killing me and I am sure that I am not alone in this. What drives us? Why do we choose such a path that is so frustrating and so dam freaking hard? And as I right this I know the answer -because IF you do get to have your vision seen it is the most rewarding feeling, at least for me. For me it's not the money or fame but to say "hey check that out I made it" fills me like love fills me to the core.
I wish I could sit here and say I am making it but I guess the truth is that I am not and I feel so disconnected from my passion of photography.
I am not the guy that needs to have a camera in had 24/7 and maybe cause I do not consider myself as an artist but rather a commercial guy that likes to execute an idea is the wrong approach.
Creating the mood of an image that a client is after is just as critical as the idea. If we did not have the spices to cook with, food would not be the same. So I consider my self a spice part of the mix. Without hair, make-up or styling would the image be same? For sure not. Even a different team would create a different image. Creating something from thin air that sends a message, says something. The message, important or not does not matter to me cause we live in a commercial world but creating an image that communicates someone's ideas physically (thru an image) gets me all hot and bothered!
Give me your idea and lets make it happen.
I often wonder what makes a good photographer cause really anyone can take a great image and I always come back to it truly lies in the heart of the person behind the camera. The one directing the scene, the one in charge of creating the mood, to bad an entire country is missing out on some one that loves life and breathing life into ideas cause it's fun to do.

2 comments:

  1. I think the trick is to become self-sufficient-live off the grid. That cuts living expenses (though you do have more chores, like gardening and slaughtering a goat now and then).

    Cutting living expenses means you don't have to earn as much to sustain a family as if you purchase everything, in the modern highly specialized society model we now have.

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  2. Good post Dave! The creative profession is fraught with these ups and downs. But as Mark Twain famously once said: "Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great." Keep the belief in yourself. And keep making the images you want to make. At some point you'll see an open door that wasn't there before.

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