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Your Camera Isn’t Going to Shoot Itself

Chris Gampat
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04/05/2015
2 Mins read

Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Samsung NX500 First impressions product photos (2 of 12)ISO 2001-1250 sec at f - 2.8

You’re probably thinking, “What the heck kind of a title is this?”

You’d be right, but this is a post dedicated to everyone who ever said that they barely ever get time to go out there and shoot anymore. You bought an expensive camera to shoot images with it, improve your photography, learn, grow, and bud into more of an artist. Yet, life is getting the best of you and your time.

Seriously, stop making excuses.

Every photographer that has ever done a 365 project of some sort has found a way to continually progress in their craft and grow as a photographer overall. But there is no reason why you can’t take a photo a day if not with that snazzy camera, with your phone or tablet.

But you have no subject matter?

Here’s what happens when you shoot anything: your brain starts to think of new ways to make an image better. Maybe it’s a different angle, maybe it’s a different composition or a new approach. Either way, it processes something new and you keep thinking creatively and differently–therefore building new ideas in your head and when you come to the subject matter that you really want to shoot, you tackle it much better when combining it with your other inspiration that you may have.

The point is that yes, your camera isn’t going to shoot itself. It will only do what you tell it to just like any other machine. A camera is just a tool to create images and exercise your creativity; but that creativity won’t exist if you don’t get out there and try to make images–inspiration or not.

Here’s an idea to get you started and to add extra value to this otherwise attempt at motivating you to be more than just a weekend warrior when it comes to shooting:

– Choose one subject for an entire day or a set amount of time.

– Define what that subject is by writing it all down

– Figure out a way to translate its identity in pixels or film

– Try 10 different angles

– Choose three different locations

– Figure out four different lighting scenarios (this can all be done with natural and existing light)

– Do six different compositions

Then when you’re done, go to the images, look at what you did and figure out how you could have made each one tell more about that identity that you wrote down before.

Give it a try–for the artist inside of you.

365 angles busy camera experiment project
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Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.