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Your Pictures Don’t Have to Be Good if You Enjoy Taking Them

Chris Gampat
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10/18/2023
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Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Panasonic S5 II review Edited JPEGs 1.81-3.2s100

This post is written for every photographer that isn’t necessarily a professional photographer. Instead, you might be a passionate photographer. But there’s pressure within the photography world to just be a better photographer all the time. Yet the world doesn’t also realize that sometimes you need to take a break from growth and just sustain instead. That’s why, no matter what, know that not all of your pictures need to be good if you just enjoy taking them.

This might sound very confusing to many photographers out there, but it shouldn’t be. Because here are some very real truths:

  • If you’re constantly trying to just make your best or even good photos, you’re going to eventually hate the craft and hate your work. There’s nothing wrong with hating your work when you know you can do better and if you can identify how you can improve. That’s part of the learning process that every single photographer goes through.
  • If you’re never taking photos just for fun or for the joy of it, then you’re never going to be able to fully connect with the emotional side of your craft. This will make your photos more and more robotic. And if that’s the case, then an AI can replace you. But you, dear passionate photographer, are what makes your photos so unique.
  • You’re bound to annoy other people if you’re constantly just trying to be a perfectionist. You don’t have to be perfect each and every time.
  • If you keep fixating on the bad things in your photos without focusing and acknowledging the good things, you’ll never be able to gauge your own progress.
  • If photography isn’t bringing you joy, then you’re not going to be able to pivot easily into doing another form of the craft.

I remember when I was a younger photographer, and all I wanted was feedback on how to make my images better. I surely got that feedback, but I was never taught how to implement it to shoot better photos. That took a lot more time. And the best kind of feedback gives you ways how to make those images better. In reality, though, you’re not always going to get the feedback that you need.

This is also another reason why I believe that photographers need to enjoy the process instead of always fixating on the end result all the time. The act of photography and improving our craft is a marathon, not a sprint. In fact, it’s a career-long marathon for so many different photographers.

This year, the On Taking Pictures podcast came back. I remember listening to Bill Wadman talk about how he was going through creative dry spells and him evolve as a photographer. And recently, I’ve heard him talk more about it. Bill also does creative work every single day with different people through portrait projects. He also does a lot of professional shoots. In the podcast, he’s sometimes mentioned that he didn’t get joy from taking photos. And as a photographer of 16 years myself, I can relate to that.

Right now, I’m in a creative project spell and I haven’t found something that really motivated me to want to shoot a lot since the Pandemic. I know that I’ve made good and even great photos before though. And I don’t expect everything to always be museum-worthy at all. But when I go out to shoot photos for myself, I genuinely enjoy the process. I even know those all of those won’t necessarily be my best work. However, they’re bound to impress someone.

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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.