Letter From The Editor – September

If only someone would take a pair of scissors to each image I created that was blurry, out of focus, too dark/light, or just plain bad, and stabbed each one right down the middle. Maybe then, I’d produce something worthy of being printed.

So far, in the three years I’ve been creating photographic work, I’m not necessarily sure I’ve created something I can look at and think, “I took that shot?! I can’t believe that came from me!” There have been times when I’ve felt good about a series of photos I’ve taken, but never really saw myself taking the one legendary shot that I could always fall back on with pride as I showed it off to everyone.

I spent my Labor Day holiday weekend in New York City and was hoping to get motivated to capture some fun street photography. It was a bit out of character for me, since I don’t usually go on photo walks and create work for me; it’s almost always been for a client, as of late. While I enjoyed the scenery and the ability to shoot what I wanted, most of my photos were fun (like the one above), but I don’t know how proud I’d be of them if they were the full representation of my work. I feel like they’re all “been there, done that, bought the t-shirt” and nothing that stands out too drastically. It probably didn’t help that I finished looking at the work of Chris Jordan’s Midway photography project, since he quit his job as an attorney to become a photographer and produce such captivating and impactful images, but because I have the tendency to check out what my peers are doing, I can’t help but look at his work, then look at mine, and think, “yikes! I need to step my game up!”

Recently, I was going over wedding photos I had taken over the weekend and doing my usual editing process. Mind you, my usual editing process involves culling out the bad images and groaning about the photos that are “passable”. Maybe one or two out of the entire 1100 I took, I enjoyed looking at, but my eyes were looking at a body of work that frustrated me. Why couldn’t I get that photo to be perfect? It isn’t that I feel I take terrible photos; it’s more or less that I look at what I’ve taken and stack myself up to my peers, unsure that I am on the right track to achieving the results I desire and have worked so hard to accomplish.

After culling the images down to the usable ones, I met up with my friend whom I shot the wedding with to discuss our bodies of work from the day of shooting. After going through her images and then showing her mine, she began to sound like a broken record. “Those images are great, Patrick! Why do you think they’re terrible? What’s up with the ‘Patrick Standard’ that makes you hate your images?” And then I pieced it together: maybe I’m hard on myself because I want perfection every time I go on a shoot. And that’s not a bad thing. It’s the reason I have returning clients. It’s the reason I have clients at all. People who I’ve worked with before will tell others who are in need of photography work about the “awesome photographer I worked with – you should really check him out!”

I will probably never be happy with my overall body of work, and I’m slowly becoming alright with that because I realize what it means. My constant disgust in what I create will never allow me to settle for mediocricy; I’m going to always push myself to achieve better results than before. I refuse to allow myself to produce what everyone else is creating – I want to do better. I want to exceed expectations. And when my clients come back to me with, “those images were fantastic! Thank you so much!” then maybe I’ll calm down and finally breath a sigh of relief.

I’ve been very fortunate to introduce a lot of wonderful writers to you all, and the articles that have been posted have really stepped things up around here. Seeing the kind of work they’re all able to achieve, and viewing everything from an international perspective, pushes me to do better. We’ve been lucky to have photographers from all over the world join the team, and to see that there is beautiful photography happening in all corners of the world encourages me to add to the group and contribute awesomeness, too. Then there are the veteran writers, who continue to consistently churn out wonderful and inciteful posts, and, well… I’m proud to say I’m leading a team of talented individuals that always bring their A game and give you all out there in Internetland something inspiring to take with you as you venture out on your own photography projects. I certainly hope we’ve not only done a great job in giving you new tools to add to your arsenal, but come to be the site that you can trust to give you that boost of motivation to create magnificent pictures that force me to step my game up.

Another great thing we’ve added to our site is reestablishing a FYP contest! Every first of the month, we are going to choose a theme for you to execute and will have 14 days to shoot and submit the work to us to be judged. We’re going to begin October 1st, so be on the lookout on Facebook and Twitter for the announcement on what the theme will be. The best part is that for the first year of contests, we’ve teamed up with 500px to generate the first place prize! It’s going to be loads of fun and I’m already excited to see what everyone comes up with! You can see all of the details here.

With a fantastic August in the books, September has been off to a great start, and I’m looking forward to producing even better articles for you all! (Naturally, they have to be better, right? That’s just how I do!)

Until next time,

- Patrick
Your Fearless Leader