This blog is excerpted from my bimonthly newsletter, which comes with a fresh music playlist made by yours truly. Sign up to receive it here.

A reminder for my fellow creators:

“Keep shooting what fills YOUR cup.” 

A photographer I admire often shares this important advice. It’s a solid reminder to maybe…. not… copy everyone else? I also take this to mean focus on your strengths. If you are creating what you’re inclined to create, it’s likely to become your strongest asset.

As photographers, we are constantly looking for the moments, scenes, and experiences that draw us in enough to want to photograph it. To save it. In fact, I don’t even think we instinctually want to share it. I’d love to ask a landscape photographer what their motive is in shooting all over the world— something tells me it isn’t Vogue or Nat Geo. Peaceful, untouched appreciation. They may even say they’re avoiding people all together! Experiencing a landscape vastly bigger and more powerful than us is quite humbling if you ask me.

Light, expression and circumstance of each image comes first and foremost before preferring “someone’s edit” over another. Photographers need to understand how to create that magic before they can successfully edit anything.  My biggest challenge is keeping that cinematic, timeless feel to an image during the editing process, and it’s been quite satisfying learning how. Lemme tell you– it does not always work, and I must settle for what’s feasible in a time crunch. This vision provides a constant goal so that my work always has another level to climb. 

All of this is to say, that you should wow the world with what moves you. If it moves you, it’s likely to move someone else and the right following will come organically. 

Curious about how I landed here? Learn about my journey to photography.