Join me as we learn photography and cinematography together
Hi, my name is Jack. I am an educator, photographer and cinematographer living in the beautiful Pacific Northwest. If you found your way here I hope it is because you are interested in photography or cinematography. So am I! So, let’s explore and improve together.
First off, I will acknowledge upfront, I am not a “professional” in either photography or cinematography. I am an educator by trade; I teach photography and cinematography, but those interests are not how I make my sole living. They are how I spend most of my free time. My experiences have been a journey.
It has been a long journey to where I am today, and the road was full of twists, turns, switchbacks and detours. My hope with this blog is to help those of you just getting started to avoid some of the pitfalls. We often learn more from our mistakes than successes, and I have made enough mistakes for both of us. My goal is to help you borrow from my experiences, while you maintain your own passion and fervor for photography. Your curiosity and drive is why I became a teacher in the first place. So, let’s begin our journey in the most natural place, right where we are now.
Stepping Off:
Whatever your experience in photography, art, design or creativity we can all improve. The first step is to look at where you are and be ok with this place, for now. This is you. You are just what you need to be to get started. Do you need to stay here? No. Probably not. I am a huge proponent of change and challenge. I will constantly challenge and encourage you to push yourself throughout this process. You are not alone. I am here with you and so, hopefully, are many others who will join along the way. Commit to the challenge, you deserve it.
There are a few questions you consider as you start (or continue) on your journey.
Question #1: Where do you want to go with your photography?
Personally, my goal with photography is to get paid to point cameras at stuff. That may still sound broad, but my interests are broad. The common threads for my journey are camera and lighting. We can get more into specifics in future posts, as we explore and try photographing new and different things. So, what do you want from your photography? Do you want to be the family photographer? Do you want to bring in some extra money on the side? Are you hoping to turn your photography into your “9 to 5”? Once you have an idea of where you’re headed, you can think about what to take with you on the journey.
Question #2: What should I pack?
What should I leave behind? might be the real question to ask. The answer: All the junk, both figurative and literal. Fear, doubt, the voices of your past who told you your whole life that hobbies are “just for fun,” or “You can never make a living doing things you love”. That was all my junk. My figurative junk. Then there is the literal junk. Gear. Cameras, tripod, strobes, gimbals, lenses, filters, gels, backdrops…etc. All the junk you may think you need. You don’t need any of that stuff…yet. Don’t obsess over what you don’t have. Look down in your hand, or next to you. What DO you have that could get you started? A solution could be as simple as your smartphone camera, an inexpensive point-and-shoot you got for Christmas 3 years ago, Grandpa’s OLD film camera. Everything else? You can leave it behind with all that figurative junk.
Question #3: What do you see as the barrier to getting to where you wanted to be in Question #1?
I see my main barrier as time. I have a full-time (and then some) job. This blog is a hobby and an extension of my day-job. To actually put in the work to develop my camera and lighting into a commercial level takes time. Time is not something you get, it is something you take. I will need to make time to develop my skills. Maybe you have plenty of time, but the potential cost of photography feels overwhelming. Or perhaps you are not confident in your talent or creative eye. As we practice skills together, I will try to give tips to acknowledge and overcome some of these common obstacles.
Let’s hit the road:
At this point I am going to assume you have done the following:
- Set a destination (in Question #1)
- Left your “junk” behind (in Question #2), and found a solution to get you started
- Identified some of the obstacles still ahead (in Question #3), so you can find paths around them.
Great! Let’s begin the journey. This may be a rough trek. I say this as a middle-aged guy starting a blog about his hobby, in the hope that anyone out there may find this helpful. So trust me, you are probably no more anxious about this adventure than I am. As I said, I am not the guru, or even a pro, or Insta-star. I am also learning and perfecting my craft.
As a teacher, I often find teaching is as much about learning from my students and the experience, as it is about passing on what I already know. I have every hope I will learn as much from my fellow travelers as I may impart to you.
Finally:
Photography and cinematography are the same, at their core. Photography (at its simplest) is the capture and recording of light. Cinematography is the same, over time. That is simple. We can work with that. Light is everywhere. We just need to have a tool for recording that light.
Our journey begins in earnest in my next blog: “Getting started with photography doesn’t have to be complicated”
P.S. I took all the photos for this post on my phone’s camera. Not because I am lazy or don’t have a proper camera, but to illustrate point which I will get more into on a future post about “The love/hate of phone cameras”.
