Don’t Panic About Your Free Bot Reviews…
Posted by Andrew Bailey in General on the Big Photo Hunt community board, .
Before I discovered track and field, I played in a marching band. The summer before my ninth-grade introduction to it, the band director quit, and they sent a young guy, a recent graduate, to help us prepare. I promise, this will make sense in a minute.
The guy ran us through our paces, watched us, and said, “Okay, there’s a lot of enthusiasm and ability here to work with. And we’re going to make a great marching band out of it!”
It was a billion degrees. We worked like sled dogs. We believed like zealots.
Then he left, and the new hire came on. He watched all our effort and tore us apart.
Half the band quit.
The new review bot has a leg in both of those worlds, and I want to wean you off the second one at the outset, because I don't think it means to do that, and I know it isn't helpful. It's not THE LAW. It's an attempt to provide suggestions that will make you better at this. But take any criticism with a pound of salt. Intention factors in. It doesn't know yours, and sometimes that matters. By way of example: Your out-of-focus could be an artistic choice. It just thinks your focus is off.
So, look at it. Consider it. Find something you think will help you get better, or make something you think is better than it does, stronger. That, I’m telling you, is the point here. But if it wasn't, I'd say make it the point anyway.
And don’t let it define how you feel about what you’re doing in any negative sense. I get it. We grow up in schools that teach us to fear and honor numbers. A 5 or 6 on anything can feel like a D. And if your feet aren’t fully planted, that can knock you off them.
Don’t let it.
One of the first rules of photography is: How does it make you feel? Or, if it isn't, it should be. Not how does anyone or anything else feel about it. This is about you and what you’re attempting, not what anyone else thinks you should be doing. Not really.
Most of us, even those who have sold things and made a bit of money doing this, aren’t doing it for the money. We aren’t even doing it for praise (though it’s nice, isn’t it?). We’re doing it because it scratches an itch in us to record moments, frame our experience, and share it.
The best advice, I promise you, that you will ever get about this art/craft is old and true:
Shoot often. Pay attention. Try everything. Do it until you’re comfortable with your camera and your ability to say what you need to say, the way you want to say it.
Then keep shooting.
Do that, and I promise you, I promise you, you’re going to love this more and more, and surprise yourself, over and over. You’re going to do great. Chances are, in ways little and large, you already have, and you already are.