It has been a long time (months) since I have scheduled a photo shoot. I feel like I have been really creative lately and have written down a lot of great ideas but I just can’t seem to pull the trigger. It bothered me, why wasn’t I going and shooting these great concepts I was coming up with? One reason, FEAR!
I’m Afraid to Schedule a Photo Shoot
As my shoot concepts get larger and more complex, fear starts creeping in. I am constantly afraid that I am going to spend all this time planning a shoot and that I’m not going to be able to pull it off. This fear of failure is pervasive and happens at every shoot. After all of the planning and sometime weeks of preparation, the fear that I will come away with nothing useful from the shoot paralyzes me and causes me to put off the shoot.
There is a valid reason for this fear of failure. I have failed before. I have had several shoots were I got a shoot, but am unhappy with the result. The ones that come to mind are the Mermaid playing chess, and the girl dining in the river.
The concept was great but the I failed the execution. I do use these as learning experiences, but the fear of creating yet another “learning experience” often prevents me from working on my next big shoot idea.
I stupidly tell myself you can’t fail if you don’t try. But not trying is just another type of failure.
My Solution
I don’t have one. Just plow through it. It helps to realize that a lot of my paralysis is caused by fear of failure. I just have to do my best, plan as best as I can, and then go do it. I might fail, or I might come back with the best photograph I have ever taken! I won’t know sitting here at my computer.
So I’ve just scheduled 2 large concept shoots over the next 3 weeks. I still have a lot of planning to do and recruiting of assistants and models, but they are on the calender and going to happen. I’m not going to fail from lack of trying.
Craig, maybe there’s something “wrong” with the execution from the photography standpoint, and I am not sure if this comment will mean anything of value to you or now, but when I look at the two “failed” examples up above, I have no idea what is wrong with them. Especially the girl dining in the river. I kind of can’t see the heads of the people playing chess so maybe there is something with that but still… you’re right, the concepts are so great.
I am a conceptual person, and love the big ideas. Learning experiences aside, I think you have to do something with both of these shots, too. Let me have a caption this photo contest (naturally we’re going to move a prawn in the first one) or put them on my blog with clever names (the second one: “I’ll Have the Fish”)
Perhaps the artistic world won’t judge them the way you, and I guess other photographers, must, because they have other value. Case in point: saw three “mistakes” in glazing from a pottery collection that were valued at a couple hundred thousand on Antiques Roadshow the other night, b/c they were so rare. Damn why can’t that happen to me–oh, hey, can I by these shots from you for fifty cents please? 😀
As I read you post, I can relate to all of it. I have been shooting for a little over three years and models for a couple of years, just for fun. All of my shoots are TFP and as they say “Your only as good as your last shoot”. The fear is not from the failure its self, its the waste of every ones time and expenses. I have to deliver images, they will have my name on them. If I don’t deliver good images, models won’t want to work with me. The successes make the failures worth it. If we are 100% sure of the outcome, we have made the image before and where is the fun in that?