Beating the creative rut

In this blog I’m gonna share with you some strategies, some tips to get out of a creative rut or a creative block in your photography. All tips are based on my own experiences so I may leave out some things that work for you and include some others that don’t… but that’s life I guess. We are not the same, we are not robots. There are no universal formulas and that’s the beauty of it, I think.

Anyway, If you get something useful out of this blog I’ll be more than happy.

Stop. Take a break. Do something else.

I don’t say this lightly. Forgetting about it for a while helps. But please consider if maybe you are just being lazy.
I don’t recommend taking breaks and doing long pauses in your photography just because you don’t feel like going out to take some photos.
I recommend stoping if you really have put the effort, if you really have tried every approach and nothing helps. Then, leave it. Take some time off photography, do something else, disconnect to reconnect again after a period of time.

I am sure, after some time, independently of how much it takes you, you will come back with a clear head and new ideas, new propositions to bring to the table, new techniques you want to try… 

Experiment

Maybe you have your own style taking photos and you are happy with it. And nothing wrong here, having your own style is excellent.
I’m fed up with photographers on social media just replicating the work of others with no personal style, no originality, no soul.
But having your own style, your own way of composing, your favorite places to go to… always leads up to stagnation. You’ll end up taking the same photos again and again and again, copying yourself and producing dull material. That’s life.

To spice things up and incorporate some novelty into your work, you have to experiment a little bit. Nothing crazy, but try other things. I’m talking going out at night if your comfort zone is daytime, changing lenses if you just always shoot with the same lens, try shooting from the hip, try Intentional Camera Movement, long sutther speeds if you only shoot very sharp focused photos… Everything is valid here.

You don’t have to produce your best work here, just have fun, try things and be open. Maybe you’ll end up discarding the vast majority of these experiments. But just trying and understading other approaches to photography makes you incorporate some of them from time to time into your arsenal, enriching it and getting off of a dull phase.

The great escape

Another thing I like to do is just go and try photographing other areas, other cities, other countries even. This one really depends on your budget of both money and time.
If you live in a reasonably big city or near one, chances are that you don’t even need a car to take a trip to a destination nearby. At least in Europe, the railroad system is pretty efficient and very affordable if you book tickets in advance. Actually, I’m planning a European Trip for later this year to see and photograph several cities in different countries by train.

I live in quite a big city in Poland, but the city itself is not that interesting to me anymore. Anywhere I go I see the same faces, the same backgrounds, the same scenes… It can be hard to be motivated when nothing changes and to top it, the city is undergoing some renovations so it is not at its most appealing point, let’s politely say.
But that won’t stop me. Every now and then, I catch a train and spend the day in a nearby city or even spend the night if the commute takes too long.

That way, when I come back to my city I generally see things a little bit different. Maybe in one of those other cities, in an attempt to grasp everything, I was more open and tried something different that later can be applied when I come back home.

Photography books

This one is easy. We all need inspiration. Inspiration is not grabbing a book and trying to copy everything we like from them.
Inspiration in a sense is understanding why some of the best photographies work and being moved by how everything intertwines and plays a role in composition, light, rythm, meaning… to then go out there and apply the knowledge. Not just copying but rather producing some new work in our own style of doing things, seeing the world as we individualy see it.

There’s an interesting thing about books, as well. Actually, not just about books but touching prints, feeling the paper in your hands, experiencing photography out of the digital medium. I can’t explain what it is, I am not a master in translating feelings into words, but every photographer would say the same. You really appreciate photography with a good photography book or a good quality print in your hands.

Good old cinema

My last piece of advice for today’s blog and something I do very often. Watch some cinema (and series)! But avoid new films, especially those that come from Netflix, Amazon Prime and the like. Yes, they have maybe produced some good films, but seldom do they produce something great (being Ripley an excellent exception).

I love classic films, black and white films to be specific. Lately I’ve seen films by Ingmar Bergman, Roman Polanski, Carol Reed, Orson Wells… But I also enjoyed Blade Runner 2049 by Dennis Villeneuve, Oppenheimer by Christopher Nolan or Perfect Days by Wim Wenders.

In all of them, the cinematography is exceptional. There’s so much to be learnt from every movie and every episode of a good production.
Watching Ripley, for instance, you can literaly hit pause whenever you want and you will get a perfect photography to learn from.

Cinema to me, is kind of a masterclass on light and composition. I try to focus a lot in how they balance the weight in every scene, the lighting, how they play with shadows or dim lights, how they place the actors to achieve meaningful compositions… it’s all there, you just have to pay attention.

Recap

So, I guess this is it for today. Remember that these are just some things I do. By no means are they universal truths, but take them into account if you feel that your work is kind of uninteresting lately or you just feel not motivated enough to go out there and keep producing. Also remember that we do this because we like it. It’s perfectly valid to stop, reassess why we do what we do and keep going or take a longer break. You know you.