I am stuck in the middle of some serious photographers block. Winter can do that to you! Not a lot of clients, gray and rainy skies, shorter days, etc. all leave one wondering what-in-the-heck to shoot. And if you live it in a city like I do-extremely boring-there is never anything going on around town to provide great opportunities to shoot (ok extremely boring city is debatable at a few times each year). So its natural to fall into the photographers equivalent of “writers block.”

I think that every photographer goes through this from time-to-time. It’s how you deal with it that separates us from the casual photo buff. For me, I fall into training mode and take the opportunity to brush up on the fundamentals or learn a new skill. This year, I am learning HDR photography and am excited to jump into spring and summer with this new skill (I’ll post a few practice photographs in a little while).

Well, when scouring the net looking for some inspiration, I found another blog post on this same phenomenon. I liked it so much, I thought that I would link to it to let you read it too. Click on the link below for that post.

http://500px.com/blog/553/7-ways-to-combat-photographer-s-block

In it, the author gives seven specific things to do to combat block. Those are:

7) collaborate with others;
6) go somewhere new;
5) shoot technical photography
4) shoot street photography
3) shoot feelings;
2) find a color;
1) Just go out and shoot.

I am not going to rewrite here what’s pointed out in that article, with one exception: Just go out and shoot. Many times, just walking up and down the street and seeing something interesting (or not) can inspire an idea. Shooting something random or within your line of sight, no matter how interesting or dull, can lead you to somewhere unintended.

And if nothing else, shooting gives you the opportunity to sharpen your skills.

Blessings and happy shooting.

Chris.