Time creeps up on all of us
When I first made this career move I was a much younger man, with a lot more energy and a significantly smaller waistline. I had a lot to learn, and all the time in the world to learn it. I didn’t realise back then how photography would change my life. I understood that I needed to connect with my creative self, and that digital cameras were the future. I was in the right frame of mind at the right moment in time.
I often get asked whether I was pushed, or did I jump? There was a little of both in those early years. My brain is poorly suited to the demands of 9-to-5 work, given that in Australia that usually ends up a 9-to-9 job anyway. As a young fella I could paper over the gaps and present a reasonable facsimile of a functional human at the office. As I got older the facade got harder to maintain. I struggle to function the way most of society does, and it took a while to realise that I might function better with an atypical schedule.
Freelance life drew me in by virtue of flexibility, and the potential to hide away from the world for weeks at a time.
There’s a philosophy professor named Brian Klaas who recently published a book about how much luck plays a role on our lives. I could have written a few chapters for him to be honest. It would be easy to take full credit for my survival thus far, but the truth is "luck" has been extraordinary gift on this journey. You don’t make it through 25 years being self employed without at least a little bit of luck going your way.
I’ve been lucky to have some fabulous clients for my photographic work. Lucky to meet great people who helped me forge innovative concepts for photo tours and workshops. Lucky to travel on assignment to so many inspiring places across the globe. Lucky to have the support of LUMIX and Sigma in recent years too. Lucky to have skills not only to take photos, but skills to use those photos in print and online. Lucky to have had professional help to start my business in the first place, and ensure I get my taxes done year after year.
And, most of all, lucky to have married the single most wonderful person in the world.
I’ve had 25 years of luck, and 25 years of great companions. I’m not a naturally gregarious person and running workshops often pushes me waaaaay outside my comfort zone. That’s mostly been a good thing for me. It’s helped me expand my personal horizons, and expand the creative horizons of my companions as well. Helping others to find their voice with the camera has been the best part of it all.
Making A Difference
Whether I’m shooting in the studio with Shellie or bouncing about a zodiac on the Kimberley Coast, the thing that makes it all worthwhile is making a difference. If the photos we deliver to clients get used far and wide, that makes us happy. If our workshop attendees start publishing their own photos online or in a book, that also makes us happy. If a few thousand people learn to enjoy banana bread from a recipe we published, then we are thrilled. Every time someone leaves a nice comment on one of my YouTubes, appreciative that they found the information and inspiration they really needed, I am inspired to make the next one.
I often advise young photographers as they embark on their career that “taking photos” is not enough. Having a photographic career is not really about capturing great photos – It’s about running a business. Some folks interpret that to mean getting your taxes done or creating a marketing campaign. Maybe that’s true. But “running a business” for me has always come down to the idea of “how am I helping my client”?
What is it they really need, and what is it I can really offer – Do they match up?
So for 25 years I’ve looked for where my skills can make a difference to others. Sometimes that means capturing. Sometimes teaching. Sometimes guiding. Sometimes cooking breakfast omelettes because the chef got drunk and slept in.
It’s all too easy to focus too much attention on cameras, and not enough on cracking eggs. Cameras are nice, but photography is amazing regardless what camera you choose. Don’t let the folks at LUMIX hear me say this, but it really doesn’t matter what camera you shoot with. It matters that you like the camera, and you like shooting with it. Beyond that I’m not terribly interested. Most cameras these days are great, and most people don’t spend enough on their lenses anyway. I see folks buying a $5,000 camera but limiting their lens budget to maybe $1,000.
That aint right folks, that aint right.
I’m lucky that I love my cameras. That little LUMIX S9 is still my default option for anything short of wildlife, because it’s full-frame yet half the size of most other models. 24MP is more than enough and in most cases twice what you need. A 35mm prime handles most situations. Maybe an 18mm for when you want a bigger scene, or that 100mm macro for bees and butterflies. Keep it simple, keep it fun.
WHY instead of HOW
The more you focus on the camera the less you are engaged with the photography. I look back on my images from China 20 years ago, and I never ask myself, “What camera did I take that with?” Because I don’t care. Because the photo is what I’m looking at, and the photo is where the story comes to life.
A better question is WHY did I take that photo? WHY is always more interesting than HOW. Why we take photos is the magic ingredient to all of it. Or more precisely, why we took THAT photo? This is where the voice of the photographer begins to emerge. WHY the photographer made the journey in the first place, and WHY they ended up in that place and that moment in time, and WHY they captured that perspective, and WHY three years later they chose that image as part of a curated series to hang in an exhibition.
WHY is where your voice begins. The more you can share yourself in that moment, the more powerful your photos will be. And after 25 years of photography I have to be honest and say that the vast majority of photography I see online bores me to tears... because there is not nearly enough of the photographer present in the photos. Not on Instagram. Not on Facebook. Not on most social media. Photography has become very impersonal, ironically, through the influence of social media and it's numbing effect of scale.
The algorithms feed us content, not contentment. Not connection. Not contemplation.
One of the great joys of my workshops in recent years is teaching people to curate their work and share a collected set of images. In shifts the focus away from scoring a photo and instead looks at enjoying a set of images that tell a bigger story. And that is the future of photography for me. Telling a story and sharing your voice.
I didn’t fully understand this 25 years ago. But I do now. I understand that a camera is just a tool, and a photo is just a picture. What matters most are the conversations around the photo. That’s where the connections take place and minds are changed. That’s where we learn, when we contemplate and consider what we see. Photography is about people, and the conversations we want to have with those people.
And the best part is, you’re all invited to join in.
– Ewen
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