As the last few posts have shown, I am in a rut in regards to my photography. I have not found a real project that inspires me; the Portraits project is currently very loose and I’m not being able to direct my creativity in finding what I need to do.

Recently, i.e. yesterday, I went out to scout for locations for next week’s photo session with Cintia. Parking in Carlton is impossible, which made scouting a bit difficult: I was always pressed for time because of the parking times. Ended up that I had a quick walk around Carlton, had lunch (was in the plans) and entered into Readings, a lovely bookstore on Lygon Street.

I browsed a bit, in the cooking section as well as in the photography section. Not much interesting in the cooking section, but in the photography section I did find a few interesting things. Both of the photo assignment books that I had acquired, a few others that I could have bought, but then I found The Passionate Photographer – Dream It, Be It.

It provides a roadmap to Photo Essays… giving a lot of tips on the ‘hard stuff’, like how to approach humans on the street to ask if you can take photos of them. The author obviously doesn’t give you a script, he provides an approach and it is up to you to execute it your own way.

I remember the Parameters: Yellow challenge. I had to more of less talk to people. Even though I did not take photos of anyone in particular (other than myself), the ballon stand, I had to ask permission to take photos of it. It was nice and I had a chat with the stand owner. All authors who mention talking to people say that people are generally inclined to allow to take photos. I will struggle for a while until I have done it enough times – kind of like asking people on dates. The worst that could happen is they say “No”.

And so I will review a few things about my project. As I mentioned, I am not happy with the Portraits project and will take some guidance from the book I bought. I must focus on being more creative and taking a deeper dive into my projects.