Click = Yeah!

on September 19, 2021

Or, sadly, click = no...

Every photographer, whether they are a professional working for pay or an amateur working for love, wants to get the Yeah. Money will be involved - you are either getting paid or paying out - but the parallel reward of approval is one of the most powerful motives for photography. Photographers who are successful...happy, contented, tranquil, proud, and amused...have all got it through the Yeah.

Yeah, so how do we get it? And how do we get it now? Fast! No time to wait...c'mon hurry up. Time is money and you owe me Yeah plus interest. Haven't got all day here...

Friend, you have as much of the day as the next person - and as much as the cat on the mat. Clocks may not all run at the same speed but the Earth turns steadily nevertheless. Slow yourself down and look at what your photography cosists of.

a. Something is out there, while you are in here.

b. You take your equipment out to capture a picture of it, and bring it back.

c. You clean it up and show it to other people.

There may be a great deal of money spent, long trips, angry scenes, and long hours staring at a spinning beach ball as your computer tries to re-start, but the basic sequence is the same. The only variation is for studio shooters who bring the out there in here and then have to sweep up after it.

With all this, you are trying to make something that gets the Yeah; the satisfaction of communicating something to someone else. You can do it by showing them beauty - other people, other places, etc, or you can show them their own image as beautiful. That is a tough Yeah to get, as people are more critical of their own image, but when you genuinely get it, your reputation will rise.

Sometimes the Yeah can be measured in dollars. Good advertising images that really do click with the public can cause a rise in sales and profits. If this is clearly evident to the agencies and clients your star will also rise.

Sometimes it is just swank - the image that is awarded the prize from some competition or exhibition. Your picture will have scored highly enough with the judges to win the thing and you must regard this as an external Yeah. If you want other's approval, and get it, you may be content.

Of course, you can take a shortcut through the tall grass of criticism by looking at your own work and judging it yourself. If you are good at that, and honest with yourself, the Yeah you score here will be the most valuable one of all.

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