Getting out of a creative slump

[Nate Battles]

I was curious to see how many photographers get into a creative slump. By this I mean when you don't feel like picking up a camera and shooting anything. Or when you feel that it's time to start a project, but your ideas wether materialized or still just floating around in your head, just don't turn out to be what you originally had envisioned. What are the ways you have overcome this? How can you prevent it?

~nate

[Clueless Winddancing]

"Explore that which you would resist." Or, "What you resist -persists." It can take years to "get" what seems like irksome platitudes like "Just seeing is enough." However, they aen't like a defibulator that may shock you back into life. Never the less when used throughout the day bothersome thoughts of cultural imprintings gradually disapate so as to liberate one for fresh outlooks. Apparently you suffer from an internally imposed expectation with a consequential dis-appointment. Are you at choice or is it doing it to you?

[adonis_abril]

Personally, I enjoy backcountry adventures and love nature first and foremost...photography second. So it has never been an issue as such - I tend to just record (with my vision) what natural light gives me. But, sometimes to motivate myself and procure some more creative juices I take out my rangefinder or DSLR and do photography projects not related to Landscape Photography...I would go out and shoot classic cars for example. I would also do candid street photography and pretend I was Henri Cartier-Bresson.. It's fun, and helps me see compositions/techniques that I've never thought of using before and now I can apply to my Landscapes.


I was curious to see how many photographers get into a creative slump. By this I mean when you don't feel like picking up a camera and shooting anything. Or when you feel that it's time to start a project, but your ideas wether materialized or still just floating around in your head, just don't turn out to be what you originally had envisioned. What are the ways you have overcome this? How can you prevent it?

~nate

[Leonard Metcalf]

Just pick up a camera and start shooting... The first one mightn't be a keeper, but I find I get there with a bit of practice. I firmly believe that creativity is about being in touch with your inner self, and often creative blocks are caused by being caught up in your head too much with too much stress and thoughts... If I am caught up in work, it takes a couple of hours or walks in the bush to let go, and find my creative self again. Dombroskis talks about his creativity coming only after a few days into a longer wilderness sojourn. There have been some great threads on this topic too, which are worth searching for.

[Leonard Metcalf]

I wrote an article about this on my blog which can be accessed here. (http://lensjournal.com/musical-secrets-unlocking-creativity)

It was written from the perspective of a musician / composer at a panel discussion at Woodford Folk Festival on Overcoming Creative Blocks.

Enjoy,

Len

[Bruce Barlow]

A couple ideas.

We have an exercise we beg students at Fine Focus Workshops to adopt: Make it a habit to set aside time to make one, and only one, photograph a day. This is in addition to any other photography one might undertake. Make this one special, and take a good, long time to make it the very best. Friend Richard Ritter mounted a very impressive show from a year's worth of one-a-days.

"Charge the Ambush." I knew a guy who adopted that strategy as a grunt in Vietnam on night patrols. He figured if he ran away, he'd probably be killed, but if he charged the ambush, he might survive. He did. Now, he says, he has no reason to put anything off, because any reason he can rationalize for procrastinating pales. When I remember to charge my own ambushes, they usuallly aren't as terrible as I imagined. It appplies to going out photographing.

Define projects. In a rigorous way, including what you plan to produce, how many, what size, etc. Get all those details decided, then go make the pictures. I find it enormously liberating to "limit" myself by making many of the other decisions in advance, and have a specific mission when I go out. If I feel stuck, I define a really small project that I can accomplish quickly and have satisfaction. I use projects to learn technical stuff: "print with Azo," or "test new wide-angle." Anything that advances my skills and abilities is fair game, and usually gets the juices flowing. I even made up a worksheet to help myself out. It works.

[Ash]

My way of seeing whether I'm getting into a slump is my blog. That's because it goes to show when I've taken photo's, of what, how many, etc.

I think it was two months without a blog. I took very few photo's, and I only got out of the slump by photographing MJ. Now I'm trying hard to get back into things and start the 'summer project' I've only just been given before term start of a new course on the 24th.


Hopefully the course will force me to avoid any further slumps :)

[Struan Gray]

I just do something else until I feel like taking photographs again.

[DOYLE THOMAS]

Art is like food, when you are hungry enough, you will Art.

Doyle

[eric black]

I spend rut time scouting- which essentially amounts to hiking without the heavy photo gear. Its a nice change of pace and I find that I not only enjoy the hike more but I seem to see potential shots better

[Nate Battles]

Thanks guys!

This is really great advice. I think that sometimes I am too forward thinking. I like to "see" the finished product before I even begin. I need to let things progress naturally. So when I don't get the results I want, I feel like giving up. I try to go to museums and look at other photography, painting and sculpture for inspiration, but sometimes it never strikes. It's like I am trying too hard and forcing creativity, which I know is not constructive.

[SamReeves]

Art is like food, when you are hungry enough, you will Art.

Doyle

Yup. When you're ready you'll start making photos again.

[Steven Barall]

So if you don't fee like taking pictures for a while what's the big deal? As Groucho said, "I love my cigar but I do take it out of my mouth sometimes."

[lenser]

I go back to my books by photographers I admire and find images I want to imitate. Then I go out and do it. That almost always finds me seeing new things and getting excited about moving back into my own groove.

[George Hart]

think…

[David R Munson]

Two suggestions.

One, check out the book "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron. It can be a little squishy at times and a little too weird for those not too open to self-help type books, but it truly is a good book. The next best option is actually one of her better techniques, which brings me to...

Two, keep a notebook. Write in it every day, everything that comes into your mind, for twenty or thirty minutes, three pages, or whatever. You can decide the amount that you write. The important thing is that you DO write. Just keep doing it, clear out the mind, and you'll be amazed at what a difference it can make in your life as a whole, not just in terms of your creative efforts.

I've written about it as well as some related topics here (http://www.davidrmunson.com/convergence/?cat=6). For the notebook-specific stuff, go to about the last third of the last post on that page (there should be three related entries there).

[Eric Rose]

I took a 3 year break once. Could stand the sight of a camera during that time. My passion for expressing myself thru photography finally came back. But you can't "make" it happen.

[tim atherton]

Don't worry about the photography - let it take care of itself.

- Find some good novels to read - maybe some you've been meaning to read for a while - or hunt out some new authors you think might be interesting.

- read some good poetry (as above)

- Go to an art gallery if there is one nearby, or make a trip to a good exhibition on somewhere

- rent (or go see) some good films (which are different from movies...) - ones that will make you think or leave you wondering

- find some fantastic architecture to look at and learn about

You may know quite easily what to pick for all of these, though I'd be happy to suggest some (with the caveat that one man's meat is another man's poison).

- Sure, hunt out some good photography monographs from the library - perhaps by people you've never heard of, or photographers whose work you've never quite "got"

- Read a couple of biography's or books about great artists - rembrandt, picasso, carravagio, michaelangelo, Van Gogh etc - enjoy what you learn about their work as well as what flawed human beings they were...

(and as David suggests - write down what strikes you about it all in a notebook)

If all that fails, there's the tried and tested method that has worked for most famous photographers/Artists (Weston, Steichen, Man Ray etc etc) - find an exotic young muse :)

[Dan Schmidt]

watch that Brett Weston DVD

[Nate Battles]

You guys are so awesome, those are some fantastic ideas! I will try them. This is a great forum, thanks again!

[Nicolai Morrisson]

I like to go out and set some arbitrary and restrictive rules for the session to try to force myself to see things differently. My current theory is that if I'm not shooting, it's because I'm not seeing things well, because if I was, I'd want to shoot whatever it I was looking at. I also find it helps to simplify, so I'll take one hand-holdable camera with one (prime) lens and do something like 12 shots within 100 feet of here, camera no higher than 3 feet off the ground, focus no farther (or closer) than 8 feet. A few weeks ago I got stuck and shot a roll of 120, each frame having a tree dead-center. Sometimes I do a few rolls in an outing and change the rules for each one. I find the more restrictive, the better.

The results aren't always show-stoppers, but they're usually not horrible, and can help get the wheels turning again. At the very worst, it usually reminds me that I like the experience of shooting and makes me want to do it more, even if the results aren't up to par that time. Of course, your mileage may vary.

[Michael T. Murphy]

I take a very pragmatic approach when I am stuck.

Usually, I change equipment. If I have been using my Mamiya 7II for example, and am very anal about focusing, composing, metering, etc. - because "each frame costs $1" (what I am thinking), I turn around and pick up my Holga instead. :D

Whatever you are doing too much of- too rigid, precise, etc., try the opposite.

Then, I go out and make photographs for a few hours without worrying about it. Just get into the rythym.

When I get home, I review, and try to find 1 or 2 images or pieces of images or "things" that I "kind-of like." :) Anything that **I** respond to. It might even be a small thing - the way blue or red appears in one image, etc.

I take the images that appeal to me, and then I go try to make images based on them. Build a little at one time, no real preconceptions. Just follow a thread. The work may be totally different than what I have done before. I just enjoy the process of exploration.

Also, another very good book, a little less *squishy* than the other one mentioned (Artists Way), is "Art and Fear." Bottom line summary: just do the work! :)

I have been limited for the past 5-6 years by chronic pain. Very frustrating I love photography, just want o make images, but it is not really worth the pain involved. If I take a lot of pills to kill the pain, the images suck. Memory sucks, no continuity. What do you do? :D Just keep trying.

Good luck!!

Best,
Michael

[Nicolai Morrisson]

I enthusiastically second the ever-loving crap out of the recommendation for Art & Fear (http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fear-David-Bayles/dp/0961454733/), as well as the follow-up, The View from the Studio Door (http://www.amazon.com/View-Studio-Door-Artists-Uncertain/dp/096145475X/). They're far and away the best $20 (combined!) I've ever spent on artmaking; I probably would have quit many times over if it weren't for them.

[Bruce Barlow]

Yup, "Art & Fear" and "The View from the Studio Door" are huge favorites here. Toss in Twyla Tharp's "The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life."

All three books espouse that good art has a lot more to do with hard work than innate talent. A hopeful message for those of us who feel we lack genius. But they also urge hard work upon us, and have little patience for the "photograph when the spirit moves you" pretension. I agree with Messrs. Bayles and Orland, and Ms. Tharp.

[David R Munson]

I would like to note one thing regarding the various books available regarding art, creativity, etc. If you pick one up and it rubs you the wrong way, just move on. There are a range of books like this, and they're written by and for different kinds of people, so if what you initially started with isn't interesting you, try something else. Just don't let one book of the genre turn you off from all of them. A while back I picked up a copy of "Art and Fear" and, frankly, thought it to be total crap. I don't even know what I did with my copy. Other people love it and it has a great reputation, I just didn't like it. However, I found other books on the subject that I really did enjoy.

[Nate Battles]

Thank you for the opposing viewpoint on "Art and Fear" It's good to have varying opinions. Thanks again!

[Bruce Barlow]

You can see opposite points of view at work here.

I felt "The Artist's Way" to be totally self-indulgent and, therefore, mostly useless to me. A few useful ideas, but it's more a touchy-feely self-help book than something that will actually help you. That opinion is based on actually DOING what she lays out in the book, not just an armchair reading of it. My opinion, that's all.

On the other hand, "Art and Fear" is great because it advocates hard work to overcome supposed lack of talent. I think we all, deep down, fear that we're not as talented as we'd like. I know I feel that way. "Get over it," Bayles and Orland say, "every photograph you make makes you a better photographer, so the more you make, the better you get." I find that immensely encouraging, and inspiring.

I wholeheartedly agree that if a book rubs you the wrong way, move on.

[Nate Battles]

Thanks Bruce!

[Jack Flesher]

I take a very pragmatic approach when I am stuck.

Usually, I change equipment.

Good one!!! :cool:

I find the best thing for me is to go out with a single camera and one lens, and force myself to make images of anything just using that. Pretty soon I start "seeing" images that fit that view and this seems to help overcome the inertia of being in the slump. Usually I know I'm on the mend when I say to myself something like, "Dang, I wish I had chosen the 110 today instead of the 210!"

Cheers,

[alanps]

Actually I just let things work themselves out - there is a reason for the slump - it might just take time. For me I fell into one after a successful exhibition in London in the 90's. I honestly looked around and thought, well this is just how I imagined it would be - happiness - then zero motivation (slump) to do anything else...

I am out of the slump now, but I am different, taking different (sort of) pictures and I think (hope!) better for it.

Slumps are neccesarily negative, they may just seem that way at the time ;)

[Bruce Barlow]

Yeah, Jack Flesher! You go, guy!

[paulr]

lot's of great suggestions. i'll repeat a few of them ...

-just do something else for a while. i quit and studied music for four years, joined a rock band, got kicked out, and then came back to photography.

-try giving yourself a photo project (or other art project) where the emphasis is volume, not quality. let yourself loosen up and experiment. you might make important discoveries when you're not trying too hard.

-the artist's way is an excellent book and has saved people. if the tone rubs you the wrong way, get over yourself and just do the exercises. it's hard work, but it works

-don't cling too tightly to restrictive defitions. you might have outgrown the old ones. you're not a large format photographer, or even a photographer. you're a human being on a creative path, exploring something in any way that works for you.

-if nothing works, consider the possibility of clinical depression. mild cases can kill motivation and creativity without being obvious. a friend who battles it describes it like this: "i'm like one of those restaurant stoves with 8 burners, but some of the time only one of them is working." when she's in a good state she's unstopable; when the depression hits hard she can't get off the couch. get help.

-get some regular exercise!

-this was my toughest lesson: if you're having a hard time completing a project, you might already be done. finishing is scary because it means you have to face the possibility of failure. deal with it. it's better than not finishing and never doing anything else.

[Nate Battles]

Thanks Paul! I'm workin' on it. :)

[j.e.simmons]

How badly do you need to do the work? If photography is an avocation, a hobby, a way of self-fulfillment, do something else for awhile. Or, change formats, grab a 35mm or digital and go for a walk - every 50-steps stop and find something to photograph. Don't move until you take a picture.

OTOH, if photography is what puts food on the table, or you're under some other form of deadline, do what I had to do as a working journalist. Get to work. Many days I didn't feel like writing, but I had to roll a sheet of paper into the typewriter or fire up the word processor and write.
juan

[Patrik Roseen]

I was curious to see how many photographers get into a creative slump. By this I mean when you don't feel like picking up a camera and shooting anything. Or when you feel that it's time to start a project, but your ideas wether materialized or still just floating around in your head, just don't turn out to be what you originally had envisioned. What are the ways you have overcome this? How can you prevent it?

~nate

You are probably not alone with these thoughts or lack of ideas for creativity.
Apart from having problems to kick myself out the door to photograph there is also the case of kicking oneself into the darkroom or mixing the chemicals to develop already exposed sheets. I think sharing a project with others makes it easier.

It could be a good idea to team up with some other fellow photographers e.g. define a challenge for 'competition'. These can either be simple tasks of things you are likely to find or more hard to find things. As others have said sometimes its about getting out there and do it.

Examples:
- trees in the wind
- pics including something red (or what ever you feel for)
- Choose a poem and make a photograph for it
- Choose a song and make a photograph for it
- People holding a hat
- Photographing people with a special profession
- Double exposures, i.e. short and far focusing of the same subject.
- Before and after
- ...

[speanburgarts]

Bump your head. Really, I have been in a terrible creative slump until the other day at my job I walked into a light and cut my head. LoL

[tim atherton]

Bump your head. Really, I have been in a terrible creative slump until the other day at my job I walked into a light and cut my head. LoL


Worked for Muybridge (mind you, he also went mildly nuts and also killed his wife's lover... but he did some pretty good work after the clonk on the noggin!)

[CG]

Hmmmm,

I had a painting teacher who made one think about staying productive. He would visit the student's cubicle / studios twice a week. If, at a given student's space, he saw evidence of substantial new work, he would stop in and talk about the work. If there was nothing much new, he'd keep right on walking to the next student's space. that was real motivation to be productive. I was paying a fortune to get the help and input from some real artists, and I didn't want to toss it all away.

I stopped, right then and there, from procrastinating on new work, or on wondering what to do.

Instead, I started formulating a set of layered strategies to keep productive. I had several layers so if the first didn't work, the second or third would.

I have improved my plans since then, and heeded his advise to be productive whether I "feel like it" or not. I don't wait for the muse to beat me on the head. I summon the muse by starting to work first. Inspiration follows effort - not the other way round.

In detail (and the details are vital.):

1. This is most important. Have a primary project you are working on now. Define it well, and have a strategy for it's evolution and continuance in place at all times. Think out it's future and where it could derail, and how to explore it's variations and nuances, and how it might be different in the future. Keep thinking a few steps ahead of yourself, but don't let the work get ahead of itself. Fully explore the work of now before jumping ahead of yourself I used to "burn up" subject matter and go to the next thing waaaay too fast, and found myself in a corner and in a slump too often. Slow down and get more out of every good idea. Good ideas are too rare to blow through them and waste them. If one image of a potato is good, maybe I can find fifty new variations that are equally worth while.

2. Have a couple of backup "projects" ready to jump in to. Sometimes the last project IS really finished.

3. Have a notebook with sketches of things I haven't had time to photograph or paint.

4. Have some backup subject matter at hand all the time. I keep some interesting dried plants in a box ready to paint or photograph. Emergency subject matter has bailed me out of a slump before.

5 Go back to the last previous phase in my work that I could stand to repeat doing, and just jump into an old project and do some more. If it was good once, maybe it will keep me creatively alive - if not really nourished.

6. Scrounge the studio for any boring item - a bottle or box and photograph it or paint it regardless. It doesn't matter what you work with since inspiration follows effort. Oddly, the further into the list I have gotten, the more ready I was to improve my work. My real turning points followed near despair, and that leads to the last and most difficult...

7. Don't let frustration turn into fatal despair. Big events of inspiration only happen once in a blue moon. Frustration is a normal part of the creative process. Tone down the mental agony. It's normal to feel awful sometimes if you're trying to find something that's yours and new and interesting. It's a great deal to ask of one's self to do all that. There's a huge tendency to think one is a loser if one is not inspired and totally sucessful all the time. The reality is that most good and great artists have been uninspired at times, and some work though it.

Once in a while, with luck and effort, inspiration happens. It isn't every day for me, and I need a plan to keep going creatively when I am in the slumps

Good luck.

C