Are photographers loners?

[George Stewart]

I do my best work and am most productive when working alone. I do get lonely on my two week landscape photography trips, but find, from experience, that traveling with another person is not good when photography is the focus.

Unless the other person is a fellow photographer with similar ways and means (read resources, interests, mobility, etc.) I would prefer to go alone.

[Michael Wynd]

[I] had my first experience photographing with a group a few weeks ago and then my second two weeks ago. I found it interesting. The second shoot had only four of us, but we each shot separately even when together.
Mike

[David Hedley]

When out in the field, visualisation and the taking of photographs is a solo exercise; I can't imagine having my line of thought disturbed by someone else at that time.

When discussing the print, it's a gregarious, social activity, where the line of thought can be discussed, challenged, etc.

[Michael Graves]

I'm not a loner. I have many friends. There's....there is....no, wait--he's dead. Well, Bob still likes me. No, he's dead, to.

Hmmm, Jim's doing twenty to life so he's out.

Yep. Loner it is.

[Diane Maher]

Since you asked the question, I'm curious to know your thoughts...

Another way of looking at it is --

Are we photographers because we're loners

or

Are we loners because we're photographers?

I'm a social creature.

I think we'd be fine with having a crowd around when photographing -- but we can't concentrate that way.

I find it much easier to go into the darkroom and start printing if my lovely wife isn't around.

All I've shot in the last 15 years is portraits. I don't think a loner would be especially interested in photographing people every chance he/she got.

William

The question arose in my mind as I was walking back from a meeting (alone) last week. I've also noticed in my department that I seem to gravitate away from the social activities of the group. My excuse is usually that I have to drive too far or stay too late in the day. Sometimes I wonder whether that is truly the reason.

I have also felt that in the department, I am somewhat in between age groups. There is a group of people who are 55 or older and a group of people who are younger than 35. I fall in between and seem to have the impression that not many people in the group are in that age group. I may be wrong, but it just feels that way more often than not. I don't really know why. Maybe this contributes to the "alone" feeling that I feel.

I find that I enjoy being out taking pictures, but usually I go alone, because I feel like I am holding others back, in that I take my time and they just go firing off a bunch of photos. My camera club is a bit more tolerant (and so are some of the people who have gone shooting with me), but in the back of my mind, I still feel that way sometimes.

Maybe this is why I find it difficult to take pictures of people. I have done so in a workshop setting, but have yet to take pictures of people in a less formal situation on a more regular basis.

And maybe I should have worded the original question to be geared towards LF photographers (even landscape photographers), but I didn't and am happy with the various responses that I have read.

[Ken Lee]

To paraphrase an old Zen sage:

To study photography, is to study the self.
To study the self, is to forget the self.
To forget the self, is to become one with all.

[Toyon]

You've got to discriminate between loneliness and aloneness. Photographers need to be able to tolerate being alone, indeed relish it. But that's apart from aloneness - the state of being aloof from others and isolated. There is nothing better for me that coming in from the solitariness of photography and the darkroom and coming into a rush of people.... and vice versa, after a while.

[Jim Galli]

Available floor space in my little darkdoom is about 36X40 inches. I fear I'm up to about 220 lbs. Does this answer your question.

[rdenney]

I guess J.R.R. Tolkien said it best.

Yeah, but Bilbo was 128 years old when he spoke those lines.

I'm the age Frodo was when Bilbo sat beside the fire in Rivendell, and I still prefer to be doing something.

But I have no fear of doing something alone.

I'm happy to work alone with the camera, but the solitude of the darkroom would get to me after a while. I've never particularly enjoyed darkroom work because of that, though I've certainly done a lot of it. I prefer being alone in a house with someone else in it, if that makes any sense. Fortunately, my wife goes to bed early--that's when I get my alone time.

Rick "who sometimes confuses being alone with being self-sufficient" Denney

[John Z.]

In the PBS documentary about Ansel Adams he spoke at one point about the sacrifices he made to be a photographer, and spoke about the things in life he did not see, or time not spent with family, because he was off pursuing his photography; it was actually a very touching moment of him reminiscing later in his life.