Question for the masses

[Chris Reisetter]

Was just wondering a general question for any who care to answer. In the amount of time you have been into photography, have you ever lost confidence in your work? If so, how did you counter act the displeasure you felt about your abilities?

[Jim Poor]

Yep, just last week!

I got back behind the camera and produced some GREAT portraits to get around it.

[ilookalot]

Originally Posted by Chris Reisetter

Was just wondering a general question for any who care to answer. In the amount of time you have been into photography, have you ever lost confidence in your work? If so, how did you counter act the displeasure you felt about your abilities?

I spent 8 hrs shooting a surfing event once not even thinking to check the iso setting(i forgot that i had been doing some low light experiments the week before)
What i ended up with was 300 of the most grainy looking shots you can imagine,the iso was set on the highest setting possible,this was in the first few weeks of owning a dslr and i was mostly winging it .
how did i cope ? canned every photo,
I reset my camera and went out the next day and got some great shots.
To say i was displeased with myself is putting it mildly but it taught me some very important lessons #1check camera settings #2 review pics regularly( i even cover the viewing screen and my head with something to block out the bright sun light) . # 3 check camera settings.
Most important of all is don,t give up ! read your camera Manual to get to know your camera well .Things will get better

[NgaiHill]

Look at this forum for inspiration! Have a look at the water drops and smoke tutorials and try something new, I have had some very pleasing results from experimenting and it just excites me more about the potential of the art.

[dbevisjr]

Before one can lose confidence in his/her ability, one must produce something that proves he/she has the ability to take great shots. I haven't really reached that point digitally but I did get some nice shots on film back in the 80s. Although I do see some improvement in my shots I am really looking forward to getting some with my DSLR that will bring back that feeling I had with film photography.

[theosus]

Originally Posted by ilookalot

I spent 8 hrs shooting a surfing event once not even thinking to check the iso setting(i forgot that i had been doing some low light experiments the week before)

Been there - had my camera on aperture priority instead of shutter priority and got 20 shots of blurry animals on the disney "kilamanjaro safari" excursion. At least they were well lit, if blurry. It was mostly animal butts any way, they seem to know when Im coming, turn away from me and hide their heads. Learned something on that trip. Check the darn settings, ignore the histogram and actually look at the SHOT every now and then.

[andyw]

I think anyone who is in any "artistic" type of endeavour sometimes doubts their ability or skills. After all we should be our own worst critics.

I have often looked at others work and thought "wow", what a long way I have to go to get to that level.

I am at the point these days though where even if I think something is not that good, I rely on whether or not the customer or actually likes it.