You often hear photographers claiming to be a landscape photographer, a portrait photographer or whatever. At times, I have called myself both. However, I have long since realised that I am all of the above and more. I just cannot restrict myself to one particular genre. I like to shoot many different things.
While I do absolutely love to shoot the landscape, I also love to work with people. If I can mix the two up, all the better. I have a sketchbook – two of them actually and I often jot ideas down in them, with great plans to convert them into a body of work, at some stage. Unfortunately, more often than not, it doesn’t happen. I blame my own laziness for this.
On occasions, a few of us will just take a notion and head out for a shoot. Often, there is no theme and everything is open-ended – to be decided on a whim, according to the weather or location. And this is fine too. However, I do work better and more productively if we have some idea of what we want to achieve.
So last week when Maria contacted me for a shoot, I jumped at the chance. She is like a lot of us – she needed to get her photographic fix! Fellow photographer Nick then came on board and he choose the location. It was a stretch of coastline near Kilcummin in north Mayo.
The location was stunning with flat rocks layered upon each other and the Atlantic waves 
gently caressing the shoreline. It’s definitely a place I’ll return to, for both this type of shoot and landscape.
Although we had no theme going into this photoshoot, we managed to tick off quite a few different shots and overall it was a most enjoyable few hours. It gave me a chance to practice at being creative and now, like an addict, I cannot wait for my next “fix”.
On the way home, we stopped off at Rosserk Abbey outside Ballina to get this shot that Maria wanted.
Presently, I feel my creativity (If indeed, I do possess any) is stalled and sometimes, in danger of disappearing altogether. I believe that creativity has to be nurtured in order to grow. If I shoot every day, it will hopefully grow and develop – if I only shoot occasionally, it will plateau and stagnate.
I prefer to collaborate on these creative type shoots and always value input from the model or fellow photographers.
If you think you’d like to work on projects like this, or if you have ideas that you’d like to try, please get in touch.
It’s usually good fun too. It’s probably suited to someone that like me, is starting off in this field and certainly someone who wants to contribute creatively to the shoot.
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