we as human beings are so freaking hard on ourselves. we tear ourselves down and believe we are incapable.
but as it turns out, you can do ANYTHING you put your mind to. you are, in fact, VERY capable of incredible things.
these days, it is so easy to make our lives appear flawlessly wonderful. we choose what to show and what to keep hidden.
but as it turns out, everyone is fighting some sort of battle. everyone is dealing with some sort of insecurity.
that being said, I wanted to share something about myself with you.
as some people know, I have never taken a photography class in my life. everything I know about the art and action of photography I have learned by playing with my camera, by trial & error. which is great, because that is just how I learn best. however, it’s also not so great because I never learned the basics of shooting film – how a light meter works, what settings to use for what different situations, how some numbers affect other numbers, blah blah blah. the technical side of my camera has terrified me from the moment I got my first DSLR at age 16. I have used the safety net of the screen on the back of my camera for TEN YEARS. and recently I have been really, really hard on myself for not knowing the basic knowledge of what I thought “made you a photographer.”
so I set out to change that.
my 2015 resolution was to learn how to shoot film. on manual — all the logic and smarts that I didn’t think I had.
I purchased a Canon EOS-3 on eBay, ordered some film, and got to work. I had NO idea what I was doing, because I couldn’t see the photos I was taking on the back of my camera any more. I had no security blanket of an LCD screen telling me “these photos look GREAT!” when the shutter on a film camera closes, you’d better hope your settings were right or else that moment is lost in a world of under-or-over-exposure forever.
it took me a couple months, but I got through my first 2 rolls of film: one B&W and one color.
then it took me several weeks to work up the courage to send them in to be processed.
I had convinced myself that the photos were shit and was hoping that at least ONE of my 60 exposures would “turn out”.
friday night, I got my photos back.
and much to my disbelief, every single one of my exposures was on point.
yeah, some of them were a tad overexposed. some of them weren’t focused to perfection. but to me — they were perfect.
and I had doubted myself and my ability SO HARD. all for nothing.
….
I share this with you because I want you to know that I’m still learning.
we are ALL still learning.
the moment we stop learning is the moment we should be afraid of.
my hope for you is that you BELIEVE IN YOUR OWN GREATNESS.
because, as I said before, you are capable of incredible things.
