Being a fine art photographer is easy.

Shogun Kamm 1988-2007

All you have to do is take photos with the intention, or heck even the afterthought of it being art. Being a good, or dare we say great, fine art photographer is another story. But no matter what kind of photographer you are, if you’re making fine art, there’s a possibility you’re art will never make two dimes to rub together. Doesn’t matter, because you can’t make fine art for money, that’s called commercial art. Fine art has to be made for the passion of it. If people want to pay you for that passion, nice. If not, f-it! You’re creating art for the love it, right? So when you’re running low on inspiration, what better to do than shoot what you love?

What do you love? Remember this is about ideas. So don’t focus on the object of the love. Focus on the idea of it. The feeling. Sure you love your wife/husband/girlfriend/boyfriend. Heck, you might love your girlfriend even more than your wife! (Just a joke, sweety.) But the person you love isn’t art, it’s what you love about them. Idea-a-fy it.

I love the rain, but a photograph of the rain is all wet. What I love about the rain is the idea of peacefulness I feel, the idea that the water is cleaning away the staleness of the world, a freeing isolation, a comfortable, saturated loneliness – that’s what I love about rain. Now if I can create a photograph that makes other people feel what I feel about rain, that could be some quality imagery.

Make a list. You know me and my lists. For this list, write down what you love about what you love. Then go out and make a photograph that makes the viewer feel that love. What’s that? Sounds like too much work? Oh, okay, then I’ll just tell all those things you love that you don’t really love them all that much. Is that what you want? I didn’t think so.

So get to it. Do it right now. Make that list. Honor the things you love and you’re likely to find both a deeper love and an endless source of inspiration for your art.

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