Photography’s Biggest Downfall (for me)

i love being a photographer. sure, i bitch about it sometimes, and get frusterated with all logistics of it and all the shit, but i always knew the artist path was for me and most of the time photography fills all the artistic voids i have. most of the time. actually all of the time. except for one: when i am attempting to express some kind of emotion of mine. politics – easy, sexuality – easy, someone else’s emotions – as easy as they make it. but, there is something about portraying a personal feeling that dams up all my photographic juices.

part of it is fear. fear that i will be like all those other cheesy photographers that just try way too hard to portray personal emotion through something conceptual. or fear that i will do another stupid self portrait that looks whiney and pathetic.fear that if i genuinely put myself out there, it’ll just go horribly wrong!

the other part? confusion. i am truly at a loss as to how i would make that happen. i feel like because photography is documentary in nature it is hard to figure out how to turn that into something that a constructed from something so personal, at least while trying to maintain some kind of realness. how do i place myself in an image (both physically or conceptually) without it being over thought. i find that my best photography comes when someone opens up and i am lucky enough to catch it, when they forget for a moment that the camera is there. how am i going to forget the camera and take the picture?

just a random random thought.