How Much Time Should We Spend To Practice Photography?
How Much Time
Should We Spend
To Practice Photography?
(This blog post was inspired by an email exchange with a photographer who scheduled a private lesson with me.)
How much time do we have?
Who knows?
But of course, the time we have varies from person to person.
However, I think it’s fair to say that we try to make the best use of our time.
And it seems that most of us devote the time that we do we have to work, sleep, and to doing our usual daily activities.
However, we also gotta devote some time to playing and relaxing.
And if we wanna improve our photography, we gotta devote whatever time we have to our studies and practice.
Furthermore, we can consider photography our play-time.
And, If done patiently and deliberately, our photography studies and practice can be our relaxing time.
So, in short, if we wanna be better photographers, we gotta set aside some time to devote to our photography studies and practice.
But again, how much time should we spend to practice photography?
How much time should we spend to practice photography? The easy answer is…
As much as we can or as much as we’d like.
But when considering how busy we can get at times, we probably can’t devote as much time as we’d like or as much time we feel is needed.
How much time should we spend to practice photography? Hers’s some guidance.
Foundationally, when we’re starting to learn photography, I’d recommend making photographs daily.
And we don’t need to go anywhere! Or spend a lot of time.
Because about five minutes a day is an excellent start to make one thoughtful picture.
Guidance regarding light
Furthermore, I think it’s suitable for our studies and practice if we make pictures under various light conditions.
Because a practice like this will heighten our visual sensibility/versatility/vocabulary, and, more than likely, we’ll notice how working under different light sources affects our process and outcomes.
However, some of those conditions may be the kind that we’ll probably consider to be “difficult”/”problematic” but preserver and make the photograph anyway.
Because this type of study and practice gets us familiar with the characteristics of light and working with light within the context/limitations of our cameras/equipment operation and understanding of photography.
Guidance regarding thinking like a photographer
Most importantly, be thoughtful and deliberate when noticing the relationship between light conditions, the possibilities of composition, and camera operation.
In other words, think like a photographer.
Of course, the intent of our thoughtful effort should be to make the best picture that we can when considering the lighting conditions that we see and the camera/equipment we’re working with.
And, please, be patient with yourself.
For example, here’s an exercise that you can do right now with whatever camera you have. And yes, even the camera on your phone.
Wherever you are right now, take out whatever camera you have and make the best picture that you can of whatever you see that gets your attention.
And then critique it.
And don’t just photograph WHAT you see. Make a thoughtful effort to photograph HOW YOU THINK ABOUT what you see.
Related Blog Post(s):
https://samdamico.com/time-day-photograph-05-31-2017/
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