Episode 007: So Many Photos, So Little Time

I took them, I guess I have to share them too

If you've been following me for a while you know I love a fresh start, and I have a touch of ADHD. If you haven't and you're just finding me, I've had at least three new Instagram accounts in the last four years. The first one had around 17,000 followers, and I decided one day that I was just going to delete it and start over for a fresh start. The second doubled in size and was about a year and a half old, and it was hacked. So, I saw that as a perfect excuse to delete it and start over again. On January 5, 2022, I started the fuji.hunter account and it is about that time in the cycle for me to get the itch to start over fresh again. However, this time is a little different. It is too big to delete, so I decided to try something different this time.

Like all my bright ideas, it started small, and then I started obsessing over it for weeks. I thought maybe I could just archive a few posts, and that would be enough to scratch the itch for a fresh start. However, I decided to archive everything, but my pinned posts and use my backup account as a place to share everyday snapshots. The idea I have behind this is to have one account for my best photos and another account for everything else.

I don't know if I'm alone here, but I often feel like my photography is all over the place. Some of my photos are the ones where I'm really trying and others are me testing things out. You see, I like to take multiple photos of the same thing over and over again until I get it right. However, I still like to share the ones that don't work or come out a little differently. When I'm in the mood to get out and photograph something but don't know what I'm looking for, I just look for old cars. These often don't fit the context of my more minimal New Topography style of photography. That's the point of the second account and it gives me a place to share these photographs.

To give you some context of how I am outside of posting photos on social media, I'm a practice manager for a family medicine office, and it is a running joke that I talk in a star shape and "vibrate" around the office. I can't help myself. I jump from project to project and get hooked on fixing problems. For example, someone said, "It would be nice to have a picnic table." Less than a week later, I was outside building a picnic table because I couldn't let it go. My personality is reflected in my photography, and most definitely my writing style too. However, it all comes from me and is an expression of what I see.

Back to the main point of this post, there is a fine line between practicing want I always preach, "Take photos for yourself because it does not matter who likes them." and curating your work to show only your best. I think both can be true and sometimes those B-sides are just as important because of the context it adds. That has been my main goal and something I'm still trying to figure out for myself. So far, I think having this second account is giving me that freedom I was looking for when it comes to sharing my work.

One account, fuji.hunter, is like my gallery and shows people this is the body of work that I am proud of and is my best face forward. The other account, plantsthatgrowdown, is all the work it took me to get those other photographs. For every photograph I'm proud of, there are a hundred that didn't work or are just snapshots. It's really important to me to share those photos that didn't work, because it is so easy to look at the ones that do and compare your work to those. I do it all the time with some photographers that only share their best. It seems like they never miss, even though I know they do and we don't see it.

It is so important for me to have that transparency and vulnerability on social media. I enjoy pulling back the curtain and showing everything, and helping others see that it is ok to miss too. However, I still need to have a space for myself to show what I can do when I try and showcase work I'm extremely proud of. Again, this is what I'm looking for and trying to explain, albeit poorly.

I hope your main takeaways from this are it's ok to second guess yourself, give yourself a fresh start, and every photo doesn't have to be perfect on the first try. Also, if you find yourself obsessing over something as silly as Instagram, you're not alone. I obsess over everything all day long, and I feel like I can't let anything go all the time. That is just part of being human. Do what makes YOU happy creatively; everything else will work out with time.

I want to hear your thoughts in the comments. Do you struggle with what to share or do you want to share photos right away only to regret it? If you found this useful, please give it a like too. It helps others find it and lets me know that you want more posts like this. As always, thank you so much for being here!

Love,

Jason

P.S. I missed a real opportunity to say, Hunter, Jason Hunter, since this is episode 007.