One of the most difficult things to obtain as a creative person is good feedback. You can get opinions from many sources, however, good feedback is often quite difficult to obtain. There is a joke that goes something like this, How many photographers does it take to screw in a light bulb? Answer: Twelve.... One to do it and eleven who say, "I could do better than that." One of the rare and special opportunities that I had was maintaining the Studio in New York City. Yes, NYC is an exciting place to be, however, that was not what made it wonderful. It was the ability to learn from other photographers, the feedback from my peers..... My building was located in the Photo District on West 23rd Street, a block from the Flatiron Building. There were quite a few photographers in my building. Several of us would get together at the end of the day and discuss the projects that we were working on and give each other advice or suggestions. It was a wonderful and rare environment because we were supportive not competitive. While we were all working in one of the most competitive markets in the world, we competed in different areas of photography. One worked with food, another still-life, industrial products for another, and my area was fashion (mainly beauty). We didn't directly compete with each other so this allowed us to be open and honest.
I met with several very talented students the other day, helping them 'zero' in on their career goals and personal style. This made me think of the analogy in marksmanship of sighting in on your target. When I was in the Marine Corps we had an expression called 'Chasing the Bull'.... After meeting with these students, reviewing their work and offering suggestions, I 'googled' Chasing the Bull and found this on a site called Len Backus' Long Range Hunting:
... but also your ability to shoot accurately is diminishing rapidly. This leads to the more inexperienced shooter (and some experienced shooters too) to second-guess what they are doing. If the shooter can see any results of an impact at all....
Now we are engaged in what is commonly known as chasing the bull. Many improper factors have been evident but not picked up by the shooter. This in turn causes a chain reaction of events that all lead to loss of confidence in all aspects of the weapon and the shooter's ability. Slow down and analyze what may be happening before you start to chase the bull.
The title of the site could be very appropriate for creative individuals as well, Long Range Hunting. Sometimes the best advice comes from looking outside your area in order to get the 'big picture' on things. So how does this relate to our creative individuals?
Pull up some of your favorite images, not the ones that you think people like or ones that are big sellers..... Be honest with yourself and pick what YOU truly like and then look for the commonalities. Show theses images to some trusted friends and see if they see any similarities. Developing a trusted group of friends or a mentor would be the best situation. Periodically you need to get some feedback on what you are doing. Sometimes it is best to "Slow down and analyze what may be happening before you start to chase the bull."
