Creaking a bit.
I will not go quietly into the night on account of a heavy bag
The thing about living a photographic life as a day job is that you have to make money with your photographs.
In the last two weeks I’ve photographed property for numerous realtors, people renting their swank properties on AirBnB, I’ve taken pictures for a press release, filmed and photographed a construction company, a hospital and a tech company. I also filmed a plenary speech (in German) about concrete. Some of this work has involved drones, some of it hasn’t. Most of it I’ve edited myself, but some of it I’ve outsourced.
You get the idea.
In my world, being a so-called jobbing photographer means being constantly available for bookings, available to work whenever I have an opening in my schedule, traveling around Stockholm by car or subway, carting around equipment, and being totally up for late-night stints of editing photos that have to be delivered asap.
It’s a bunch of other things too, of course, but I would say that my photographic life these days is definitely more “gig economy worker” than “sensitive artist pontificating about the light”.
I work to satisfy the needs of my clients, and get more bookings. To get paid. To get more bookings. To deliver photos and video and get paid. And so on.
Now, I actually like the blood-rush of my job. I’m a workaholic adrenaline junkie – I always have been. You don’t simultaneously write a PhD, teach full-time, write a novel (that gets published), and work as a freelance journalist for the broadsheets (like I did in my early 30s) unless you’re comfortable working hard.
But now that I’m 55, I find myself having to pace myself a bit more.
And that’s scary.
Last week, for the first time since I can’t remember when, I couldn’t power through my ToDo list on two occasions.
This might sound like nothing to anyone that doesn’t know me, but believe me it is: I would ordinarily have to have a fever (or there be an emergency) to not get through my ToDo list.
I’ve learned that if I don’t deliver on all the necessary fronts, I take a hit financially. Sooner or later. To some degree or another.
So, I’ve always pushed myself to get it done. Get everything done. Done and dusted. Dusted and done.
But last week I just collapsed in front of the TV. Two days in a row. I couldn’t do what I told myself I had to.
Then on Monday this week, after four shoots at four different locations around Stockholm, plus a hasty trip to the hospital for my regular botox treatment for migraines, I got back, walked Lucy and promptly nodded off over a cup of tea before I could empty my memory cards.
I awoke and chided myself for being lame.
From, the distance of nearly a week later, I have a bit more perspective and by my reckoning I’m either a bit run down, tired, on the cusp of burnout.
Or perhaps it’s the beginning of the beginning to struggle under the weight of being a full-time photographer.
Eeeek!
Trying to downsize
I’m having yet another a clear out. My office can be both stringently tidy and dreadfully chaotic. It depends on the time, the day, and whatever vortex of madness might or might not be swirling around me.
My golden rule though is to dust the desk every morning no matter what.
I sent off a large box of camera equipment to MPB at the start of the week in an attempt to keep the clutter down.
Yes, it will be nice to have a bit of money in exchange for the camera and numerous lenses I’m flogging, but I think what I’m happiest most about is freeing up the space. Both actual and mental.
I’ve been mulling over reducing my kit bag since the spring. It’s taken me far too long to decide what to do and how to reduce my kit bag that, in the end, I just boxed up what I decided I could/should be able to live without and sent it off with as little thought as possible. I literally did it very quickly so I wouldn’t overthink it again.
It occured to me a couple of days later that I might have been a bit hasty.
I’m worried that I’ve dumped an 85mm portrait lens when I probably shouldn’t have.
But right now it’s done and dusted and I’m not letting myself go there.
The lens was old, slow to focus and although it delivered beautiful images, I rarely used it because it’s too heavy to carry on my day-to-day shoot “just in case”.
Like I said, I’m on a quest to downsize everything.
Partly for the space, but mostly for the sake of my body.
I’ve been putting off a shoulder operation since the start of the year because I can’t/don’t want to take 6 weeks off work to recover.
The plan is to keep trying to keep the pain at bay with physical rehab. As long as possible.
I’m also trying to minimise my kit on shoots to reduce the wear and tear on my limbs.
I did a photo/film shoot at a hospital at the start of the week but kept my kit bag to an absolute minimum. We’re talking two cameras, two lenses. One for photos, one for video. I’ve been trialing this set-up for a while now, reducing the weight by skipping on lenses and not taking a gimbal unless I really, mission-critically need one. Hitherto, no one has commented on any changes in quality to the work I’ve delivered and I’ve continued to get bookings so – fingers crossed – the minimal kit seems to be ok for now.
But my minimal kit wasn’t enough for a job I had to do on Thursday. First, I photographed an apartment, which meant I needed all my interior gear. Then I covered a conference and had to do both photos and video. I literally had to cart around two camera bodies, four lenses, a video tripod, a regular tripod, an external monitor, six batteries, a cable, some memory cards, a multi-purpose tool for the fiddly stuff, lens wipes, a flash, and a camera strap.
By the time I’d finished work on Thursday, my neck and shoulders were so sore that I struggled to look over my shoulder when reversing in the car park when I got back from the city.
The gym helps, and I work hard to stay in shape. But I’m still not sure I’ve minimised my set-up as much as I could.
So, I’m ending this week still wondering what I could do to trim things down. Claude, my AI guru of choice, is currently telling me to ditch my hybrid Canon/Lumix set up and go all-in on Lumix.
I can’t deal with anymore existential questions right now.
7 Snaps…
From from my photographic life since I last wrote.
I took this snap on the way back from a paid shoot. It was a glorious fall afternoon. I couldn’t help but chuckle as I spied this guy with a book in his hand. He was leaning on a wall, wearing a beret and a very long scarf as if waiting to be photographed by some Instagram influencer. Unlucky for him, it was just me.
This was taken the day before I stressed like hell to get from one end of Götgatan to the other struggling under the weight of all my gear. I think I was anticipating ahead of time how stressed and weighed down I was going to be. I’m obsessive like that.
I took this while doing an interior shoot last Thursday. I always combine bracketed ambient exposures with 1-2 flash exposures to get the colours and lighting correct, and here I’m trying to get a shot of the hall. I look like I could do with a hearty lunch and a protein shake or three.
Taken during the “Swedish Concrete Industry” conference I was covering. I stepped away to the side of the room and glanced out of the window. I pressed my camera against the glass and focused manually to get the buildings in focus. Stockholm is a beautiful city.
I was meeting a friend for lunch but had a few minutes to spare, so I snapped a few frames outside Slussen. The renovations aren’t completely finished yet but they’re getting closer.
I’m going through a stage where I just photograph everything at the moment. Perhaps it’s because of the changing season. All I know is that I seem to just want to get everything and anything down.
I finished a gig and took some snaps on Friday as I wandered down Drottninggatan to the subway. Guess what time of year it is!!
Taken from a corporate shoot. The challenge of documenting an online meeting in a small room!
Bonus snap
A word of advice from an interior photographer. Be careful if you’re renovating your kitchen. Black or dark grey cupboards are very, very hard to keep clean. They show the dirt and where you’ve wiped them clean. But, I have to admit, they do look cool.