Today I was thinking about the importance of capturing memories. And the importance of letting them be just that.
Anymore, we take photos in order to INSTANTLY tell a story and share with our friends, family and social media audiences what it is that we are doing in this moment. These photos were taken in July, a little over a month ago. This last month being very busy, I hadn’t had a spare minute to sort through these images or to do much with them. Our entire family, me and my five siblings, their spouses and children and my parents were able to all be together for the fourth of July. I am not even very good at keeping my camera out during family functions anymore - but it was a beautiful day, a rare occasion, and I planned to keep it by my side.
It’s always in the back of my head, “Oh so and so will want to see these”, “Oh that is a good shot, people would enjoy that” and "I have to get this one just right because this will be the one I share on Facebook"… Yada yada… And when you think about it, sharing to social media, especially when it comes to weddings and special events - is sorta my job. But today, while looking back through these photos, I was reminded that our motivation behind shooting shouldn’t be to “instantly share” but to instead think of the moment in the far future when it will be shared as precious history, maybe as a print or as that photo that hangs in grandma’s house for 15 years. I should be motivated by the sweetness of the moment and the memory that will be held through the photo, instead of the attention that photo can provide me if instantly shared with the public. This isn’t to say its ever wrong to share things you’re doing right now, or something you’re excited about, of course not! But it is only to say, whether you’re shooting as your job or whether your just snapping away on your cell phone, when you snap the photo - let your motivation be SO that you can remember the moment in 10 years, not so that the world will know about it in 10 minutes.
Food for thought. 😃 Happy Sunday!
<3 Laura Marie
Very nice Laura, Thank you!!
ReplyDeleteIn some ways being a photographer is like being a painter or musician. Many times your work isn't fully appreciated until years down the road. The value of your photos increases over time. So much so that someone would pay a hundred times as much as your asking price just to peer back to that time in their life they can never get back. Every time you make the extra effort to capture those moments, you are warming the hearts of multiple generations. This is your art, this is your music. In a world where everything about our lives is insta-published, the caring, slower approach of the photographer is needed more than ever.
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