How I almost lost my creative self when it comes to photography.

I discovered film photography about a year ago, it changed my life - giving me a reason to leave the house whilst helping me with depression by me wanting to create something.

It’d happen about once every 3 months - I’d take a photo nicer then anything I have ever captured to date and I’d see my social media rise with these snippets of ‘‘perfection’’. What was once a one outstanding photo every 3 moths became one every two months… then one every few weeks. Suddenly the photos that sparked my creativity at the beginning of my journey were not worth pressing the shutter for. Simple every day scenes and places around me went ignored.

That’s when I stopped taking photos, I could not see myself going out and spending time on photos that would not match that perceived perfection that I had created in my mind and that lasted months.

Now I have come to a realization that that model of creativity is unsustainable, for me at least - I have to focus on what I enjoy. I have started a new account on instagram where I only post photos that I enjoy taking, I don’t care if 10 people see my photos or 200, what really matters to me is that my creativity is being kept alive. I might end up getting an ‘‘outstanding’’ photograph eventually, which I’ll post to my old account with all the good ones but for now, I’m just happy to focus on the reason I fell in love with photography. Lessons learned - stay true to who you are when it comes to creativity, don’t compare yourself to others, there’s only one you and It’s already the best version it can be.

In case anyone is interested, My new film only Instagram account is @AnalogGrn