This week I posted a few words about being comfortable shooting “nothing” in the post “A little faded and not so perfect anymore” receiving some questions about what my “typical” day looks like when I am out walking the city and shooting, the length of time I might shoot, what I find worthy and interesting and how often I might shoot. And so as a follow-up to that post, I thought I would share with you visually what an afternoon looks like when I am out and about searching for “nothing”.
Yesterday, I decided to take a late afternoon walk and head to TK Maxx in the city center for some shirt shopping waiting for Agnieszka to finish work and meet up with me. I left home around 16:10 pm and took the tram from Ochota and headed into the city, continuously shooting whatever caught my eye along the way. I got off at the main train station and decided to walk the long way around the Palace of Culture and Science so that I could continue to shoot while I headed towards TK Maxx. In a moment of inspiration, I detoured to have a coffee at eMeSeN and enjoy a few minutes of reading. (I love this place and found out yesterday that it will be closing next week….so now is the time to go if you have not been and live locally. Lease issue and they are looking for a new spot.)
Finished with the short break and it’s time to get back to shooting! It is now around 17 and I begin to make my way to my destination shooting along the way and not in too much of hurry. I am pretty pleased with what I have captured already and now that I am heading into a more pedestrian area, my eyes are fully adjusted searching for nothing. I did mange to find Einstein buying a smart phone and that kind of made my day.
By 17:40, I am finished shopping, having snapped a few images inside and recieved word fom Agnieszka that she will meet me shortly. Perfect, I now have 20 minutes to kill waiting for her to trek across town and I can spend it shooting in the area nearby Metro Świętokrzyska where she will arrive.
Spontaneously, we decide to have a coffee and a glass of wine at Przegryź (which has the best Pierogi z jagodami) and head towrds that area in the tram. We recently discovered this spot and really enjoy the atmosphere, snacks and neighborhood. Afterwards, around 19:55 we begin the walk towrds the tram and home, of course I am shooting somewaht along the way.
All in all, I shot around 200 images yesterday and thei varies day-to-day. Some days I can shoot 1000 images and some days its 20 (if I am not working for someone, then it is a lot more obviously, but on my time, then it varies. And as a freelancer, time fluxuates.). Some are repeats of a scene that I was uncertain in how to approach while others are just junk. The details above are only important to give context to my afternoon and a small timeline. It isn’t necessarily hours and hours spent looking for something in particular and in most cases it is myself needing to get the charge of inspiration and while I am getting charged up, I continue to shoot…”nothing”. Mostly when I am shooting it is wandering from one scene into another, looking for interest, but sometimes something like beautiful light or a spectacular scene or landscape will make shooting easy for me, but if not, then I busy myself with “nothing”..
Everyone has a different approach to how they work and what they see. This is how I am approaching mine right now and this will even change as I grow more confident in the city and my style. The point of this post is to provide a little insight into what I do to keep inspired and show some of what an afternoon of shooting can look like. When I first started to pursue photography, I was often unsure of what I should spend time on and what I should focus on and I would often go out to shoot, and come home feeling defeated and bitter from not having anything to show. Later, I shifted my idea of what it means to me and crafted a better approach for myself, like the one described here. Spending a few hours looking for nothing in particular and coming away satisfied that I might have something to show you.
I do this just about every day and as a matter of fact, I am about ready to go out today after I finish up some work and that I need to do. I love to walk and explore the city with my camera and see what I can discover.
Here is a map of the route. After which are a bunch of images from the route, all in order of when they were shot. As for the images themselves, only about 3 of them are ones that I might normally post and the rest may end up in future posts or an article or they may not. Today, they end up here. Enjoy!
Note: I take my camera everywhere. Always. And on the rare occasion that I leave it at home…I find that I wished I had it. So I bring it everywhere (this is where I insert that I am suing a Canon EOS 6DII and 50mm 1.2f that my fantastic partners at Digital24.pl have put in my hands to use…and use I do). I also have my Samsung on me when the need arises to use that…which I do as well, but in a different manner. I really love the Samsung for fast and easy images that are instantly sharable.
Erik Witsoe 