Finding motivation

and overcoming a slump in creativity.

May 27, 2024

Hello, I’m Gill and I write a photography blog inspired by the landscapes of Suffolk and beyond. Please subscribe to read more of my writing and visit my website to view my images

Saxtead Windmill in a meadow of buttercups.

Every once in a while my creativity takes a nosedive and I find it difficult to get motivated and to get out and take images. I am not really sure what the catalyst for these feelings is but it can make photography really challenging. It is difficult to be a creative when the creativity isn’t flowing.

Photographically May is one of my favourite months. The countryside looks vibrant and fresh, there is colour everywhere and the weather is usually conducive for the soft dreamy images that I like making. I don’t even mind the early sunrise times and find it fairly easy to adjust to the 4am starts.

However this month we have had a lot of grey mornings, the wind has banished any chance of mist and I have been putting off going out with the camera because the weather hasn’t offered the conditions I crave. I have plenty of images in my head but these haven’t materialised because the conditions haven’t been perfect.

So this week I decided I needed to get out with the camera and make the most of the spring landscapes, otherwise I was in danger of missing all the sights that make May beautiful. It is no good waiting for perfect conditions only for the season to march on and the landscapes to change before I have had a chance to photograph them.

The things that I find particularly appealing about May are all the wild flowers and I love the opportunity to incorporate them into my landscapes. So this week I headed out to focus on some of the areas I have passed recently on my travels.

I am lucky that here in Suffolk we have some varied landscapes, from the coast to the heathland and forest. However much of the open land is agricultural with wide open fields of wheat, barley and sugar beet. Usually these hold little appeal but every so often I come across fields of flowers that have been planted for animal feed or as a green manure. These fields create blocks of colour in the landscape and can present a challenge compositionally but I love photographing them as they are transient and different.

Crimson Clover - a field of green manure

In landscapes like this I like to try and capture the essence of the location by sketching with my camera.

What do I mean by ‘sketching’ with my camera?

Sometimes a single image doesn’t do the landscape justice. I can see a photograph that I feels represents the scene in front of me - like the first image of the clover field (above). But does this single image tell the whole story? If I add the three detail images of the clover into the mix, does the combination of all four images tell a better story?

This is what I mean about sketching with my camera. I like to take lots of images - trying different angles, viewpoints, focal lengths, depth of field or camera techniques. I also like to think creatively and experiment and I like to consider different way of using and displaying the images I have taken.

Photographic sketching is about creating a body of work from one outing - where the impact of all the small sketches is greater than that of a single shot.

On Thursday I visited a nature reserve on a small creak very close to where I live. I went there to see if the sea pinks were blooming on the Saltmarsh. The light was very flat and the day was windy but I decided to try a sketchbook walk and see what I could make of the location. My idea was to try to capture the essence of the creek using a series of images instead of one single shot. I wanted the sketches to be small, themed, and complimentary and I planned to combine them all at the end of my walk into a single panel that I felt best represented my time in the location.

I like to employ this idea when I am feeling at my least creative as I think it really helps to re inspire me.

Despite the grey day the creek was looking beautiful. There were vast swaths of cow parsley and ox eye daisies blooming along the edge of the sea wall and I was instantly drawn to these natural elements.

Boyton Dock shot through the cow parsley using a shallow DOF. The avocets flying overhead were a bonus!

I photographed the flowers as I would usually do, shooting through the foliage to create a soft dreamy effect. I then experimented with some in camera multiple exposures which I felt gave a more ethereal feel.

2 image, in camera multiple exposure of cow parsley

I also tried some multiple exposure, ICM images - which I never usually do, but I found it was fun to experiment, particularly with the grasses. These images were two exposures blended in camera, one was an ICM shot taken at 0.4 second at F22, ISO 31. The second was a straight shot of the grass overlaid in camera.

I may never use these images again but for me that is the whole point of sketching with the camera. Like an artist it allows me to play, to experiment and try new things. These images are a complete departure from my usual photography, but if I only ever repeat what I have always done then surely I will never grow as a photographer?

At the end of the session I had lots of images of small scenes which I edited in a cohesive way (by making sure all the tones in each image were similar) and used them to create the following ‘sketch’ of my morning on the creek.

This type of photography means that I can go out whatever the conditions and find something to create. It may not be a portfolio shot but it gives me ideas for things I could shoot when the conditions are better.

I have written about this idea before and you can read how I created a similar panel in the past in this PDF. I also discuss my thoughts around presentation and processing.

If you are feeling inspired then I would suggest you check out the work of Niall Benvie who has done something similar with the grid theme. He calls this work chocolate bars which he describes in the following way:

Offer a hungry person a single chunk of chocolate and they aren’t likely to be satisfied. But offer the whole bar and it’s a different story. The same principle applies to single, close-ups of rock, or lichens or indeed any abstract image. Present them together in a single piece of work, however, and they acquire a presence, collectively, that they lack alone.

You can view Niall’s chocolate bars here.

Creating panels allows me to photograph the diversity of a place - I can capture the whole story and all the variations of a location using different images which I can combine artistically to create one image. This can often be more powerful than the sum of its parts. Below are a couple of examples.

As for my motivation - well, just getting out with the camera has made me feel so much better. Spending time in nature, soaking up all the sights and sounds, connecting with the world around me and recording my observations in a series of sketches has been liberating and fun. There was no pressure to produce something stunning, just the opportunity to enjoy the landscape.

Motivation for photography can be hard to find at home. My best advice is just to get out with the camera and take pictures - you never know what will develop.

How do you deal with lack of motivation ? Do you have any tips or ideas that help you overcome times when you aren’t feeling that creative? I would love to hear your thoughts so please leave a comment below.

For the Love of Landscapes

Discussion about this post