SS,

I guess we have to define what personal work is. Is personal work the image and only the image, or is personal work the reason behind the image.

DJ,
For me the difference is the "Intent". For events etc, I am working for my client or audience. For my "Personal" work, I'm working for me with only that in mind. If the audience responds to an image that's great but not the reason I made it.

__________________
"If you don't stand for something,
You'll fall for anything."

http://www.streetshooter.us

~ Shooter's Flickr photostream

Streetshooter,
You know the thing about shooting on the street that is important to me is that we have captured a moment in time. The landscape photographer like Ansel Adams was great, and I have a signed book of his. But you can almost see the place worn in the rocks from other photographers taking that same shot. Our work may not be great, but we have something that no one else has or will take again.
photosbypike

Chuck, your right on all counts. I'm not ditching Ansel My 38 yo daughter is named after him. Bethany Ansel. But, I have seen the glorious landscape spots riddled with ciggy butts, soda bottles, foot tracks etc...it's a terrible thing I tell ya.
If I want to see that stuff, I'll stay on the street where all that crap is home....

__________________
"If you don't stand for something,
You'll fall for anything."

http://www.streetshooter.us

~ Shooter's Flickr photostream

curiously enough, I really am not sure. I know why I compose classical music --it's the only way I can reveal my innermost feelings and anyone who can read my music can read me. But photography? I've been doing it at least twice as long as music and yet i'm not sure why as I haven't shown any particular aptitude for it so far. Perhaps it's because I feel that I have the ability to take good photos but just haven't quite found the way to do it yet. I suspect originally it was a way of showing my love of nature as if to say, "look, have you really noticed how beautiful this scene is". Probably I'm also a frustrated painter and would secretly like to create something as atmospheric as a good painter. Perhaps one day, someone will be able to tell me why I spend so much time on photography (and, even worse, talk about it on forums.....). I'll ask my girlfriend what she thinks.

David

Interesting discussion with many good points. I will just contribute with a personal comment.

When I took up photography again with the digital technique some four years ago I thought a lot about this and read different photographers and philosophers like Barthes and Baudrillard. There is no single answer to the OP:s question, only a personal one.

With the plentitude of photographs around us there is risk that one gets the feeling: "Not another one of..." But as every photograph is unique in a formal sense it can never get really boring. Last spring I photographed a rock on the beach at about ten different occasions as practice and for a local exhibition. I learned a lot and the light was never the same and therefore the resulting images were never exactly alike.

My main interest has always been nature but during the last year I have been doing more "street" and it is a new challenge. I have always liked to work with projects and it is a way for me to formulate a challenge. This years "street" project was 6 days alone in Paris.

I have been sailing for 45 years and raced a lot in different classes and also made some rather long cruises. For all my life this has been an activity that was never questioned, although it is expensive, takes a lot of time and can be rather uncomfortable at times. So when people asked me why? I always said that I am sailor and that's it! I still sail quite a lot but photography has slowly received the same position for me. So my answer to the OP is quite simply: I am a photographer and I like creating images. It makes me happy and it is always interesting to see how something looks when it is in a photograph.

__________________
Stickan 1

Panasonic Lumix GF1
AF Lenses: Panasonic 20mm f1.7 Pancake, 14-45mm Zoom

Other gear: Sony a900 + lenses, M9 + lenses

Homepage:
http://stickan1.1x.com/

It is interesting reading this thread. Some reasons are very personal, some are not.. and our photos can be the same as well.

My reasons are as follow (same ones I told my parents who thought I was crazy spending so much money on gears):

1. Exercise my creativity (outside of my normal engineering type research)
2. Documenting my life (instead of a diary and to supplement my lack of memory)
3. A hobby that is accessible everyday

I have been busy trying out many things the last couple of months, I am sort of searching for "my own style".

I can really relate to that.

Do you spend roughly equal amounts of time with each of these "relaxation" pursuits?

I too compose music (including some classical but usually more in the TV/film vein of orchestral than strictly classical). I'm kind of finding I go full circle between being interested in photography and graphics work in general, and composing but so far have only really pursued one at a time since both can eat time like there's no tomorrow.

Maybe I should find something I'm actually good at rather than flitting between two things I'm not good at!

Basically I'm in photography because I'm an equipment nut . I like handling cameras, from the days I was a little boy and could play around with my dad's cameras and other stuff .

I have done a lot of family pictures, doing less now because our children are over 20 and mostly oppose against having their picture taken. I have about 1.5m of albums with family pictures and I'm really grateful to myself I made all those. From time to time my wife and children pick a few of them and go over the pictures, very gratifying .

These days I'm trying to make pictures that are worthy of being hung on the walls; so far I have a few that I will have printed when I get around to it . My equipment is no excuse for bad pictures, it never has been BTW during the last 30 years.

I like going out with a camera, preferably during sunny weather with a fierce blue sky or very variable weather (sun + clouds + rain). I try to walk in a promising area, hopefully finding something interesting with appropriate light. Done some macro lately, but it appeared I really hate the fiddling around with flash, tripod, arranging stuff and all that.

Can't say something like not being able to live without photography, in fact I've lived through periods of several years without touching a camera. And then again I picked it up.

The period between giving up the darkroom and the inception of digital photography was a relatively frustrating period. Colour prints would turn out wrong all the time, slide films would be scratched and slides would pop in the projector or show Newton rings. Now I have control again in this digital era, finally !

This µ4/3 stuff comes right in time for me. It's luggable and it delivers quality pictures, photography gear has never been better and there's still more to come!

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Best regards, Ad.

Pictures | Equipment | Minolta collection

Well...What do I think when I pick up my camera?

Good and deep question, but if I start thinking about "why", I will miss my next good shot...So I just "do".

I will "think" in my next life.

Or maybe...I'm too lazy for painting!