Since last September I barely made any photographs. I suppose I was burnt out from overthinking about my art, what I really wanted from life, and in general a lot of stress from different areas of life. So, for a good half a year, I have not picked up my camera except for the occasional snapshot and testing some new settings here and there. During that time, deep down I missed taking photos and this feeling was slowly growing stronger, but it did not reach the threshold to take any action. That is, until one day, I caught in my hand my never used before Beirette Electronic, a compact, automatic film camera. It has a 42mm, f2.8 lens with adjustable aperture, zone focusing and ISO setting. But that is all that goes for adjustability. Shutter speed is calculated by the camera, with no exposure compensation or any other shooting mode setting. Basically, it is an aperture priority point and shoot camera.
I believe the simplicity of the machine was what sparked some sense of inspiration in me to go out and shoot again. I didn’t need to think about settings, I cannot even check focus as there is no range finder, only a viewfinder with some floating marks that show the edges of the frame. On the one hand this setup made it more difficult to take great or even usable pictures. On the other hand, this simplified the process of shooting. I couldn’t control a lot about exposure, I wasn’t even sure if I had the focus at least in the vicinity of the subject. Hence I did not have to worry about these things. I could easily just let them thoughts go. The picture might be completely shit, so why worry, just shoot. It was kind of a gamble, with delayed results and surprises. Moreover, this way of thinking alleviated the pressure creating something beautiful, that comes from comparing my work to the pristine and perfect looking art that one sees every single day on social-media sites. I knew, these photos were not going to be perfect, but they were something else, something different.
This carefree approach and the excitement of that bit of gamble and not knowing the results immediately helped me to get out of that rut. It did not solve all my issues but it was an important first step. There are a lot more to be taken even though now, a couple of months later I feel much better about photography. I know have a goal and motivation to create, but more on that later.
