Chris Warkocki | Perils of Photography

Justyna in her first model shoot

Being a photographer can be quite the gratifying experience, but it’s not all rainbows and beautiful women in my line of work. For every hour of shooting they say that there is an additional hour of editing. This rule applies to most, but I tend to be a speed demon behind the computer and can punish a wedding set the day after without a sacrifice in quality. Being quick is what keeps me caught up on the workload, but there is still a major sacrifice working the way I like to work…

Typically in a week I have anywhere from 1 to 10 shoots ranging from personal projects to senior sessions and of course model and fashion work. My mind is a constant fountain of creativity and energy but the intensity of the flow can change from day-to-day and even hour to hour. Like a geyser there are times when my mind opens up and rushes out with ideas and I can’t help but make phone calls to local models and vent my inner photographic frustration out on them at some sick location. These impromptu shoots tend to make people wonder whether I’m still sane or not, but I will let you know that all my sanity left years ago and I run purely on inspiration and gummi bears.

His ____ face...

With paid work and personal projects stacking up and my hard drive bursting to the seems I sit in front of my shiny new Mac wondering where to start and how I’m ever going to finish. This week brought me to my knees when it comes to editing with over 3000+ images total shot and many of them with time restraints I’ve had to pull myself together and focus harder than I typically let myself.

For those of you fellow photographers who suffer the same plague of editing perils I give you one pice of advice… VENT! I’ve found that if I don’t just walk away for at least 15 minutes from what I’m doing my eyes start to crawl slowly out of my head and land straight on my keyboard. Not a pretty sight, but it’s a feeling I get when I stare at the screen for hours at a time reading histograms and moving sliders slight notches left and right just to get the right amount of effect into the image. Why, O ever why did I decide that I wanted to edit all these pics????!

Amanda @ the abandoned house

In the grand scheme of things editing isn’t that bad. The problem I tend to face is bulk editing and that’s the problem when you start getting noticed and pursued by clients new and old. Today in particular has been a truly rough editing day with multiple shoots, with multiple styles all having to stay in their perspective areas as I can’t afford to start trickling one idea on to the next and then having to go back and start over. If only Michael Keaton knew how awesome it would truly have been to multiply ones self and accomplish all the things you enjoy the least but in a shorter time frame. Of course we all know there are penalties for using such awesome powers, but one can dream of bad movie plots coming true.

What is the most amusing part of this blog post is this is actually a way for me to break up my editing schedule today. Besides a wonderful phone call from a beautiful person today I haven’t given myself a lot of latitude to relax the mental muscle. I did rest on the cement floor for about 15 minutes earlier and even left for dinner at the nearby taco bell, but in all I’ve spent over 10 hours behind the computer today and am feeling drained physically, but mostly mentally. Hence this blog post as I need to use a different part of my brain to rest the necessary lobe for photographic creativity.

As a Heart Attack in the alley

The good news is that the quality of work that has come from this week has been exceptional and I am so happy to have experienced it all and pushed through those barriers to where I’m currently at. The sound of the Dropkick Murphy’s is definitely helping even though I’m not a big music buff. Getting past this hurdle is a lot of work, but every time you surpass it you get a feeling that you conquer any future projects that you may encounter. What I’ve learned today and hope to leave you all with is the fact that no matter how fast you are at something the inner fuel within runs dry faster even quicker. Mental fortitude and perseverance are the traits you need in any difficult task to finish with a great product and a smile on your face because you now know how awesome you truly are!