Trying to Get Better as a Hobbyist Photographer

I believe I’ve mentioned this before, but one of the difficult things as a hobbyist photographer, is finding people willing to simply let you shoot them for an hour or so. I’d love to get more practice shooting portraits, but I also know I’m not good enough, nor do I have the lighting gear, for someone to be relying on me to capture something like their senior portraits, family Christmas card photos,or engagement pictures.

Let’s face it, outside of those situations, people don’t generally run to get their pictures taken as adults, and many of us outright hate to have our picture taken!

So, I’m always glad to get the opportunity to take some photos for someone who gets that I can’t really promise them anything, but wants to just have some fun and see what we come up with.

I wrote last month about what I learned from spending some time with my friend, Christine, and she at least liked the finished product enough to give me permission to show off a couple of them myself. (She also made one her Facebook profile pic, which made me happy, I felt like I had at least accomplished something!)

I’ve started a little Facebook album of portrait work with some more of the photos, which is just photos of Christine at this point. Now I just need to find more people willing to let me order them around and take their picture for awhile with no expectations of the finished product. How do you find that when you don’t have kids? 😉

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