Accountability. We all need it to keep us honest. But when you have to keep yourself motivated, and there's no one looking over your shoulder to keep you on track, sometimes its hard to keep yourself going. When I talk to my friends, and students, I always ask them about what projects they have coming up and what projects they have done recently. A simple question, "So what have you shot recently?", starts and avalanche of excuses. "I haven't had the time." "I am going to get around to it." etc. The main problem is, no accountability. If I don't call and ask them about their photography progress, it never comes up, so its easy for them to just let it go. Well, I came up with a simple thing for them to do. One simple accessory to keep photographers motivated, and accountable to themselves.
A portfolio! Here's what you do. You buy a 12 page portfolio and you commit to putting ONE completed photo per month in the port. That means you commit to NE single completed photo per month. You make this commitment and promise to yourself. Now, at the end of each month, you either put your completed photo in the port, or you put a piece of paper in the port that explains to YOURSELF, the honest reason you didn't
shoot that month. So you either have a photo for that month, or the reason you DONT have a photo that month. But the key is, EVERY MONTH there is some representation.
At the end of the year, you go back and look at your port. It will either be full of your work, or the reasons (or excuses) you didn't fulfill your promise to yourself. The thing is, you will be reading what YOU wrote. You will be the judge. And you might get tired of telling yourself the same old excuses and force yourself to create actual WORK for your port.
Accountability is a powerful tool. Use it to your advantage.
STAY CREATIVE!
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