When I came to my first semester of college, I thought I was a good writer and I wanted to get better at it, so I hoped I would write a lot. I got my wish. I wrote literally every day: I wrote for classwork; I wrote for student media; I wrote in my journal every night. Still, it wasn’t the kind of writing I wanted to do.
I was proud of my classwork, but it was always still just classwork, tailored to the professor I was writing for. My long-form student media work never made it past second drafts. My journal became more of a diary that I mindlessly described my day in. Despite probably writing more per day than anyone else I know, I started thinking of myself as someone who never writes at all.
Today, I’m opening my blog. I’m hoping that this will be my reason to write without relying on external forces like my grades or my resume to motivate me. My reward will be an online space that I can look proudly at, knowing I built it in my own image. Putting a spam email in the inboxes of my friends who cared enough to subscribe will be a nice bonus.
With that said, I thought I’d write up a little summary of my recent artistic life and where I think it’s going to go next.
Wait, How Did You Break It?
After a chaotic first half to my summer, I thought July and August would be my chance to slow down, work part time, and hunt for freelance gigs. The Kia Optima that broke my hand on Independence Day thought otherwise. As a result, I didn’t do as much this summer as I would have liked.
However, there was a big step forward in my career when I shot for Defend the North X in August alongside the supremely talented Rell McCready, which really deserves a blog post of its own.
The other big development was purchasing my first film camera, a Petri FTEE, from a guy I knew on the internet. Using film not only made photography more fun, but more memorable. I doubt shooting my first ever roll and then running into Kai Cenat making a video in lower Manhattan would have been quite as interesting if I had my DSLR on me.
It also helped that the analog camera was comparatively easier to operate while I was deprived of my left fingers. Unfortunately, nothing in this world truly comes easy, and I was reminded of that when I discovered that my second roll was loaded improperly when I had been shooting on it obliviously for weeks.
My two completed rolls now sit in my dorm room waiting to be developed. I might do it myself in my darkroom class next semester if I can’t be bothered to pay someone else to do it before then.
What’s Next?
Before I started photography, I was learning 3D art. It was my Covid hobby; I learned composition by posting renders to online forums, then receiving feedback from a colorful, international group of mappers and animators.
Of these talented people, many were also photographers. I was told that the skillsets for 3D scenebuilding and real-life photography were pretty similar. Maybe that’s why I liked my first photos so much that I felt encouraged to keep practicing. Still, for the most part, my only critic was myself.
For years, I’ve been my own photography teacher. But two weeks ago, I started my first ever photography class.
This is pretty much uncharted territory for me, but I have a few basic predictions I’m fairly certain of:
- I’m going to be shooting a lot more frequently.
- I’m going to see a lot more of my area.
- I’m going to become a better photographer.
With weekly assignments, I won’t just be shooting when I feel like it; it’ll become something of a routine. And I will be using that routine as a reason to see more of the DMV from the big Metro system I get unlimited access to.
But it’s obvious that spending more time shooting will make me a stronger photographer. The important part is that I’m preparing to relearn the basics. As a lifelong hater of video tutorials that taught himself Photoshop, weightlifting, computer animation, and fighting games, I know how easy it can be to skip over fundamentals. So even though I’m confident enough in my photography to sell it for money, I know my foundation could be a lot stronger.
So in the near future, the photos I post will be different. The subject material will be more mundane. They might be more similar within sets because of my specific assignment requirements. But most importantly, I think they’ll look better on average.
Also, I’m swearing off cropping, indefinitely.
Thanks for reading!
Ben Ackman's Photography Website 