ORIGINALITY IN AN OVER SATURATED MARKET

I've heard photographers talk about the photography market as being "over saturated", and it's true. If you are taking the same photos as the millons of other photographers in the world then yes, it's as saturated as....well, as the photography market. I look at it differently though. In a world with infinite possibilities coupled with a good knowledge of Photoshop then it should be relatively easy to stand out from the crowd.

Is it a saturated market for Von Wong or Kirsty Mitchell? I don't think so. Photographers of that calibre stand out from the crowd because they create images that no one has ever seen before. My theory behind this is that every original person has had a 'bollocks to this' moment. When they have become so tired of churning out the same crap that they just say "bollocks to this" and start actually thinking about what they are going to do next.

Recently I've started to have that same 'bollocks to this' feeling. Although I've only really been taking still images since March 2014 it has already started bugging me when someone says "Let's do a Little Red Riding Hood shoot" or "I want to recreate this image". I'm thinking 'Why? It's already been done!' I think those things are good if you just want to practice, but once you know how to use your camera and you know how light works then why spend all that time putting together a shoot that someone else has no doubt done better somewhere else?

On the rare occasions that i do a shoot that is a 100% Goat Noise Photography shoot I've started to really think about what i'm going to do. Not just the props and models, but how am i going to light it? How can i do something different from natural light and flashes? What produces light? How can i add that light source into a location? Then think of something crazy like a spaceman. Where can i get a spaceman suit from? I can gurantee you that somewhere right now that whatever prop you need is sitting in a warehouse somewhere and someone will rent to you.

So, in short. Originally will stop your area of photography from being so saturated. If there are a million wedding photographers in the world, how many of those just use film and use vintage cameras? How many people take family photographs but actually set up a scene where every member of the family is doing something interesting and not just sitting in a chair?

Be original.