Inspiration.

At (a month shy) of 40, I feel I am exactly where I am meant to be.  In life, in career.  I have an incredibly supportive family, two amazing little darlings, a husband who is one of the most honest and hard working men I know, and a small circle of friends who I trust and who inspire me in countless ways.  And although the journey to “here” has been full of bumps and curves ….the road ahead sometimes scares the daylights out of me and sometimes has me racing towards it.  But on mornings such as this as I head into a double header wedding weekend, I’m feeling incredibly inspired.  

As a wedding photographer, we are inundated with millions of images of in the wedding industry.  With countless wedding websites and resources like Pinterest, it’s easy to get sucked right into the abyss of shooting images like everyone else.  And for some photogs, this works great.  See a pose you like, save the image, and shoot it the next time you head into a wedding, senior, baby, commercial or family shoot.  But this does not work for me.  In fact, it works against me.  I usually leave feeling less creative and that I somehow wasn’t able to shoot like that amazing photographer did even though his shoot was in Fiji and mine was in Tecumseh.  Hmmm.  Crazy how that works.  Or like xyz Photgraphy up the road who seems to be shooting more often than everyone combined.  But anyways, you get the point.

So today as I head into a full weekend of shooting beautiful people, amazing details and more importantly people’s connections with eachother I look at what’s right in front of me for inspiration.  My own world.  Not what another photographer sees as inspiring.  But what I see as inspiring.  My children, my clients, sunshine, fresh fruit, a morning kiss …. it’s this type of inspiration that sets me up to produce my best work.  When I shoot from somewhere real, that is me, when I shoot from my heart.