Aaron Outward: Is Less Really More (A personal Challenge)

Late last year photography for me started moving from a simple hobby to a passion. I had begun studying it much more detail and actively working towards becoming a better photographer. Then some great news came my way, they found my bone marrow match and I would be having my transplant immediately. From a health standpoint this was awesome news but it also meant an extended hiatus from my newest passion. What made it worse is I had just upgraded my equipment to much nicer lenses and a semi-pro camera that I was dying to use.

As most of you know the transplant went great and I began my road to recovery. Soon I would be back out on the streets and in the parks doing what I love. Then it happened, the first decently nice day where I could go outside had come. I grabbed my gear and off I went to re-ignite my passion. Something was wrong; while I was out I didn’t feel inspired. I felt like I couldn’t find anything of interest for me to shoot, and I went home fairly dejected. I decided maybe it was just my creative eye was lazy from its hiatus and just needed some time to practice to see properly again. I went out the next day, which turned out better but still not that same passion as before. Everything when I was out was a chore.

That night I started reflecting on what was happening. Why was I not enjoying this like I used to. I had this fairly top of the line camera and lenses, I should be having a blast. It was this concept popped into my head, is Less Really More?

As I reflected back on my year in photography in 2010, although I was enjoying it quite a bit I was always changing and upgrading my gear. Finally, when I hit acquired the kit that I thought would make me happiest, I was actually enjoying it the least.

I realized I had fallen into the common trap of consumerism. We are always being bombarded with bigger, better, and faster products with all these new bells and whistles in a bid for us to replace our perfectly good products for something new. But the real question is do we actually NEED these features.

This realization made me take a step back and begin to analyze what type of photography I actually enjoy shooting and what I features are actually required for this.

This is when I really started asking myself the question, is less really more? To do this I had to start honestly weighing my Needs versus wants.

When I actually sat down and looked at my kit I realized all the great features it offered had come at a cost, weight. My camera was heavy, and for someone recovering from a transplant, I was much weaker which affected my ability to shoot with the camera. This wasn’t the biggest issue. When I really looked at it I realized the camera made me a lazy eye level photographer. I am not afraid to lie on the ground and roll in the grass (of course when it is less muddy and dry) to try a different perspective. But with this camera I wasn’t really open to trying out more perspectives. In addition, I realized that I barely used all the features that made this camera better than the lower level versions.

This realization made me really intrigued with the concept of is Less Really More. As Einstein said, “any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex and more violent. But it takes a touch of genius and lots of courage to move something in the opposite direction.”

So I thought I would give myself a new challenge to help improve as a photographer and re-ignite my passion; The less is more challenge. I would downgrade my equipment to something that only satisfied the NEEDS of my photography and ignored the wants. This way I could focus solely on improving as a photographer. I knew I would of course upgrade my camera again one day but only when I felt that my equipment was limiting me photographically and my current camera was no longer satisfying my needs. No longer would I be sucked into the consumerism trap bigger and more complex unless it specially addressed a need of mine.

It took me a couple weeks of swaying back and forth between the "is Less Really More" personal challenge. But each time I came back from taking photos I grew more and more restless, and finally pulled the trigger.

I think my Less is More challenge achieved exactly what I had hoped for. It not only reignited a passion for my photography but poured a whole gallon of gasoline on it and it has made me a much better photographer. The images in this post are what I consider my five best images since I took up this personal challenge. They were all created with the entry level Nikon D5000 and Nikon’s cheapest lens, the 18-55 VR.
Since taking up my personal challenge my photography has improved in leaps in bounds. So the question I would pose to many of you, are there things in your life that would actually be improved by imposing this less is more strategy? If so I would love to hear about it.

Is there an image that is missing from here?