Being creative and original is very important to me personally.
I like to think I’m striving for some kind of originality in my work, always.
I also like to think I’m an open minded person too, and hopefully only becoming more open minded as my age increases.
I think ever-evolving creativity and open mindedness go a hand in hand.
But can you be creative and original in an echo chamber? I’m not so sure.
Well if you ask Google it’ll tell you that “an echo chamber is an environment where a person only encounters information or opinions that reflect and reinforce their own”.
I had a few people reach out to me earlier in the year when I went to a certain wedding photography conference to say that they were surprised because that conference didn’t seem very “me”.
Exactly. And that’s why I went. I wanted to see something different. People I’ve never heard of or from. Differing opinions and styles to what I’m used to.
Echo chambers in wedding photography come in all shapes and sizes.
The tiniest of echo chambers is the personal ego. Believing your own work is amazing.
The next smallest is your friend(s) or family member(s) who think everything you produce is incredible. Having a photographer friend who is just going to tell you that everything you do is brilliant isn’t creatively helpful (or true).
And at the big end of the scale, arguably every “community” that exists in wedding photography is an echo chamber of its own, as they all pretty much push one look, one ethos, one way of thinking.
Social media is an echo chamber. Your followers follow you either because they’re customers or they like your work. You’re only ever getting a biased view.
And as a consumer social media is the echoiest chamber of all. As the algorithms are so clever now, they’ll only show us stuff they know we’re already into – so we’re blocked from anything that could challenge our opinions or help us form new opinions.
So an echo chamber is exactly what that Google search said. Something where our existing opinions are echoed and solidified.
And since our creativity is us expressing our opinions through photography, you can see the direct link.
An echo chamber is a comfortable place to exist in a lot of ways.
It’ll tell us we’re doing it the right way, that loads of other people agree with how we do it, and that’s great for our comfortability.
And I know for lots of people originality isn’t an important facet of their photography and that’s fine. It’s not an important consideration for lots of clients either.
But comfort isn’t always great for creativity either because it can lead to feeling stale and stagnant. And then our work doesn’t feel fulfilling. And that’s a downward spiral.
I’d argue the comfortability of an echo chamber is bloody awful for originality because you’re never feeding your creative mind with new information or inspiration.
I came away from that conference in March wanting my work to evolve in different directions. Not change, but evolve. Morph. I went because many of the speakers were making work different to mine. I wanted to hear why and where it comes from. I learned so much more than if I’d attended a conference or workshop within my so-called style.
The first step is realising that any community you’re taking part in is an echo chamber. I’ve never found one that isn’t. That’s not me bad-mouthing these communities it’s just my opinion. And as I said earlier, not everyone is chasing originality, which is absolutely fine.
If you are, then it’s important to seek out experiences and education which challenge rather than reinforce the opinions you’ve already formed.
There’s almost no point attending something which reinforces existing opinions as far as creativity is concerned.
And have at least one friend who will always be honest about your work when you ask for an opinion. That’s invaluable.
Even outside of the industry, listening to new music, reading different books than you’d normally read, going to places you wouldn’t normally go.
Once you hear the echo, look for a way out.
Thanks for reading!
Adam
