The Best Photographers Are Curious About Everything

(Photography was never the destination.)

There’s a funny thing that happens when people become photographers. They stop looking outside photography for inspiration.

Suddenly every YouTube recommendation is another camera review. Every book is about composition. Every podcast is another gear conversation. Every Instagram account looks exactly like the last one.

And then they wonder why all their photographs start looking the same.

I don’t think photographers become better photographers by SOLEY consuming more photography.

I think they become better photographers by becoming more interesting people.

The best photograph you’ll ever make probably won’t come from watching another “Top 10 Film Stocks” video.

It’ll come from reading a novel. Listening to an old song that brings memories and joy. Walking through a museum. Watching waves crash against a jetty. Getting lost in a city you’ve never been to. Having a conversation with someone whose life looks nothing like yours.

Living.

When I hit creative slumps, I rarely find my way out by buying another camera. I find my way out by stepping away from photography. I start writing. I fill notebooks. I read books that have nothing to do with cameras. I listen to music that reminds me of a different season of my life. I carry a film camera without any pressure to make “good” photographs. Somewhere in that process photography quietly comes back.

I think curiosity works like breathing. If you’re constantly exhaling, creating, producing, posting… you eventually run out of air.

You have to inhale.

Books are an inhale. Music is an inhale. Travel is an inhale. Conversations are an inhale. An adventure with no agenda is an inhale.

Even boredom is an inhale.

You can’t keep making meaningful work if you never refill the tank.

Photography has introduced me to other creative people, to music, to artists, to designers, to writers, to new places, to new culture.

Some of my favorite photographs exist because I became interested in something that wasn’t photography at all. The camera just happened to be with me.

I think that’s the secret.

The best photographers don’t obsess over photography. They obsess over life. Photography is simply how they respond to it.

The older I get, the less interested I become in mastering cameras. I’m far more interested in becoming someone who notices more. Someone who asks better questions.Someone who’s endlessly curious.

Because curiosity always leaves breadcrumbs back to creativity. And creativity has never lived inside the camera. It’s always been inside the person carrying it.

—Brendan