Getting back the inspiration to shoot!

There comes a time when any work one does feels repetitive and uninspiring. It was precisely this need and hunger for inspiration that led me to pursue photography in the first place. Over the years I have done a wide array of photo shoots and in the last few months I had been stuck in a creative rut.

Recently, taking photographs felt like routine work and I was not “feeling” my camera like I did in the past. Even though my gear has grown substantially and our studio members have increased, but I felt an unexplainable emptiness inside me. I had grown technically, but I felt that I had morphed spiritually inside.

On one such dark day I got a call from a client to shoot a family portrait. So I booked the shoot for a Saturday and set off to their house with Shumail, our Pi Studio member. I only took one continuous light, one external flash, one camera body and a couple of lenses. This was a very trimmed down version of gear we usually use for our routine shoots such as weddings which usually involve a lot of equipment and manpower.

The shoot was planned to be shot in the afternoon inside my client’s house and in its outer courtyard. The house was beautifully constructed by the Pakistani architect Mr. Ali Alam. When I reached there and started searching for frames, I felt the inspiration return back to me. The patterns of light and the beautiful architecture gave me ideas to photograph the family. The father of the children shared a great idea, thus we ended up photographing the family on the roof as well.

The family kitten "Buffon"  playing with the son's shoelaces

As I started shooting, my heart started to melt at the love and affection the family had for each other. The way their children were playfully laughing and the love the parents had for them was profoundly heartwarming. The love and laughter shared by the family melted my heart and brought back the photographer in me.

I got reminded that what photography was really about and why I had started shooting in the first place. The love which we share with other human beings as a photographer is what shooting is really about for me. Moreover, the joy of capturing the most intimate moments of humans and preserving them for future generations is the ultimate joy in shooting.