We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Sara Bruce. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Sara below.
Sara, we are so happy that our community is going to have a chance to learn more about you, your story and hopefully even take in some of the lessons you’ve learned along the way. Let’s start with self-care – what do you do for self-care and has it had any impact on your effectiveness?
Sometimes the stress of normal every day life can put weight on ones’s shoulders. I add in not only the chaos of lightness and darkness within my own life, but I channel that energy to the images that I capture while out sky chasing, or what most others call Storm Chasing. The drive to the fact of being told that my images were plain out not good, ugly, and stupid, helped foster me to the work that I do today when I’m out chasing storms or photography in general. I may have been limited in the fields of what most would consider as photography with nothing more than a phone camera, but I didn’t let that stop me. Even with mobile photography, the skies and what you capture has no limits into your own creations. Photography can be the best medicine in terms of self-care, self-love, discovery of one self and creativity. Even if your captures aren’t how you want them to come out now, keywords will be to keep practicing until the day you get to where you want to be. Your results will come out with how you imagined it within your own mind. I myself would have never guessed that I’d be a finalists for the 2023 Weather Photographer of the Year, but I did. Don’t limit yourself, or stop yourself from spreading your own wings out there.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
To most I’m known as the Weather Jinxer Storm Chaser. This would be my third year to actually be self-teaching myself photography on a DSLR camera which is no easy task. Everyone has to start somewhere, it doesn’t just happen overnight as much as we all wished it would. It takes a lot of hard work and time, as well as putting in the effort to get to where we want to be in photography. I always advocate to use the gear you have on hand versus just going out and buying the most expensive equipment. This year in terms of chasing the skies and storm chasing I’ll be more focused on improving on sharpness within my images, as well as continuing to fine tune lightning photography since that is my main goal. I always think it’s important to have a plan or a goal to work on, to help improve and fine tune what you’re learning or wanting to learn, whether that’s a new hobby or skill. Keep practicing and you’ll eventually succeed, and I promise there is no harm in asking questions as well as trying and failing to get to where you want to be in photography. It’s a long journey, but it’s a journey all of our own when learning something new or to add to your own self-care.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
If one was early in their journey on photography and wanting to improve on their skills would be to practice, know your gear, and don’t be afraid to fail. For starters I could state that when I was first learning how to do self-taught photography, you want to know what my bright idea was? It was to take my camera that I had no idea on really truly how to use, due to no knowledge on how to even use a camera, look up information on the internet from multiple sources on what settings they thought was best, and went straight to a thunderstorm to try to take lightning photography even without a Tripod. You want to know how that turned out for me? Either completely black images or completely white images. I can laugh about it now, but do you know how disheartening it was when I first tried? Looking back now I should have known how to use my gear properly, as well as not go out during a thunderstorm expecting awesome pictures. Wasn’t going to happen. Sorry. So know your gear, know what and how your camera works, even in terms of mobile photography. I can’t stress this enough, but practice, practice, and practice some more. Even if you don’t have a whole lot of time, and you don’t even have to go out there with a plan in mind of what you want to photograph, just get out there and practice. You can even practice in your own backyard. Just practice and never give up. Which leads to my last bit of areas to know, is that it’s okay to fail. Most photographers out there, and even hundreds of websites will always tell you to post nothing but the best images. Trust me, we all make mistakes, and we fail. Sometimes hundreds of times. We keep trying, keep practicing, and for most they only show off that masterpiece of art we call photography. So, even if you fail, and believe me you will, I promise, it’s not the end of the world, we keep striving to improve and we keep going until we capture it as to how we want others to perceive it or what we want you to focus on. So if you’re staring your own journey in photography my advice to you is don’t ever forget to know your gear, keep practicing, and that it’s okay to fail.
All the wisdom you’ve shared today is sincerely appreciated. Before we go, can you tell us about the main challenge you are currently facing?
For most in being creative and a photographer the biggest obstacle or what I call a road block is the feeling of just not being good enough, or not being a great photographer in general. We’re sometimes our own biggest critique or we’re plain out just harder on ourselves besides just the audience. It’s always the questions of what can we improve on, or what can we do to make things better. One way I resolve that roadblock is to keep on trying and practicing as well as look at other photographers images for inspiration so that when I look at someone else’s art I know what I like or dislike within the image to help tone my own style. Remember in photography, we each have a different style in terms of capturing the images as well as editing. We each have our own roadblocks when starting or even if you’re further within your own journey of photography.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/weather_jinxer_storm_chaser/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WeatherJinxerStormChaser
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/WeatherJinxer
- Youtube: @Weather_Jinxer_StormChaser
Image Credits
@WeatherJinxerStormChaser
