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timclinchphotography.com

Do you have lots of good ideas for photography projects – but

find they never come to fruition? Tim Clinch knows exactly

how you feel. The answer, he discovers, is to think smart.

A FORTNIGHT AT F/8

I

t may sound as if I’m

preaching in this month’s

column, and possibly I

am a bit. Please realise, as

you read, these words are

addressed to myself as much

as to you. The subject of my

sermon, Dearly Beloved, is, to

my mind, the most common

failing of photographers, and

I am certainly no exception.

I have recently been having

a good clear out of all my hard

drives and computers, during

the course of which I have come

to a sad realisation. While I am

a fount of great ideas when it

comes to my personal projects,

I am very good at starting them

off, but I’m absolutely rubbish at

finishing them.

The aforementioned hard

drives are full to bursting with

the seeds of good ideas. A few

pictures lovingly taken, a great

and impassioned side of A4

full of reasons why this latest

project will be the one that

changes things. The one that

will get done, the one that will

prove, once and for all, that I

am a great photographer, and

the one that will get me off

my flabby backside and prove

to myself that I can still cut

the mustard.

What the hard drives do

prove is that not a single one

of these projects is anywhere

near completion. In fact, the

majority are floundering at the

idea stage. They never even had

the decency to fail because they

didn’t get that far.

I

was having a conversation

with a colleague recently and

he was expounding on his

own latest project. It was a

year-long photographic essay

about someone or other he’d

met somewhere or other and,

as my eyes began to glaze over,

with a sinking heart, I was forced

to confront one of the main

problems for us photographers.

Our plans are almost

invariably far too grandiose.

We need to think smaller and

more concisely.

I mentioned this to the

beloved partner, who is a

teacher, the other day and she

said: ‘Ah – that’s because your

projects are not smart.’

Now, I’ve never been a big

fan of these management-

speak phrases, but it was, I

have to admit, a bit of a light

bulb moment. SMART stands

for Specific, Measurable,

Achievable, Realistic and Time

‘Our plans are almost invariably far too

grandiose. We need to think smaller

and more concisely.’

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