Thinking of who's looking at your pictures does make you shoot in a certain way, right or wrong?
My wife who is not a photographer BUT someone who does know how to tell a a nice picture from another will never be able to advise me which lens gives a "better" result, etc. But yet, she can tell me which picture she likes best and which she finds there's nothing interesting.
On the other hand, my photographer friends who know more about lenses will start asking me what lenses I used, film or digital, and all the questions regarding the equipment I used when they see some "nice" pictures from me.
So I guess, the "Nice" when my wife said it must have a different meaning to the "Nice" when my photographer friends said it.
So now, what?
Should I aim to please my wife or my photographer friends? (as a reminder, my wife is quite a critic at pictures. She's not very artistic when compared to many others but at least she has some art sense)
When I said, "ART is selfish, you only set out to please yourself, you should only shoot for yourself, you shoot what you feel NOT what you want others to like... etc..." erhem... "Bullshit!" that's what the realists will say! Sometimes, I am a realist too!
We all want an audience, don't we?
But some can go so crazy in "Fans-collecting" that they often lose themselves, lose their own character, lose their gut feeling, lose their moxie in doing what they want, in fear of losing their fans and losing their audience.
If my audience is a bunch of gear nuts, I'll be changing gears constantly in order to satisfy my audience.
If my audience is a bunch of non-artistic business people, I'll only be shooting what makes money, whatever that's "in-season".
If my audience is a bunch of sensitive people who appreciates ART, I'll be more sensitive in the content I wanna present in my images.
So I guess, it's either Change Your Audience (if you find you're not getting the right audience) OR Change You (to suit what's most "popular").
