Who inspires me?

Gabriela Bowers
May 9, 2021
3 min read

Throughout my photography career I have been on a journey on discovering my own style and technique. With that takes plenty of practice and trial and error to see what truly portrays my my individuality as a photographer. With the photography market being so saturated with a multitude of talented photographers, it can become difficult to see where you stand and if you'll even stick out. However it is impossible to create work that is not somewhat inspired or influenced by previous work. We are constantly exposed to photos and images on a daily basis, so subconsciously when we produce, it'll always resemble someone elses style or technique somehow.

As my passion and interest for photography grew, so has my appreciation for other photographers in the field. I found myself wanting to create work as good there's or try out their style. That's where I realised that I had formed an admiration for other photographers and their work. Nowadays it is quite easy to keep up with other photographers work, especially if you are on social media, simply pressing that 'Follow' button will automatically have you constantly exposed to their latest projects! Whereas compared to the older days where people had to physically buy their books and portfolios to get a good look at most of their images in the best quality.

Who influences me?

JESSICA KOBEISSI

In recent years I have stumbled across Jessica's YouTube when she first started out her series '4 photographers shoot the same model', she introduced me to the world of post production and retouching, and ever since then I have been hooked on her content and everything she had to teach about photography. She has made an array of videos explaining things from of course retouching, colour grading, and equipment to even the more pressing subjects like contracts and client horror stories.

Jessica is a young fashion fashion photographer who has built most of her following on YouTube due to her advice and talent in the field. What I like about her way of shooting is how it is very portrait based, and the viewer is automatically attracted to the tones, colours and textures of the image. While she also shoots in black and white sometimes for a more classic take, it is to deliberately extenuate the lines, and structure of the clothing. Her compositions and posing are always quite interesting and keep the images looking exciting and very fashion forward.

What I have always found endearing about her was that she rarely ever works in the studio or uses artificial lighting. For me, that was something I could relate to her with, was that we both prefer the outdoors when it comes to taking our photos! Needless to say that her studio images are completely stunning, and definitely inspires me to try and brush up on my studio experience.

LENA MELNIK

Lately I have been following a photographer and filmmaker called Lena Melnik, who similarly to Jessica Kobeissi, shoots fashion. Lena has shot commercial and has worked with various magazines.What struck me about her photography was her beautiful compositions and how much she accentuated and embraced the models natural beauty. She works in a variety of ways shooting in both studio as well as on location. She is not a social media character, however uses her socials to the advantage of promoting her work.