Samantha Hayn Photography | Shooting with intent to capture emotion

This is something I’ve been struggling with since the beginning of my photography. I always knew I wanted to capture the essence of certain moods with my photography, but sometimes figuring out how to incorporate that seems nearly impossible. “How so?” you ask…

For example, I’m drawn to color, and bright light. I almost always favor a color image over a black and white, just because I feel like that’s more happy and cheerful, but what you might not realize is that’s mostly the opposite of my real mood that given day. Sometimes I pick up my camera just to calm down, relax, and ease my mind.As hard as this is to let out and tell everyone, I think it’s important to not hide your flaws, and brush what your going through under the rug.  I struggle very bad with anxiety, and while all the images you see me post are happy, colorful, and bright, what you don’t realize is I might have been the exact opposite of that deep down inside.  We all have good day’s and bad day’s and though most days are unbearably tough on me emotionally, just picking up my camera is therapeutic so I’ll go snap happy.

What I have come to realize though is capturing my “moods” whether its good or bad, it takes me emotionally out of this world (In a good way) because my heart + soul wen’t into it and I know I’m capturing something real. Nobody’s perfect, and all of the things you see on social media are not always  exact representations of the life people lead, or things people are going through.

I read a wonderful post from one of the artist’s I look up to dearly [Julie Paisley] and she really put things into perspective for me in terms of not trying to be like all the others out there and try to come off like I live this lavish life filled with a beautifully decorated house straight from a magazine, with the perfectly decorated office, a kitchen filled with only the finest of organic foods, and a closet filled with the newest “in” clothing. That’s just not me, that’s not the life I live or ever will live, so why try to even compete with that? Answer: you don’t. 

My life is the opposite. My room floor is COVERED in clothes, my kitchen sink is always full of dishes because they magically appear from thin air (literally), I barely ever wear makeup because “ain’t nobody got time fo dat”, most of my clothes have come from a thrift store, and I don’t splurge on anything [except] for photography related items, most of the time. lol! I have stopped looking for acceptance from my peers, and stopped fishing for the “pat on the back” and the compliments, and have accepted who I am as a person + artist, and now all I need to do is capture the pure essance of that.  

 This is something I’m going to be working on a lot this year! Shooting with intent to capture real emotions, whether it’s good, bad, happy,sad, messy, or dirty! haha it’s time to keep it real