Something strange happened on Christmas day. I started taking pictures in a way I never had before. I was photographing Christmas lights at my mother’s house, trying to capture bokeh glares and the colorful lights reflecting off of wet slates. I put my camera closer and closer to the wet ground until I started creating these crazy abstract light blurs. I had the aperture wide open and was spinning the focus ring kind of haphazardly and snapping the shutter. The images I was capturing were unlike anything I’d ever seen or made before with a camera. They looked liked illustrations or photos from space. In short, I was playing and very much lost in a creative moment. This is something I haven’t experienced in a LONG time.
When I look back on my Instagram, I see that last year I only posted four photos before last week. Honestly, even though photography is an important passion of mine, I just haven’t been interested/inspired to create or share any work. I don’t think I’m alone here. Maybe it’s Instagram fatigue, maybe it’s being in a full-time content creation role (in the pandemic!), or just being burned out. I’m not sure, but it’s nice to be creating again. I haven’t sold any NFTs yet, but I’m excited about the photo community I’m seeing emerge on Twitter and the opportunities that are being cultivated for artists with DAOs and other blockchain-based technologies.
In the spirit of creative boldness, I minted the images from this colorful shoot on Open Sea (I opted Open Sea over Foundation this time to save on gas fees and to see how it may or may not affect traffic to the images). You can see the rest of the images here (https://opensea.io/collection/sidewalk-nebula) and below.
As always thanks,
John