Do you consider taking pictures of your doll fun?

I used to love taking photos of my dolls, I used to have no problem carrying them out in public either, but something with me changed over the years and now I find it a chore and don't do it at all. Which really sucks thinking about it. I used to love posting/sharing my dolls but now just keep to myself. I recreated my BJD Instagram page to try and motivate myself to take photos again but no luck lol (; w ; )

 

OK, confession time: I HATE taking doll pictures.

I don't like how they turn out. I take tons and tons, and then it's a fiddly process of uploading them to my computer, deciding which ones to keep and which need to be deleted, uploading to Flickr/Tumblr/Instagram, fighting with said social media on cropping, and watching the decompression data loss turn my somewhat nice pictures into a grainy mess. Oh, and as an added bonus, realizing that something was wrong the entire time, but I'm too lazy to go back and fix it.

Now, I like looking at pictures of dolls. I like the pictures that I've taken of my dolls, cuz they're already taken. I like sharing pictures of my dolls, because other people like them, and sometimes folks find them useful.

I hate taking pictures on my phone - they always turn out fish-eyed because of the small lens.
I hate using the camera, because I am not good at it (more practice and knowledge needed).
I hate lighting. It's always either too bright or too dim.
I hate setting up pictures, cuz I'm still remodeling, the house is a mess, and I have to clear a space. Also, there's almost always a random cat photobomb and wig theft.

So, that's my confession. I hate taking doll pictures. And I am very embarrassed/ashamed about it.

 

@MaleficentMrsofEvil I think the biggest issue with photography is that if you have something you want to achieve in a photo, you will almost invariably need gear and prep time for it. Even though photographers always claim that gear doesn't matter, in the end they always talk about gear and spend thousands for the sake of, say, a slightly faster lens. Why? Because someone with gear can do stuff you just can't do without. It's not like painting, digital or traditional, where if you have more or less the same instruments the sheer quality of the output is 90% decided by skill. Actually a good draftsman can do with a crayon what someone who can't draw well can't do with a $5000 screen tablet. It will straight up look better.
If you read photography manuals outside of the very basic ones on composition and framing, they're mostly about what gear to choose to achieve something or get a good picture in a given scenario. An example is that if you are shooting in a place where lights are warm (say 3000K), and use a flash or other light with a different temperature (say 5500K), the final result will generally look poor. Why? Because you can't white balance for a cool and warm light at the same time. One of the two temperatures will cast a dominant on the picture. That's why if you shoot with a flash around dusk it looks ugly and it's obvious that you used a flash. The solution is using these gel strips that go over your flash and correct the temperature (you can do that with colored plastic, but those are graded correctly to achieve a certain temperature). And so on and so on. If you're shooting outside you also have to consider that gear is heavy and takes space, you need to set it up...
The second issue is that although you can DIY some of the gear, like diffusers and reflector sheets (you can't DIY off-camera flashes that sync correctly) setting things up and finding the right shot becomes very time consuming. If you don't have a studio place specifically set up for shooting pictures, it's even more time consuming. Generally the cheaper and less gear-intensive you go, the less you don't have a full immersion approach to photography, the more time-intensive things become just to set up. And if you don't set things up, you generally don't get pictures that are just as nice. It's not like painting where someone who's really good can do stuff that looks good in two strokes of a crayon.

If you get into the aspect of playing with light it can be fun. I generally use a couple light sources and bounce some light off a white sheet of paper (or whatever I have, pillows, fabric), it's fun to see how you can modify shadows by just holding something near the thing you're photographing.

 

I love taking pictures of my doll! Admittedly, most of them aren't great and I take them with my phone. Even so, I enjoy capturing photos of my doll in different places, outfits, and poses. For me, it's like keeping a log I can look back on to see the progress I've made. I only share a handful of the pics I take to a few friends.

 

Thank you, @lutke - I suspected that it was also partially an issue of me being cheap with my camera.
For example, if I got a newer camera with a larger screen, I could see mistakes and correct them immediately and not afterwards.
Perhaps some photography books and a better camera are in my future... After all, I did the smallest upgrade on my sewing machine and fell in love with sewing.

 

@MaleficentMrsofEvil I think if you have a decent camera already there's no need to upgrade for the sake of upgrading, but it's a good thing to get the tools if you don't have them, like reflectors and so on. Reading photography books tells you what to get! I was not dissing photography or claiming it's a pay-to-win sort of deal or saying that manuals are glorified adverts, but there's indeed a nexus between using techniques and having the tools needed to apply those techniques. Without the gear and setup for the gear, you can't use the techniques. I think it can be fun, it's just time consuming to get proper shots unless you have a dedicated studio space.

 

There is a super easy fix to this! Just zoom in a little (2x zoom works well for me without there being any visible image quality distortion). You might need to step back a little and take pictures from further away than you are used to but they'll look so much better and it'll be so much easier to frame your image. Fisheye-be-gone! Same for the camera - dial in 55mm for the focal length and you'll get a good portrait with some nice blur in the bg.

I think it is true to an extent (if one wants a specific type of hi-quality photo with a good skillset to start with) but I also have to disagree with a lot of this. I think something that puts people off from enjoying taking photos is that guides and photo communities are often overly into gear and technicalities (that you gotta have the fast lens and the reflectors and that and that tripod and you gotta do it in a studio, and get this flood light and master-slave system flashes and make sure you get the up to date model camera and etc etc etc) which makes people new to photography feel like they have to overcome this huge learning curve with a lot of expensive tech and then they're finally allowed to take photos as long as someone on the internet approves of the camera they're using. This will just end up with a lot of gear that sits around unused and not very many good photos get taken And all those available tools will still not fix unflattering angles or poor lighting and most of all the feeling bad for "not being good at photography". No amount of joints makes a well-posing doll, no amount of gear makes a good photo.

Sorry for the small rant but I feel 100% that great photos can be taken with very basic equipment and most problems easily fixed for free, especially if it's a hobby and for fun. It's sometimes nice to upgrade once one feels like they've grown out of something or has come to the conclusion they need something specific, of course! I always feel a bit sad when someone is discouraged from exploring photography further because they don't have the "right" equipment but in reality... how awesome is that we have little decent cameras in our phones these days? That you can whip out of your pocket, play around with a bit and take some cute shots of your dolls with? Insane.

 

@cobaltconduct Don't get me wrong, I'm far from a gearhead or approving of gearhead mentality. I shoot with an old phone but when you look to do something and you end up bumping against the limitations of the gear you're using, it's a pretty hard wall.
I had a small photography setup for other things that is just two lamps with thin paper taped on as a diffuser. I use white sheets of paper as reflectors. It's OK, it works, but it doesn't compare against things done with a proper setup (gear but also a proper photo space, time to set things up and so on).

Also... Note that this specifically applies to me and my own photos. Some of my favorite photos in the hobby are definitely not made with professional setups and all the shiny gear. I definitely like mood more than perfect lighting or whatever. But when I'm taking pictures I do feel the weight of technical limitations, and I think that impacts how much fun I have with setting up a photoshoot.

 

I love photographing my dolls, and do so all the time! (my flicker has over 30k photos, the vast majority being my dolls haha..) But I usually don't bother with setup or lighting, other than to make sure the doll can be clearly seen. I take photos for myself, to help with my poor memory, and to preserve moments or ideas. I rarely take nicely set up photoshoots anymore, but I did use to try now and then. I got myself a nice lightbox that stores away easily and a low-end dslr camera that's good enough for me...but I often just use my phone to snap quick shots. I have very shaky hands and low energy so I lose patience with setup and lose my mind over dust specks or flyaway hairs. Easier to not care and just take candid shots. (for me, of course!)

 

Any kind of arts and crafts I do I've never been into the photography aspect afterwards. For a lot of people it's its own art form and really fun. Not for me! All the fun is in customizing, holding, posing, and looking at them. I take generally pretty crappy photos and I'm okay with that haha.

 

I do think taking photos is fun. Photoshoots are great! (I tried my hands on photostories before, too.)
My problems are: don't have a lot of time and I need to be better at taking photos. I should enroll in photography courses...

 

Most of the time I do get a sense of enjoyment out of taking the photos, same can’t always be said when it comes to looking through said photos though!
I only take quite basic photos anyway as I haven’t the space, patience or skill to set up anything elaborate. I really wish I did though as I admire so much of the amazing doll photography I see.

 

I love coming up with photo projects, choosing outfits and props, but in the end I hate it when I don't get the look I wanted. I hate editing photos. I hate posing. But I love taking pictures and I love looking at some of the more hilarious photos. But I keep thinking - is it worth the effort when there are so many better photographers out there? Can anyone even be interested in the amount of photos that are posted daily on Instagram, Flickr, etc.?

 

I am an artist but totally not a photographer, so I don't usually take photos of any dolls. I enjoy having them on display, thinking about their characters and stories, and sometimes making little dioramas for them, but not as much photographing them. Wish I did enjoy it though, some people make absolutely beautiful pieces of art out there.