Johanna - The Empowering effect of individual portraiture and not having a niche

In the last year my main focus was on couple's within my photography - I mostly consider myself an LGBTQ+ couple's photographer. Romantic love is something which always fascinated me so this isn't a surprise. People around me called me a hopeless romantic many times. Part of growing up for me was to realise that while romantic love is beautiful, we shouldn't depend on a partner to be happy, or to value ourselves and lose ourselves in relationships.

When I started studying photography at college, taking self-portraits was a way to connect with myself and see myself from an outside perspective - but still through my own lens. My classmates taking pictures of me helped me to see how others see me. I explored how I wanted to be seen - and whether that was something coming from outside expectations or my inner self. This was an important step for me to explore who I am and to feel more grounded. Many times we are so busy living our lives that there is a lack of connection with ourselves - our body, our identity, mind, soul - whatever you like to call it. I think photography is an excellent way to find our way (back) to ourselves.

One question from my photography history professor that stayed with me was this: Can you take a photograph that is completely objective? I think that it is only possible if you close your eyes. This is important - as there is as much of the photographer in the final photos as the subject of the photograph.

These days if you're a photographer you have to find your niche - you have to have a completely formed style, a narrowed down theme - and not just for you work, but even for yourself -this is what we call a brand. While I very much see the reasons behind it and can even agree it is needed to a degree- I think we shouldn't let having a brand stopping us from experimenting and growing and sharing our work. This is a bit of a side track - this was to say, that I've mostly been sharing couple's photo sessions as I felt like I had to pick one subject and not overwhelm people with all sorts of photography. I admire storytelling and documentary within my photography and so I realised that strictly being defined by one niche is not for me and I would like to extend my photography a little more outside of couple's photography. After all, the natural style, feelings, raw moments and creating/documenting the mood is still within my work. The other reason is that I would very much like to have people come back to me throughout their life - as they're going through different parts of their journey It would be my honour to be there, and take photos of each precious season of life.

Johanna trusted me to capture photos of her during this individual photo session on a surprisingly Sunny day in July. We scheduled the photoshoot a bit earlier in the day as I usually do, as it was supposed to be cloudy - but as Scottish weather is, it did not go to plan. The Sun was brighter than ever. It really changed the style of the photos than what I planned for - but isn't that the beauty of taking photos in nature? I love these photos and Johanna was so easy to direct - running up and down in the knee high grass, enjoying the Scottish Summer at its highest.