How Can One Stay Inspired in Their Photography Journey?

ABOUT ME

My name is Søren Thorsen. I live with my wife in Vojens – a small town in the south of Denmark close to Germany. I am a dentist by profession – but retired since 2007. Being born in 1944, I am from a time when babies were made of solid materials. Besides photography I play tennis and bridge.
I’m very fond of humor, also in photography. It’s an important part of being alive.

Man holding a camera with a silver umbrella in the background.
A camera with an "OLYMPUS" lens cap in front of a mirror reflecting a man's face.

Me and Photography

I have been dealing seriously with photography since the beginning of the 70´ies. Pure and honest photography is important to me, and my main genre is street photography. I love to walk around in the streets, regard people and take candid images of them. The world is a complex thing, and street life reflects that. Contact with people through photography gives me values and social connections. I consider myself mainly as a street photographer and not a travel photographer even if most of my images on this site come from traveling.
A good image must contain a message, tell a story or just be technically delicate. You must be able to return to it, enjoy it again or find new angles in the story. An image is always an abstraction, because you cut a 2-dimensional slice out of the 3-dimensional reality. When you press the button, the manipulation starts.
I stopped working analogue at the beginning of the century. In the darkroom I liked of course the results, or at least some of them, but I was not fond of the darkroom work. Computer work in digital photography is just me. My cameras are a couple of Sony a6600 with  16-70 and 70-350 zoom lenses.
The site is my photographic window to the world. Earlier, I used to take part in exhibitions and contests. but now I’m fine with just to show my images here. Today, it is very demanding to make and maintain a website, and that can keep you away from doing worse things.
To get inspired I can recommend visiting exhibitions, YouTube and books – I own about 4 shelf meters of photographic books. Do not copy but make another version of what inspires you.

Black and white photo of a man’s torso and stomach pulled in reflected in a circular mirror on a tiled wall.

Hope

A black and white photo of a man's torso and abdomen reflected in a round mirror. The man is shirtless, and only his upper body is visible in the mirror, showing his profile. The background consists of tiled walls and a towel hanging on the left side.

Reality

SAID ABOUT PHOTOGRAPHY

  • The camera is an intermedium between the photographer and the subject.
  • The camera  allows the photographer to capture a moment of eternity.
  • The photographer is more visionary than just observing, because he observes and isolate details.
  • Photography is the instinct of hunting without the desire to kill. Instead of a dead man, you make him eternal. – Chris Marker 1966.
  • The strength of a photographer is not the images he takes, but the images he shows in public.

MY SOCIAL LIFE IN PHOTOGRAPHY

When you’re taking images, it’s mostly a thing that you do on your own. But within photography I have a good friend – Christian Guldager. We work together on common projects such as to cover Rømø Motor Festival, that you can see images from on my Gallery page.
With Christian I have also made slideshows with sound. To be mentioned is a show about having a dog, a show about the modern human in his own absurd world, and a show about showing feelings figuratively. Some of the shows are om my YouTube page.
Earlier, we also arranged exhibitions. At our local museum we have presented ”The Golden” 13 times. It is a censured FIAP-exhibition with around 600 accepted works every time.
I am a member of an unofficial group of photographers called “Fotosyndikatet”, or in English “The Photo Syndicate”. The members are Marianne Skovby Christensen, Leif Christensen, Erik Holmgaard, Peter Klode and me. We join one or two times a year to have a good time together and to share our common interest in photography.
HAVE A GOOD TIME WITH MY PHOTOGRAPHY – HOPE TO SEE YOU HERE AGAIN.

A vintage black and white photo of a family standing in front of a house with a brick exterior. The family consists of a man, a woman, and two children. The man is standing with his arms crossed next to a car. The woman is standing to his right, and the two children are positioned to her right. One child is standing, and the other is seated on a tricycle. The house has a chimney and a flag is visible in the background.

Family self portrait

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