In 2016 I realized that I was burned out of being my own employer, selling vintage clothing, and hustling. I’m not the greatest salesperson, although I’m good at marketing, but that’s a topic for another blog.
I previously did all my freelance work as KMurrayCreative, and “nuked” that site the minute I landed my first “w2” job. I couldn’t even look at it. My photography reminded me of painful personal times. The vintage clothing had lost its magic. I uninstalled WooCommerce from VintageReveries.com and configured an automatic post recycler plugin; I couldn’t bring myself to completely kill that site. but I didn’t want to update or look at it! I just wanted to exist and be free, without obligation to anyone after 4:30pm.
Backing up old backup drives to newer formats, virus scanned, and organized has made me randomly glimpse at some of my better creations as a photographer and creative director. I’ve always found paid work doing photography, and I’ve always been horrible at showing it off. It comes too easy, and I’m always solely in love with the project that I’m currently on or about to go start. Seeing old images in the tiny grid view of folder contents was a tease into my past self.
I’m hoping to re-build this site and all of my portfolios as an exercise in professional self-discovery and personal growth.
I’m starting by using the program ACDSee to catalog and hopefully facially recognize close to 1 million pictures (maybe 300,000 raw files). Almost all my photography is only named by the date I shot it, and the contents of each folder from 2011-2016 is a mystery until opening the 50mg raw or the web-resolution exports folder (if it exists). As the program can’t seem to easily handle external drives (without crashing) as it claims, this project is slowed even more. I may end up reactivating my subscription to Adobe Lightroom.
Trying to find my best work, especially my photography, for this portfolio is overwhelming and a pain!