byPetaL - My Life and Me

silvansoul asked: hey, i love your photography! is it your profession..? or just a hobby? great blog ☺

It is an outlet, a meditation if you will. Not my main career. I have had things published, done promo shots for friends etc but not as a big money earner. A long time ago I used to be a professional singer. I found when I did what I loved creatively as my career I felt restricted and unhappy. So i think i’ll leave my photography as a side project for now. It gives me the chance to be free and photograph what I want, when I want. Having said that, it makes me happy knowing others are enjoying my photography as much as me. Thanks :)

#RTPG is a ‘Random Tweet Photo Gift’. It is a new concept i’ve come up with to try to let people on twitter know that their thoughts are being appreciated and their existence is noticed.

I am still so new to twitter but it doesn’t take long to work out the way things run.

I was initially surprised at how often many do really put themselves, their talents, their points of view, their hard work, their very souls out in the open for all to see. And not just once, but repeatedly.

Many times I would see the same message, a message that could contain brilliance, repeated over and over looking for a single entity from anywhere in the known universe to acknowledge it…only to notice that it was rewarded with nothing but silence.

It is no-one’s fault. You can’t read everything that appears on your screen and you can’t answer everything you see.  I’ve tried to be good and give as much time as I can, because I know people have put effort into showing me whatever it is they have shared whether it be a simple thought or a complex story.  However, as I followed more and more people I was just overwhelmed by the amount that would appear in front of me.  Eventually I had to face the reality that there would be times when I would sadly be contributing to the dreaded silence that I hated so much.

So I decided to do something about it.  I couldn’t promise that i’d be able to catch every piece of gold that was sent to my wall but i could try to acknowledge the people that send it consistently.  I may not have much time but I do have MANY photos so I decided to choose photos and send them to the people on twitter who made me smile, inspired me to be more, or simply warmed my heart.

I should say #RTPG is ‘random’ in that it is unexpected for the receiver and I never know exactly who is going to be online and catch my eye when I have the time to send something, but it isn’t a random photo.  I try to do a bit of research, look at someone’s profile, think about the sort of stuff they talk about and try to choose a shot which I think they will appreciate the most.

I should also say all the shots I send are photos I have taken.  I do that simply because I control those so I know there will be no issue with throwing them out to the very public Internet.  I also hope that if people know they are receiving photos I have taken they will feel more like they really are getting a part of me.  Maybe then it will be something to remind them there is at least one person out in the silence that does care, that does notice, and totally appreciates the effort they are taking.

So that is why I came up with #RTPG.  I will try to get the photos out to as many as I can, please be patient with me as you can imagine the whole thing does take time.   

Please feel free to forward the photos i send as #RTPG’s on to others you feel would appreciate them or need them (I simply ask you keep my @byPetaL with it). 

Additionally, if you know someone deserving and want me to send something specific to them either at random or referencing you, I am more than happy to do that.  Let me know who they are and the sort of photo they would like, and I will do my best.  You can see i have a high concentration of animal shots but i do take shots of other things.  I should let you know the only thing I won’t post is photos of people because of the privacy issues around that so no requests for baby or kid shots. Baby animals are fine.

Well I hope that has explained a little about my behaviour over the last couple of days.  Keep an eye out for #RTPG’s and for people who deserve/need #RTPG’s because everyone should know there is more than space on the other side of that 140 characters.

by PetaL