Love Is My Niche: When Your Why Matters More Than Your What

Hi guys! This is Keara Russell, owner of Luna Photography, and welcome to this week’s blog excerpt of Photographer With a Blog.

This blog is going to kick off our new series. Following last month’s Behind the Lens, this month we’re going Beyond the Lens, and I want to explain what that means.

Behind the Lens was about getting to know the photographer, getting to know the artist behind the work. It was about the things we don’t necessarily see when we look at a finished photograph, the insecurities, the doubts, the struggles, the experiences, and the moments that shape us as artists. It was about looking behind the lens and seeing the person holding it.

But Beyond the Lens is going to be a little different. This series is about the things outside of us that shape the way we think about our art. The expectations, the rules, the opinions, the things the photography industry, and honestly, the world, has told us we’re supposed to believe. And we’re going to challenge some of them.

This is my unpopular opinion series. We’re going beyond what we’re told photography should look like, what an artist should be, how a photographer should run their business, and what an artist should photograph.

So if you’re a photographer struggling to find your niche, maybe the problem isn’t that you haven’t found one. Maybe you’ve just been looking where everyone else told you to look.

When I was first starting out and I was told to pick a niche, it caused a lot of insecurity for me. I could go to a wedding and have an amazing time, but I couldn’t walk away from that wedding thinking, “This is the only thing I want to photograph forever.” The next morning, I could wake up and go photograph an engagement, or a couples session, or a maternity session, and feel just as happy and just as fulfilled doing those things.

And I started wondering if there was something wrong with me because I couldn’t find that one thing. That one thing I only wanted to do, that one thing I knew I was the best at, that one thing I could build my entire identity around.

And I know I’m not the only photographer who has felt that way. I know there are photographers hearing “pick a niche” right now who are sitting with that same worry and insecurity, wondering why they haven’t found the one thing they want to photograph forever. And I really want to get out in front of that.

I want you to hear this from me: you don’t have to pick a niche.

And if you want to pick a niche, it doesn’t have to be so incredibly specific that you only photograph weddings. It doesn’t have to mean you only photograph engagements. It doesn’t have to mean you only photograph maternity. Because I think we’ve been taught to look at a niche as a category when it can be so much more than that.

What if your niche is a feeling? What if it’s love, happiness, connection, or nostalgia? What if your niche is a season? Maybe you just want to be a Christmas photographer. Think about how much exists inside of that. You could photograph couples, children, grandparents, families, maternity, weddings, and engagements. You haven’t limited yourself to one type of person or one type of session. You’ve simply created an artistic focus around a season.

Or maybe your niche is a purpose. Maybe you want to be a religious photographer. Inside of that one niche could be worship ceremonies, church services, sermons, missionary work, baptisms, or even standing on the side of the road photographing missionaries who are out serving others. That’s still a niche. It’s just not a tiny one.

And that’s what I mean when I say it doesn’t have to be super, super niched down, guys. There are so many ways to define what you do without putting yourself in a box. You can choose a feeling, a season, a purpose, an experience, a type of connection, or a story. It doesn’t always have to be a genre.

And I think there’s a happy medium that we can reach. Because can having a niche be beneficial? Of course. It can help you market yourself, attract the clients you want, become known for something, and absolutely help you build a recognizable brand. But is it necessary? No. Helpful doesn’t equal mandatory.

Sometimes I think we get so caught up trying to follow the formula for becoming a “successful photographer” that we forget we’re artists first. Your creativity doesn’t have to stay in one category just because your Instagram bio does. And honestly, your Instagram bio doesn’t even have to stay in one category.

That’s something that’s helped me thrive as a photographer, because I didn’t want to choose one thing. I want to photograph the love between a mom and her son. I want to photograph the love between a couple who just got engaged. I want to photograph the couple who looked at all the expectations surrounding a wedding and said, “You know what? Screw the flower arrangements. Screw the catering. Let’s run to our local courthouse, get married, and run away on our honeymoon.”

That’s what I want to photograph. I want the imperfect, the unexpected, the quiet moments, the loud moments, and the moments that don’t necessarily fit neatly into a category. I want anything that has love at the center of it. I want to photograph anything that shows undivided connection. That’s what I want to do.

And maybe that’s what you’ve been trying to find this entire time. Maybe you haven’t been unable to find your niche. Maybe you’ve just been trying to force yourself into somebody else’s definition of one.

I know so many photographers out there right now who are struggling with this. They’re looking around at everyone else and thinking, “Why don’t I have it figured out?” “Why can’t I choose?” “Why can’t I just stick to one thing?”

And I’m here to tell you it doesn’t have to be a struggle. Stop listening to them. Just because someone has been doing photography longer than you, or they’ve been successful doing things one particular way, doesn’t mean they know what the heck they’re talking about when it comes to your art.

You are allowed to figure this out for yourself. You’re allowed to decide what matters to you. You’re allowed to build a business around what genuinely makes you happy instead of what someone else says is the smartest marketing strategy.

And when I really think about why I started photography, it was never because I wanted to become known for one specific category. I started photography because of love. I started photography because of the pictures on my mom’s wall. I started photography because of a patient I had to say goodbye to. I started photography because of my husband’s baptism.

Every reason I fell in love with photography was different, but every single one of those reasons was centered around love and connection. That’s my niche. Love is my niche.

It doesn’t have to be yours. You can choose weddings, families, maternity, branding, cars, Christmas, your faith, a feeling, or a story. Or maybe you decide you don’t need a niche at all. That’s your choice. But I want you to know there’s another option.

You don’t have to condense yourself down into one tiny little category just because someone told you that’s what a photographer is supposed to do. You don’t have to make yourself smaller to make your brand make sense. You are allowed to be an artist before you are a brand. You are allowed to change, explore, and photograph what makes you feel alive.

Because photography is art, and art was never meant to fit perfectly inside a box.

With all my love and all of my support,

Keara Russell

Owner & Photographer

Luna Photography