It's at these times that I take a step back and remember what got me taking photos in the first place. As well as the need or desire to create and record, I've always (well, since my teens) had an interest in the techniques, details and history of photography. A trip to a photo exhibition or gallery, or something like the photography, film and tv museum at Bradford can plant seeds of things I want to try. My favourite ever photo is 'Birth of the Ark Royal' by E.Chambre Hardman of Liverpool, and the National Trust have relatively recently opened up his former studio, preserved as it was throughout the latter part of the 20th century, to visitors at 59 Rodney Street, Liverpool. That's on my list for the next time I hit a dry spell.
Most recently though I went back to my roots and shot some film. I always find it refreshing to only have a few handfuls of frames rather that the machine gun of a modern DSLR. It makes you consider what's in and what's out of frame, as cropping is more difficult; it makes you think about exposure and not just shoot & adjust as you can with a preview screen. My most extreme recent example is taking my £9 eBay Halina TLR out for a day at a stately home, with a part-used roll of 120 velvia 50ASA, giving me about 8 exposures to use. no built-in meter meant using my £4 handheld lightmeter to get exposure right on the fairly unforgiving film. Focuses the mind beautifully. I only took about five shots in the end, but as I always used to be when shooting film, I'll be excited to get them back and see how I did.
