I often love shadows to add mood to an image...

Every photographer, and creative for that matter, needs a muse, someone that inspires their artistic talent, unfortunately I’ve had many over my 30-year career as a photographer, though I lost the most important, the 10th muse.  Like most modern muses, they come and go in this business as everyone will eventually live their lives and then the good-byes come to reality and it’s time to find a new muse.  Though as sad as this might sound, it’s just a fact for most artists, and not a bad thing, as the word muse comes from Ancient Greek which started with three then went to nine muses.

People move on, even our muses.  Sometimes it’s a heartbreaker, ultimately, it’s usually better for both parties, though the key to knowing you had a great muse, is that all memories, inspirational and personal, are cherished for a million years—if you feel that way about your muse, it was ideal, not wasted inspiration.

From an upcoming book, "One Light, One Chair."

An ideal muse to me is someone that allows a “marriage of the minds” to create something together, not just someone that feeds my artistic passion to photograph someone else.  I prefer a muse that lights up my camera lens when we feel the creative passion together, anything else that inspires me tends to come from mentors.  I always associate songs to my muse too, as music multiplies the inspiration when photographing my muse; Think of it as an MTV music video you might like—the music and the videography together invoke your emotions.

Just like great photographs that invoke your emotions and propel your mind into a new dimension, a muse should propel your creative juices forward with creative passion, much like being in love with your significant other, if there is no passion, you truly are living a false relationship. As a photographer, my ultimate muse is the “tenth muse.”

Nothing like natural light creating mood in the image, feel the passion?

Plato named Sappho, an Ancient Greek born on the island of Lesbos, as the tenth muse.  While this compliment was for a poetic muse, photography is poetry to me, so I’ll close by saying, I miss my tenth muse.   Have to run, have a safe and happy holiday season and don’t forget our men and women in the military along with their families and friends—God Bless, Rolando.