Stepping on Toes?

I was so going to post a picture of my "super star" daughter this morning singing into her orange vibrating McDonald's microphone. I was going to write about her grimace when I grabbed the camera and wanted only 1 measly pic while she belted out Miley Cyrus (yes god help me) mixed with her superstar hand gestures and very serious look of stardom on her face.

BUT after logging into my ever so quiet blog, a comment sat awaiting- of course posted anonymously (because anonymous wouldn't have it any other way)

You have a nice presentation, but every wedding picture here seems tostrangely familar to the other wedding photographers' images we've seen. You should try to be a little more original ;)

So my first thought was does anonymous know that tostrangely? isn't a word? Or does anonymous know that familiar was spelled up all wrong y'all? And then I thought- well Anonymous- thanks for winking- I err- guess

But all joking aside- I wouldn't want to question someones' intelligence based on a blogger comment. I mean for real- it's a blogger comment. Honestly, I have photographed almost 40 weddings every year going into my 5th year now. Do the pictures resemble other photographers- probably some do- I wasn't aware that photo locations earned copyrights? I can tell you that my photos certainly are starting to resemble my own photos- for years now in Winnipeg the same locations boast the same kinds of photos.

Then I wondered if it could be another photographer making the judgement, but surely most wouldn't post anonymously. I mean, for years I have had some very well established photographers make suggestions regarding my photo business- and they have always been pretty upfront about who they are.

But now, I am thinking I have to not care. I have always asked my clients for ideas, we have always taken photos that they have seen (friends weddings, websites, more recently slide shows)- I have even accepted pages of word documents of all sorts of photos people want me to take. Originality? What is that exactly? There was a time a month ago that I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO SCREAM if I saw another "phrase" from my website that I personally wrote, copied and pasted onto someones site. I WANTED TO PULL MY HAIR OUT every time I saw the exact same package on someones price list.
But then- there was peace :-) I know we are a small market- exchanging ideas over the web. It's what we in this industry see- and absorb- and know.

I suppose I at least have a nice presentation ;)

And just for fun, I am posting this very over done purple wall, and I betcha I will take a picture just like it this year too! Have a great weekend- looks like yesterday's expected snow for Saturday is now a long shot!