You arrive at a location. You stand there. Nothing happens. You feel flat. The street feels hostile or indifferent. You take one uninspired frame and immediately want to go home.

This is not a creativity problem. It is a warm-up problem. Every photographer has it.

The first 20 frames of any session are almost always throwaway. They are the price of admission. The mistake is stopping before you pay it. Instead: accept that the first 20 frames will be nothing, make them anyway, and count.

Some photographers use physical triggers to shift state. Walk faster than feels natural for five minutes. Photograph the first ten things you see without thinking about them. Change location every three minutes until something catches you.

Others use a constraint: one colour, one focal length, one type of subject. The constraint stops you waiting for 'something to happen' because you're already looking for a specific thing.

Some photographers work better after coffee, after a walk, after they've been in a place for 30 minutes and stopped feeling like a stranger. Know which you are.

The worst thing you can do is wait to feel inspired before you start. Inspiration follows action, almost never the other way around.

Watch for: the moment you stop thinking about what you're doing and start reacting. That is when the session actually starts.

The point: the camera does not care how you feel when you pick it up. The street does not warm up for you. You warm up for the street.