How important is it to find your own "style"?

You don't really 'find' your style as a photographer. It just sort of comes to you. It may be that you look back over a few months worth of work and see a recurring theme or pattern. You can then build on this theme and create something unique out of it.

As for whether it limits you to doing only certain types of photography, it all depends on the type of photography you're interested. And would it be such a bad thing to specialize in one area of photography? More often than not you'll find that people with one specialty will excel over someone who claims they can do every type of photography.

Stick to what you're best at and you and your style will evolve without you even noticing. Good luck!

A "style" is important - very important - as one of the facets that differentiates one photographer from another.

Irrespective of your field of interest there will be many photographers competing for the limited access to the market and it is the one with a recognisable "style" who starts off with the advantage. In fairness the elements of personality, good customer-facing attitude, willingness to meet customer requests etc that are all part of the package but their "style" is the equivalent of being the most easily recognised.

For many photographers, irrespective of whether amateur, professional or hobbyist, hearing their work described as "the [photographer's name] style" is both a compliment and a sign of recognition that confirms expertise.

I think it all depends on what field of photography you want to go into. If you want to be in fashion, then yeah, it's important to have an individual style. If you're going into advertising, it might a little bit. If your doing senior portraits or school pictures, then no, I'd say that it's pretty generic. It can't hurt though.

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