My recent discovery of the joy of taking snapshots was some what of a confession, I suppose, in this World of Photography, in which everyone I talk to — from successful pros to budding hobbyists — seems so damn driven, so damn clear on what they are doing and why. Well I am not. Photography is an integral part of my life, of how I make money and, most important, how I experience and interact with the world. But for me, the process of photography is ripe with conflicts.
I confess this now — slightly uneasily in light of my job of bringing “answers” to photographers though my writing — because I think that we all appreciate honestly and because I kind of hope that I’m not the only one who feels a sense of conflict. If I am, I’ll make this my last show-all-my-cards post, and go back to trying to dish out answers.
Here’s a link to a gallery featuring my vacation snapshots, which I uploaded yesterday. Not one of the pictures is worthy of mention photographically, but taking them gave me the most photographic pleasure I have ever enjoyed. And I have never enjoyed looking at my own pictures so much.
I realize that you are no more interested in my vacation snapshots than I would be in those of someone I don’t know — especially when just about every one features me and my girlfriend, Carla Rein, staring directly into the lens, dead center, serving up a seeming parody of how not to make an interesting image. But that’s the point: I wasn’t making images; I was taking pictures. And damn is it fun.
If you think I’m rambling on about nothing, I don’t blame you. I am simply sharing something that, for me, is quite wonderful. For the first time Continue reading “The Joy of Taking Snapshots”
“If you have a point of view. . .why the heck wouldn’t you be involved in the doing?
This from the video that Chase Jarvis featured on his blog yesterday, and which I’m featuring here. It’s a short clip from a series from PSFK — a “trends research, innovation, and activation company” that publishes a daily news site, which is worth checking out — and if you take Jarvis’s advice, as you watch the video you’ll replace the title of “planner” with “photographer” and you’ll get some interesting food for thought.
Interesting, but actually not that innovative, at least to the photographers who are as successful as Jarvis, in terms of incomes, recognition and satisfaction). I say this because like Jarvis, these successful photographers often tell me — in one way or another — over and over again: “It’s not the photography, stupid!”
Thanks to Virginia DeBolt I’m a little less retarded than I was yesterday, but unfortunately, “eHow” is not going to help me get much brighter.
Kudos to DeBolt for helping me (once again, damnit!) figure out the incredibly simple Photoshop task that I don’t do often, and that I just can’t get stuck my dense head: how to draw a simple rule around an image. I needed to do so for my post yesterday, and (damnit!) I couldn’t.
I know, I know. I’m dense. But being dense, I got all excited when a Google search lead me to the community-driven website, eHow, that promises answers — in text and video tutorials — to “How To Do Just About Everything.” I was excited because Continue reading “Photoshop Border Drawing, But Not Much Else at “eHow””
In October I was asked, for the second time, to write the introduction to Expressions, the printed showpiece featuring more than 200 stunning nature images for an annual contest run by the North American Nature Photographers Association (NANPA). Jam-packed with work from both amateur and pro photographers, and Expressions is inspirational and educational to look at, and contestants report that the contest is enjoyable and motivational to participate in.
Although I don’t photograph nature — at least, other than subjects involving homo sapiens — for the past couple years I’ve been writing for NANPA’s new Currents magazine, and the assignments have given me a profoundly deeper respect for nature photographers. I’ve spoken at length with acclaimed nature photographers like George Lepp, Joel Sartore, and Arthur Morris — all down-to-earth and as generous with their time and knowledge as they are successful. While covering topics on conservation, bird photography and travel photography, I’ve learned Continue reading “The Nature of Photography Contest Judging”
Well, that’s a good question, and one with no easy answers — or, at least, answers that are likely to overwhelm some photographers while underwhelming others. How do still photographers go about video with a mind on business success?
It’s hard not to get wrapped up in vintage photographs — even fairly mundane ones — which are given power simply by their age and which remind us that content and context is often the most intriguing aspects of an image, regardless of when or where they were made.
Head to “Shorpy” delve into the realms of considering what makes an image great or interesting both to you, as well as to learn a whole lot of interesting ideas and historic facts that have nothing to do with photography for photography’s sake. Shorpy is a refreshing reminder to photographers about what photography was originally conceived to accomplish — to capture history (then the present) in a manner that no other media ever had before.
For all is modern zest, photography was and remains a means o record. To share the present with precision. To evoke the past — even of only yesterday’s birthday party — with more power than was ever imaginable. (Although, sure, cave paintings and Renaissance statuary is pretty damn cool.)
The very first shot I snapped on Christmas Eve 2007 was my little pile of going-into-the-danger-zone gear — lean and light and ready for the whole night. Actually, I never thought of it as a danger zone — not in the least — but I was a little nervous nonetheless, mostly because I had to be prepared for the totally unexpected, and that’s always a little nerve racking, if exciting.
I share this simple snapshot of my ratty backpack and the contents I have carefully selected to stuff in it because there’s something about that I just love, and I wouldn’t have even snapped it if I hadn’t simply been checking to see if my dusty camera was working. And it makes me think that I find such images from other photographers totally engaging, although I haven’t seen hardly as many as I would like.
I mean, isn’t it great to see those somehow sexy, revealing images of studios in action, taken from behind the camera, all the lights, power packs, tangles of cords, gobos and gobo-knows what exploding everywhere, ordered chaos.
So Tuesday Jain Lemos contacts me about whether I might have a Buenos Aires Christmas story and picture package to contribute to News Plink. I don’t know what Plink is, but any project Jain’s involved in is a good one, and I do have some BA X-Mass images I’ve been dying to get out there.
“I don’t know if you’ll want them,” I write. “They’re from ‘Villa 31,’ the city’s most infamous slum.”
In my last post I featured the nifty “DNG Recover Edges” and made the point that it only works on DNGs. I discovered this nifty, free application while researching my column for the latest October/November 2009 issue of AfterCapture. In “Catching Up with the Amazing DNG” I celebrate how far the DNG has come in five years, since it was publicly announced by Adobe on September 27, 2004.
If you would appreciate a little background information on the DNG or to better understand how this amazing file format continues to pick up steam in its march towards a universal standard, give my piece a read. It’s based in large part by conversations with Adobe’s Tom Hogarty and digital workflow guru Peter Krogh.
Both touched on some pretty heady technical developments about the DNG, which were both hard to understand and even harder to communicate. However, both Hogarty and Krogh insisted that what really matters Continue reading “Learning All About The Amazing DNG”
My recent discovery of the joy of taking snapshots was some what of a confession, I suppose, in this World of Photography, in which everyone I talk to — from successful pros to budding hobbyists — seems so damn driven, so damn clear on what they are doing and why. Well I am not. Photography is an integral part of my life, of how I make money and, most important, how I experience and interact with the world. But for me, the process of photography is ripe with conflicts.
Here’s a link to a 
The very first shot I snapped on 
