Archives for the month of: March, 2010

Mar,13

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Worth a second look

Going backwards, despite my better judgement, to see what I missed...

Over the last few days I’ve been going through shots from a scouting trip I took in January. First of all, I edited the shots I wanted (or so I thought) almost two months ago and had no intentions of revisiting that shoot other than the occasional sentimental impulse. So what the heck am I doing editing through and old shot?

I didn’t intentionally sit down, open Lightroom and start looking through old shots. I hardly ever do that when I’m in a hurry. This time as I was thumbing through a specific date looking for a specific shot that I specifically knew I had, old shots started popping out at me. Later that afternoon I couldn’t help but think, “Are there other shots that I just skimmed through?”

See, the brain is an amazing thing – it’s capable of rapidly, accurately, and effeciently sorting all kinds of things and its capable of finding, at a glance, things that stick out to us photographically and artistically – sometimes to our demise. It’s that efficiency thing that can kill us, isn’t it? I find that if I’m in a hurry with editing a shoot that I skip over all sorts of pictures that are worthy of my time- pictures that are in some cases more powerful than the ones that got the first nod.

It’s started to make me wonder what I’ve skipped over in the past without even a second thought. I have no doubt that there are pictures sitting on my hard drive just waiting for a second look.

So in respect for the pictures I’ve skipped and also for looking backwards for just a bit, I’ve posted just a few “late bloomers” from the bunch. These are shots that I completely missed when I was sorting through this shoot originally. Some are just as good, if not better, than the original shots I put together while some were just worth a reconsideration.

What’s sitting on your hard drive?

Mar,12

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Culture

General

Photography

Travel

Vision

Why

The Question of Why

Why you picked up a camera and Why you can't put it down

So what was it about a camera that even made you/me/us pick it up in the first place?

Seriously. Think about it.

That simple question has been running through my head all day. It made me think about this old Canon body that my dad used to have in our closet. I couldn’t tell you how old this thing was, or the last time it had been used before I found it. It was old enough that the smell of the leather case it had been kept in for all those years had permeated the entire camera. When I was probably 9 years old I would go around the house winding that thing up and taking shots without any film in it just because I knew it had to be the coolest thing in our house – it really was a cool camera and I really loved the noise of the mirror flapping up and down. I liked the sheer look of the thing – It was rugged as all get out but I knew it was for making something beautiful. At that time I’m not sure it had much to do with creating beautiful images – though I do wish I had the shots from when my father would sneak film into it to surprise me.

As a kid I’m sure my love for the camera mostly came from my perception of it as being a high-tech toy that made one of the most beautiful noises I’d ever heard. As an adult, through a long process, it obviously came much more than that. The backstory is for another day.

So here’s the question again.

Why photography? What made us pick up a camera for the first time and then keep picking it up time and time again?

I know for me its a combination of art and science. I’ve always been “artsy” and if I think about it, the camera was really never far away my whole life. I was always drawn to creating beauty but at the same time this scientific, numbers-driven, concrete stuff. I’ll always remember creating those first intentional images and feeling the rush when you saw them – wanting to know what would happen if you tried this or that – what numbers needed to be changed to make this more beautiful. The shape, the feel, and the technology of the whole thing obviously attracted me and I bet if many of us were honest, we picked up a camera for the first time because the technology is just plain cool. It’s a sexy machine.

The sticking power of photography came from the experiences I had behind it – freezing emotions, events, and people. I keep picking up the camera because I know that each and every time I do, it teaches me something new about it, humbles me, amazes me, and all the while encourages me to keep going. I absolutly love the images – the moments – a picture allows me to create. There is no doubt that we all could fill an entire blogs with the question “Why.”

So with that I open this question up to you. Let us know why you started and what makes it more than just pointing a lens and pushing a button for you? Why not something else? We have a million things that we could occupy ourselves with, but why do we keep coming back to this? Every story is different and I’m sure we all have our reasons – so lets here them!

And just fyi, as an adult, I still think the mirror flap and shutter are among the most beautiful noises I’ve ever heard.

Mar,10

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Top 10

Vision

Blogging 101: For Photographers

Why most blogs suck and why we don't read them

Right out of the gate, let me say this – in the 7+ years I’ve been blogging – this is one of the hardest posts I’ve ever written. When you intitionally sit down to write a blog post who’s subtitle is “Why most blogs suck and why we don’t read them.” – a few things happen. First, you risk coming across as an arrogant a-hole who runs a blog hosted on servers made out of gold. Second, you all the sudden look around at your own blog and find yourself saying “Uhhhh…” and wondering who left the door open on the ‘healthy’ criticism refrigerator. Third, you risk offending people. I’m not here to offend people by any means. If you are offending by this, feel free to go back to your blog with the #9eff00 background, the dancing banana, and the size 18 Comic Sans – assume the everything is right with the world and don’t let us scare you.

I, undoubtedly, am an offender on some level of each one of these points I’m about to list. I don’t pretend to not be with every single post. It’s a blog – it’s organic – some days you just forget, you rant, you write like a 12 year old, or load 18 megabytes worth of photos into one post.

That being said, some might ask why write an article like this. Good question.

Over the last 3 years I’ve had opportunities to teach on the subject of communication from a tech-centric point of view to a few nation-wide organizations. Tech-centric meaning, we use technology to our advantage to communicate a specific message. Every time I finish teaching, I walk away more and more convinced that simple things, especially when pertaining to a blog, can have huge advantages as far as effective communication is concerned. On the same side of that coin, I can speak with some authority on the subject because, I, much like you, have been abused by blogs, bloggers, design, eye-ball melting backgrounds, marquees, pop-ups, adverts, and middle-aged house moms yelling at the internet for the better part of a decade.

So here we go:

Why most blogs suck and why we don’t read them
(in absolutely no order)

Mar,08

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Paying

Opportunity and Giving back

And how a 6'5" giant(me) interacts with Tibetan Monk Ballers...

You might have seen this shot earlier in my post about “Do What You Want with What You Have.” It’s a nice shot with lots of little compositional things I would have changed; some lighting changes, posing suggestions, framing the shot differently, etc. However, that’s not the point of this post.

I’m actually really proud of this picture for a number of reasons. This picture actually helped me nail down some thoughts I had been having for quiet a while about our roll as photographers – especially in another culture and how do we serve the community rather than take from it. It was also a turning point for me to re-see the things that I saw the first time I came here that moved me. So much happens around us that we are numb for so many different reasons. Listed below are the things that, this shot, taught me.