I often look at the work of a younger me and cringe at his decisions. His choice of moments was hurried and impatient. His composition was simplistic. His use of colour and composition was undeveloped. My god, he barely seemed to know what he was doing. No wonder he spent so much energy trying to convince himself he wasn’t an …
Cameras Don’t Make Photographs.
The recent outrage over Steve McCurry’s penchant for tweaking his photographs with Photoshop is just one in a long series of opportunities for photographers to get their panties in a twist over how photography should or should not be done. This morning, I’ve about as much desire to enter the fray as I have to pour this mug of coffee …
More Than Wow.
I used to be a magician. An honest-to-God, I-do-this-for-a-living Magician. And a juggler too. And a comedian. But let’s talk about the magic part. I spent a lot of time by myself, learning how to hide coins and cards and make birds appear from nowhere. I had an illusion built that allowed me to cut myself in half on stage. …
Image or Imagery?
Each time I travel I get the same questions about my gear. Here are the answers. But I should warn you, this post quickly turned into a bit of a rant. What Camera do you use? Right now it’s Fuji mirror-less for the most part. And a couple zoom lenses from 16mm to 90mm. Sometimes longer. But it could as …
Vision-Driven Exposure: A Clarification
I wanted to follow up on my article about how I expose, to clarify a few things. If you’ve read that article, read on. If not, you might want to read it first. To make a few things clear, my last post was not a dismissal of craft. Craft has its place. Excellence matters. But there’s this thing about people …
Vision-Driven Exposures
This is my confession. I no longer use a light meter. I don’t spot meter. In fact most of the time I don’t even know what metering mode I’m on. My life as a digital photographer became infinitely easier when I abandoned those, put my camera back to manual and simply began exposing for what’s important. Whether you use a …
Vision and Voice
I wrote a book called Vision & Voice. This is not about that. This is about the constant stream of questions I hear that all share a similar quest fuelled by a similar desperation. The questions all centre on one recurring desire: the longing to find your voice photographically. I have tried, in my way, to answer the question creatively, …
Find The Magic
I had a moment in Italy last month as I walked down cobbled streets looking at reflections in the canals of Venice, raising my camera once in a while to my face, feeling like I was in that state of flow that most creatives feel in their souls like a drug when it comes over them. That moment was a …
Learning Mastery
Facebook did it to me again. A headline promised me I could master photography easily. It sent me (I couldn’t help it, I was curious) to an infographic about apertures and shutter speeds and focus modes and rules of thirds. I read it all. And when I was done I knew exactly what I knew when I was 15 years …
Your Next Step: Unified Work
If you’ve read my latest eBook, Making The Image, you know I’m a big fan of questions. Always have been. Questions open us to possibilities, especially when they lead to more questions, experimentation, increased curiosity, and play. This is the last in a series of articles about the power of four particular questions to drive our work forward. The first …