It is a short step from learning to use a camera to hoping others like what we create. It’s a natural step. But when the next step is allowing the tastes of others to change what we create, it’s a step in a direction that leads away from art. We are responsible for our art, and to be honest with …
Chasing Photographic Style.
We value style, forms of expression so unique to shooters that you can identify their work immediately. Show me a Jill Greenberg photograph, or an Annie Leibovitz cover and their name comes to mind without a conscious thought, much less looking for the photo credit. So valued is the notion of style that it won’t be long before someone writes …
It’s the Vision Is Better Show!
Today we launched the Vision Is Better show, a mostly-weekly 10-15 minute video podcast about photography. I’ve pre-recorded the first 6 of them and they’re live now on You Tube and I’m hoping that you’ll do 2 things for me – the first is subscribing. The second is asking questions in the comments. I’m hoping these questions will become the …
OverSharing?
A couple years ago I went for sushi with Chase Jarvis and as we sat across the table talking about art and commerce and life and stuff, he expressed an idea that I’ve loved and played with ever since – that the task of an artist is this: to create, and to share, and to do whatever you need to …
Poetry & Imperfection
The third in a trilogy of opinionated editorial articles about getting past the craft in order to express vision. I’m heading back to the Khutzeymateen this weekend and have 3 days with the grizzly bears and the wilderness and with any luck the bee in my bonnet will take his leave and I’ll return with a renewed calm. This article …
Stop Using A Camera, Start Making Photographs
The day my photography changed was the day I stopped learning to use a camera and started learning to make photographs. Indulge me: it’s more than just semantics, at least it was for me. We begin, most of us, learning photography as the art of using a camera, figuring out the buttons and dials and learning to focus and expose. …
The Place of Craft
“Sharpness is over-rated. No one has ever looked at the best photographs of this century and been moved emotionally because it was tack sharp or because the histogram was perfect. We suffer, not from a lack of technical ability, but from a lack of visual literacy, imagination, and the willingness to connect emotionally – and vulnerably – with our subjects.” …
New Ideas, New Directions
Today is one of those days. And this is one of those rambling posts. Feel free to skip it if you’re looking for something with a single coherent point that’s easy to follow. We’ve just said goodbye to my mother at the airport and I’m settled on the couch in our new place in Victoria, surrounded by light and birdsong …
Enough.
Bull Kelp, Queen Charlotte Strait, British Columbia When I dropped into the waters of Queen Charlotte Strait a couple weeks ago it was a bit of a graduation for me. I’ve spent a year working towards it. Four different SCUBA certifications, a lot of reading, research, and far too much dreaming about the photographs I hoped I would make. And …
Back to Sucking.
This weekend I’m off to the northern tip of Vancouver Island to dive in the giant kelp forests with sea lions and octopus. I can’t wait! After a year of taking SCUBA courses and, forgive the pun, immersing myself in a hobby more bewildering than even photography, I am finally taking my cameras into the water and it feels like …