Postcards from Lesotho
After 2 weeks in the highlands of Lesotho I’m back in Johannesburg for a couple days to wash the dust off and get the bumps massaged out before beginning the long journey home. The highlight this morning was waking up in a bed that was not my sleeping bag, and getting a cup of coffee that was not powdered Nescafe. …
How To Get Sh*t Done
Have you ever felt like you’re insanely busy but not actually accomplishing anything? Like you’re frantically doing stuff but never getting stuff done? Being creative, no matter what the discipline or genre means making things, it means creating, and to do that – whether it’s one photograph or a significant body of work, never mind all the things we need …
Everyone’s A Photographer?
I posted this to FaceBook one year ago and now seems as good a time as ever to post this here. I was speaking last year at an event with a panel of photographers. There was a Q&A afterwards and someone asked me what I thought about this idea that “everyone is a photographer.” I told her I agreed. Everyone …
The One About Creative Burnout
I’m tired. Not like the “I need a nap” kind of tired, but the kind of tired that goes into your soul and slows your thinking and makes you dread the things you were so excited to put on the calendar only a few months ago. The kind of tired that feels like the first signs of burning out. And …
Postcards from Venice
The train from Venice pulled out only minutes ago, heading south to Florence and away from the city that, after 8 years, I’m only now beginning to really discover, though I’ve loved her – quirky, busy, impossibly tangled with tourists, as well as beautiful, romantic, and bathed in light – from the start. Florence will be a quick one, 4 …
How to Deal with Creative Boredom
I get about a dozen emails or comments on social media every month asking me what to do when you wake up one day and you realize you’re bored and you feel like your photographs are boring and because the only only thing worse than making boring photographs is being bored yourself, and because I think there’s a connection, I …
What’s the That?
After the start of my course, The Compelling Frame, there were some good questions and excellent conversations about the lesson on Intent. I thought I’d clarify it in the discussions we were having, but I’m going to post it here because I think it might be illuminating for a larger audience. I want you to imagine you and I are …
Change How You Make Photographs.
Today’s the day you’ve been waiting for! For some of you it’s the day I finally stop teasing you about The Compelling Frame. For some of you it’s the day I finally stop talking about it. If you’re among the first, then you’re in luck! If you’re among the second group, I’m sorry to say you’ve got another week to …
3 Ways to Start Seeing Better
This is the final of three videos I’ve made to introduce you to the course I’m releasing next week. The Course is called The Compelling Frame and I’ll give you a sneak peek at it in this video. The video is about learning to see because while we’re exploring making stronger photographs with composition and visual design I think it …
3 Ways to Improve Your Compositions Now
Last week I put up a video about Making Images That Connect. This morning I’ve put up the second video. If the first video was about the need to make stronger images, this is about how we begin to really do that. It’s not a long video and it’s not a full-on course in composition (that’s coming!) – but doing …