daily

Fail In Private

 

Failing In Public

Here’s the thing about failed projects:

It’s fine to start something, and give up after you begin – midway, almost done, whatever. Sometimes things don’t work out.

I’ve done that quite a few times. A new project will pop into my head, and I’ll start on it, but then I give up. Lack of interest, lack of time, whatever.

The trouble starts when you share a project you haven’t thought through to completion. You make a big announcement, “Hey! I’m doing a thing!” You share the thing. Everyone’s excited.

And then? Crickets.

People that follow your work are left in the lurch. Nothing more comes of your big project after that first big thing, or the announcement. Do that a few times, and people start to question your credibility.

Maybe it’s better to fail in private. Then you’re only disappointing yourself.

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Outlasting

Outlasting

If you have critics, maybe you’re on to something. Adam Smith, in You and Your Work Aren’t For Everyone, says that the Wright brothers had their share of naysayers, but they kept experimenting, until…liftoff.

“Nothing shuts critics up faster than producing results,” Smith says.

But just because you have critics doesn’t mean what you’re doing is great. You just have to outlast them, and keep producing the kind of work that’s right for you.

(via Jon Wilkening)

Paid Stuff and Fun Stuff

Paid Stuff vs Free Stuff

Working on personal projects is something I still try to do, it’s very important to me. I also believe it plays an important part in developing your own style, staying creatively motivated, exploring new ideas and learning new things…I try hard to produce personal projects fairly regularly, even when I’m busy with actual work. I try to produce and post something usually once or twice a week.

GIF artist Al Boardman talks about personal projects in a way a lot of artists do: It’s important to do the fun stuff and the paid stuff.

The paid stuff keeps the lights on, but the personal stuff keeps you, you.

And it’s usually the personal work that makes people sit up, take notice, and ask if you’re for hire.

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On Discomfort

On Discomfort

Will I ever get over the awkwardness of asking people to take portraits, or for their help in starting a documentary project?

Probably not, which is why I try to do it often.

It’s kind of weird, to go up to someone, or send someone a note, and ask to make their portrait. How well do they know you? How well do they know your work? Do they know you at all?

I like to think it’s flattering to ask someone to take their portrait. It kind of says that I think the person is interesting enough to inquire. It also says that I want to spend a bit of time with the person – to get to know them better.

But I’m also a guy, and sometimes it feels like the bad guy stereotypes come through when I ask someone to join me in making photos.

For documentaries, it’s really weird, because here’s someone who does a cool thing but doesn’t know who I am, or what I’ve done. That was the case with my Albion Anagama documentary. I learned after the project was done that Ken and Anne had no idea what to expect. Thankfully, they were pleasantly surprised with the outcome.

But what if they weren’t?

That’s the risk of making something: you don’t know what the participant will think. You only hope that they’ll be pleased enough to continue a relationship and work with you again.

Getting over the hump of asking in the first place? I have no idea how to solve it. I’m going to keep trying, though, no matter how much discomfort it causes me.

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A Confession

 

University of Michigan Museum of Art

Sometimes, when I just need to unwind at work, or kill some time in the grocery line, I’ll look at the For Sale board on Fred Miranda.

I don’t need anything, and I’m sure as heck not going to buy anything. But it’s fun to read the equipment listings, especially when I don’t recognize something. That’s always a good research opportunity, and I love few things more than doing research.

Granted, I have picked up a few good finds on Fred Miranda. My go-to Canon 5D is from that listing board, as was my Fuji X-E1 and my 20mm lens.

I look at Fred Miranda like a car person reads a hot rod mag. No harm in that.

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My Two Wedding Photography Rules

Jolly Pumpkin - Ann Arbor, Michigan

This weekend I’m shooting my once-per-year wedding gig.

I have two rules for photographing someone’s wedding:

  1. I have to know you.
  2. I have to like you.

Those stipulations help me to be super picky about the gigs I agree to take.

I don’t need the income. I don’t need the images for my portfolio. I see it as a way to use my skills for someone I know and like.

It’s also fun as hell.

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While There’s Still Time

Go make something beautiful.

There’s so much ugliness on display in the world lately.

Our oceans are dying. Our neighbors and protectors are dying. Political compromise is dying. Common sense seems to be dying.

It’s enough to make you think about building that bunker out in the backyard and waiting the whole thing out.

Artists, musicians, religious leaders, and poets will help us try to make sense of it all, over time. In the meantime, there are photographers on the front lines of these terrible events, witnessing first-hand the terrible things that humans do to each other.

As they’re doing that, try to get out and capture something beautiful, while there’s still time. While it’s still there.

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Other Art

Check out other art other than your own.

If you’re a photographer, do you only check out other photographers’ work? Is there value in digging into architecture, say, or sculpture?

I follow lots of photographers whose work I enjoy. Usually, their work is so different from mine. Lately, I’m trying to follow other artists, too, just to get a broad view of the creative world. Photography is great, but so is music, dance, painting, film.

Artists have a lot to learn from each other.

Don’t be afraid to stretch beyond your own artistic corner of the world.

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Just Another Asshole

Just Another Asshole

A year or two ago, I thought about doing a book called “So You Bought a Fancy Camera.” It would be for friends who had just bought a DSLR or mirrorless camera and needed to get started with the basics.

Instead, I spent my time making another book (and another after that), covering something other than how-to material, and I feel like that was time better spent.

Who needs another asshole talking about focal length?

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On Switching Gears

Switching Gears

Here’s what I used to do with my free time:

I’d take an old Macintosh, either from eBay or an e-waste drive, plug it in, fire it up, and fix whatever was wrong.

I’d add RAM, or install a new PRAM battery. I’d clean out the vents and get the gunk off the keyboard. Make sure the mouse worked. Install the latest version of the operating system. Try out a different hard drive.

This went on for three or four years. Take a random Friday night, put on The Verve Pipe’s Villains, grab a six pack, and tinker. And then I’d write about it.

I loved it.

And then I walked away.

In its place, I picked up a new hobby, and slowly let the former one slip into the past, like Saturday morning cartoons or homecoming dances.

This happens to lots of us. Often, several times during our lives. Maybe we outgrow our hobbies after a while, or situations change in life. We get married, start families, switch jobs. Our priorities change.

I used to feel bad about leaving my Mac hobby behind. I still love tinkering, and I still play with my old PowerMac and Newtons.

But just like I left behind playing Magic: The Gathering, and staying up late trying to beat Super Mario Bros. 3, I switched gears.

It’s okay to try on new things, and leave old things behind. Maybe photography won’t be “my thing” forever, and that’s fine, too.

There are plenty of hobbies out there.

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Cameras Are Like Pets

Ann Arbor, Michigan

For a long time, I used disposable cameras and point and shoots to do my photography. It wasn’t quite a hobby yet, but I used those two tools to do a lot of shooting – particularly on cross-country road trips.

But then something flipped, and I wanted to take photography seriously. I had the drive, and the intent, so I saved up money and bought my first DSLR in 2010. I saw it as an investment in a new hobby.

I get the sense that many people buying entry-level DSLRs are buying the “fancy” camera to take “better” photos.

Don’t buy a fancy camera unless you have the patience and time to do it right.

For most people, a smartphone camera is all they ever need. Point and shoots are great, and affordable.

Buying a DSLR or mirrorless camera is like buying a pet: it needs feeding, care, to be taken for a walk, etc.

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Break Time

Break Time

Jon Wilkening is taking a much-needed break from his work, and from social media, this month.

Good for him. And it’s such a Today thing to do. I’ve seen so many blog posts lately where the authors are taking the month of July and turning off all social media.

I do that from time to time, usually on vacation or around the holidays. I find that I usually don’t miss much, and what I do miss, I don’t know any better.

Taking breaks from your hobby can be helpful, too. Last winter, after I finished my portrait project, I needed to step away from photography and recharge. The same thing happened this spring when I got my new job: my brain needed to work out other things than exposures and apertures.

So take a breather. And don’t feel guilty about it.

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Take On City Hall

Take On City Hall

[Photography] is not a popularity contest; it’s creating something that means something.

Ted Forbes says that no one cares about your photographs. The world doesn’t need more photos, or paintings, or songs – we have plenty, thanks.

What does matter? Projects. Difference-making, not-easy work.

Take pretty shots, sure. Just understand no one cares about them. Nor should they.

But when you tackle projects that say something, or take on a big issue, you’re doing the work that a good journalist can do. Humanity needs stuff that matters.

Take on City Hall, whatever that means to you.

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On More vs Just Enough

More vs Just Enough

More is a losing sum game. Once you get more, you only continue to want more. We’re pre-wired this way.

Jason Zook writes that “just enough” is good enough. Just enough followers, just enough leisure time, just enough income to be comfortable.

How does this relate to photography and creativity?

Think about all the stuff surrounding photography. More lenses, more Lightroom presets, more training videos, more lighting rigs. More, more, more.

It’s tough. I feel it myself, every time I see a 135mm lens for sale on Fred Miranda, or when a photographer I enjoy releases a new preset pack.

But then I think: Will this help? Will I actually use it?

When will enough be enough?

Lots of people can make money off of your feelings of inadequacy, or your gear lust. Next time you get the itch, try turning that around and say, “With what I have right now, I’m going to make something that someone will want from me.”

[via Jon Wilkening’s retweet]

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Nothing To Do With Thinking

On Thinking

“Painting has nothing to do with thinking, because in painting thinking is painting. Thinking is language – record-keeping – and has to take place before and after. Einstein did not think when he was calculating: he calculated – producing the next equation in reaction to the one that went before – just as in painting one form is a response to another, and so on.”

– Gerhard Richter

So it goes with making anything, from photographs to ceramics.

You don’t do by thinking. You just do.

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Look, A New Camera

 

Canon AE-1

Earlier this week, Hasseblad released a new thing: a mirrorless medium format camera.

Of course, if you follow the camera press, you heard about it from rumor to reveal. It’s supposed to be the “next big thing.” Maybe it will be.

For those in a rush to spend $10,000 on a new camera, might I suggest something? Don’t read the initial reviews. Read the reviews from users a year from now.

How does it handle? What hiccups does it have? How tough is it? What complications does it introduce?

A lot of things – cars, tablets, cameras – are introduced to great fanfare with no thought to the long-term usability of the product. When things go wrong, do they go horribly wrong? Does the company stand behind the product?

Yes, a new camera, shiny and cool with a neat new idea. But if you wait a year, it should still be cool, and I bet you’ll get a better deal on it.

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On Street Photography

 

On Street Photography

Some of my favorite photographers are street photographers. Those New York guys in the ‘60s and ‘70s? It’s some of my favorite work.

There’s something about modern street photography, though, that doesn’t appeal to me. It starts to look the same after while.

There are exceptions.

I’m not a huge fan of doing street photography, either – not in its traditional sense. I’ll head out with a camera and explore a city. I’ll even take photos of people in the streets, in windows, in their cars, wherever. It just has to be a pretty special shot for me to share it.

A shot like those guys (or ladies) in the mid-century would make.

Shapes, shadows, the kind of urban landscape stuff that Stephen Shore would make – that’s more up my alley.

I took a spare Friday this summer and hit the not-so-mean streets of Ann Arbor, Michigan. It was a beautiful evening, Summerfest was going on, and Friday nights in Ann Arbor are pretty hopping. The light was past the too-harsh phase. It was one of those great June nights in Michigan.

For this exercise, I shot locations, mostly. I saw an interesting scene, waited until something fun came along, and made a photo. Or the sunlight would come in at an interesting angle, so I’d shoot that scene.

What I didn’t do was go out and try to find interesting people. Maybe that’s the Stephen Shore difference.

More scene finding, less Gary Winogrand’ing.

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New Camera Day

Low-End Shooting

Exciting news: Canon released a new camera today. More megapixels! Touchscreen! GPS!

For many people, it really is exciting. They have $3,500 burning a whole in their pocket, or they need it for professional work.

But for us low-end shooters, we don’t need latest and greatest. In fact, a new Canon 5D means that the previous models, Marks I-III, will be on sale here soon. You can buy an affordable used or refurbished model.

I’m not shy about it: I use a 10 year old 5D for most photo stuff. There are others (six megapixels? C’mon!) who are even more ambitious in their anachronism.

So you can use this New Camera Day as an opportunity to jump on something new, jump on something old – or maybe wait a bit, until it goes on sale.

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On Projects

 

On Projects

Give me a month, and a new idea, and I’ll make a project out of it.

Quitting coffee for a month? Done that. Quitting alcohol for a month? Done that (in January). Doing Lent, even though I’m not Catholic? Done that. Drive cross country a few times? Check!

I’ve done the workout thing, the running thing, the daily photo project thing, the portrait project thing, tried the vegetarian thing, a few documentary things.

A lot of my inspiration comes from Benjamin Franklin, who challenged himself with all kinds of fun personal projects. And because the idea of learning new things and applying what I’ve learned is immensely gratifying.

By pushing up against your limits, even if those are just perceived limits, can help you figure out more about yourself.

Can you quit meat/coffee/alcohol? What does that mean for the rest of your life? Does it makes things better, overall, or worse? What did you learn by doing that? Etc.

Here lately, I’ve had a few more personal projects in mind:

  • Make only black and white photos for the summer
  • Take up running again
  • Lose five pounds

The good part is, these are all small things to try. If I fail, I’m not losing anything (except, perhaps, a bit of fitness).

But if I succeed, maybe it will make life a tiny bit better.

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On Daily Blogging

Turn On the Bright Light

CJ Chilvers, (of @alesserphotographer) through Seth Godin, writes about the benefits of the daily blog post. That appeals to me.

I used to maintain an (almost) daily blog about a subject I was passionate about. It did well, and was a lot of fun for that period of my life.

For this stage, I’m focusing my blogging efforts on photography. I try to share a photo (or two) every day, and a longer, more thoughtful series on Wednesday evenings.

What can I say? I like routines.

Sometimes that breaks down on weekends, and on holidays, or when I leave for vacation. But for the most part: a photo a day.

What if I didn’t just share a photo, but also shared…something else? Some bit of insight, how-to, or project every single day? Could I do it?

Chilvers’ insistence on the daily blogging stuff appeals to me. I like to write. I like to share. And I like little projects and personal challenges. Plus, I’ve been looking for a project to start on the first day of summer this year.

Maybe this is it.

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