philosophy

Creativity is, in some respects, intangible. It does not have a physical form. It cannot be distilled and sold in bottles. It cannot be summoned at will, and if it does happen to show its face, there is no guarantee that it will stick around.

The scene through the viewfinder was one of pastoral beauty: a thatched and jettied cottage, with colorful Gertrude Jekyll borders full of Lupins.

Emotional Intelligence (EI) is the capability of individuals to recognize their own, and other people's, emotions, to discern between different feelings and label them appropriately, to use emotional information to guide thinking and behavior, and to manage and/or adjust emotions to adapt environments or achieve one's goal(s).

At the end of my photo workshops, and during my seminars, I often ask the participants a simple question: “What does your photography mean to you?”

It’s been around a year since I switched to photographing on 35mm film for the majority of my work. Beyond a couple of false starts and some misconceptions, I think I’ve adjusted well, and I’m really happy to have made the change. Now that I have a good amount of work to reference, I’ve been thinking a lot about some of the adjustments I needed to make in order to adapt to a film mindset.

Photographer Sean Tucker's latest video is a departure from the gear or technique videos that typically make the rounds in the photo world. In fact, it's not even specifically about or for photographers. It's for all artists, and it's about the importance of understanding (and balancing) your ego.

Being a monk who has photographed monastic communities from many years now, many people have asked me if I have something to share from my experience. Well, there isn't much.

How do I find my style? It’s a question that inevitably comes up for almost every photographer actively trying to improve their images. It’s a tough question, at first. Because at first, you don’t really know what that means. Many photographers think that “style” is just equal to how someone might edit their images.

I’ve always had a fascination with geometry and man-made structures, their perfection has a strong attraction on me. It took me time to realize that what I appreciated most wasn’t necessarily their symmetry or the simple repetition of shapes but the parallelism between the various elements of the construction of an image.

One of my images has been subjected to criticism and scrutiny in a way that none of my other work ever has. The photograph in question is of a scene in London, Chinatown; a man reaches into a sewer while shouting about how someone threw his needles down there.

What if you had the same camera, lighting and subject matter as everyone else. A groundhog day for a photographer so to speak. If we all have the same gear what would make you different?

When most people think of the word Zen, a meditating monk in a monastery comes to mind, a practice of enlightenment, a person being in the present or someone without attachments. When I think of Zen, I think of a lifestyle that has profoundly influenced my photography practice. I would like to dive into the ways of zen photography and how it might enlighten your creative practice.

I found an image that I don't want to see. Too familiar, and so, too hurtful. But as the Internet meme jokes, "What has been seen can't be unseen." In that context, such images are considered shocking, graphic, violent. The image I refer to, however, is far removed from any of these labels. But for me, there it is, that Punctum that Barthes spoke of. As I write, Google Chrome suggests the correct spelling is 'puncture' -- how appropriate.

Here's an inspiring 14-minute TEDx Talk by photographer Billy Weeks about documentary photography. Weeks explores that specific moment in which a photographer and subject "intersect with a single point of view."

As creatives, we all go through a very similar journey when it comes to improving our skill. Though details of the turbulent ride vary for everyone, it always boils down to two things; the how, and the why.

We tend to treat the ethics of taking photographs in a very much black and white fashion. We judge "He should never have shot that" or alternatively "She is on firm ground shooting that, it is OK" and then arguments revolve around that, never resolving anything.

The kind of photography I do begins as a moment of theft. Finding the scene, finding your angle, and stealing the moment for yourself. Some photographers are creators. They build a scene, a still life, or arrange their models and angle their lights and create an image from nothing. I’m not one of those photographers. I’m a thief.

I feel that there's a word missing from our vocabulary, and this essay is the culmination of an effort to find such a word, to define it usefully, and to work through some of what it might mean.

I kept this post as a draft for months, unsure if I should publish it since it discusses things and events that aren't very easy to share. I hope it can inspire and help at least one person from my personal life experience.

To me, creativity is all about cross-pollination of ideas in novel ways.

Recently, a friend told me of a photographer for whom he wanted to work. The seasoned fine art photographer, in his 50s, took a look at my friend’s 5x7 prints, taken on an assortment of digital and analog cameras, and said "These are not photos. Wait here."

"When you push the shutter and take a photo, you're a photographer... but are you an artist?" asks photographer Roger Ballen. "As an artist, I use photography as a medium to express my artistic vision."

In the 3-minute video above, by COOPH, Ballen offers 7 thoughts to help you become both a photographer and an artist.

I’d like to think that as I age I get wiser. I sure hope so because I want to be a better person every day! Lately I’ve been pondering about principles. For most of my life I’ve been chasing after the 1-2-3 approach only to realize that things are so complex, I would have been better off knowing the principles of life rather than going in without any guiding principle.

Since I am a photographer, I’ve compiled 5 principles that I’ve discovered that are beneficial for photographers. I hold them as true because they’ve always been true for me and I am sure they will be for you too!

One of the things I love about photography is it appeals to both the geek and the artist in all of us. On the geek side you have the technical considerations of making an image; the f-stops, shutter speeds, depth of field, histograms, dynamic range, all the stuff we must all master in order to communicate our vision.

Of course we can’t forget about all the ‘geeky’ gear, super telephotos, focusing rails, tele-converters, extension tubes, fill flash, and such. On the artistry side things are a little tougher to define, shape, color, composition, mood, balance, and that fickle mistress light, to mention just a few.

Dear photographer friend,

I wanted to write you a letter on the concept of “killing the masters of photography”. It is kind of a Buddhist philosophy, as well as a philosophy I gained from Seneca, my stoic philosophy hero and mentor.

Dear friend,

You might have heard the term “YOLO”, which stands for “you only live once”. However, I think most people misconstrue the word. They think that it means to live a life of hedonism and pleasure, and give themselves the license to do stupid stuff and waste their time and money.

Throughout your measure of time learning photography and shooting, have you ever reached a point of realization that there is hardly a place left on the planet that you can shoot where someone else hasn’t already? Especially the most remarkable places, we find they have been packaged up, guard rails erected, and signs posted that welcome us while at the same time restrain our ability to capture a unique perspective.

Here's an inspiring 5-minute video in which renowned street photographer Joel Meyerowitz talks about his approach and mindset to making photos.

Ever since junior high school, I was the kid with the camera. And many years later, I’m still the guy who shows up to every life event with camera in hand to document the lives of my friends.

I used to carry around a hulking DSLR, but the weight bothers me, and the large size feels too intrusive for the everyday. I don’t want to interrupt life by taking photos, I simply want them to remember the fractions of a second that end up representing curated slices of life.

Every day about 200 million photographs get uploaded to Facebook. That’s almost double the number of all the books that have ever been published in human history. And that’s just Facebook, I’m not even mentioning Instagram, Snapchat, or just the photos everybody takes and doesn’t even post online.

While taking all those pictures, most people don’t really think about what they’re actually doing, or how the process works. But if they did think about it, I guess their reasoning for that process would be somewhat like this...

GAS, also known as Gear Acquisition Syndrome, is very common among photographers. It simply means that you just can't get enough new lenses, equipment and upgrade your camera as soon as possible in order to have more options and - according to the seemingly prevalent opinion - become better.

But have you ever thought about the opposite side of this imaginary disease - the Gear Avoidance Syndrome? A syndrome that might even be good for you and your photography. And your wallet.

Quite a few years ago I took a solo trip down to Key West, FL. It was the first time I had gone on a vacation by myself, and since I was free of the distraction of friends and family, I decided it would make a great opportunity to expand upon my photography skills.

You see, the trip was shortly after I had decided to take this whole photography hobby of mine seriously. I had worked with video for years but now I wanted to work on becoming a good photographer as well, not just one that took as many photos as possible and then looked for the three good ones out of the hundreds shot (seriously, it's a horrible method and I wouldn't recommend it to anybody).

Thank God, I am now a gear minimalist focused on photography and a big fan of "limitation creativity" (i.e. you are more creative with less)... But here’s the truth, I used to be a huge gear junkie, basically having Gear Acquisition Syndrome (G.A.S.) as soon as I got a new camera. I had this problem since the very beginning, but now I am cured. In one sense I am trying to help those who know they have G.A.S. to stop having it and trying to prevent others from having it.

The Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, literally "change good," is at the heart of many a successful company. It represents a dedication to constant change for the better, and is famously used by Toyota on their assembly lines, where employees are encouraged to point out issues and suggest improvements.

But car companies aren't the only ones that employ the idea of Kaizen; the philosophy may also be at the heart of Fujifilm’s habit of constantly improving its cameras with firmware updates.