Month: April 2011

Witnesses by choice

Last week, the news of the deaths of two photojournalists, Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros raced around the world of photojournalism (and the larger media world.) I read the various pieces and mostly I was saddened by the loss. I grieve for their families, for our profession and for our world as a whole. During a presentation I gave Thursday night, I paused and asked the audience to remember the two photographers. As I was reading the various articles on their deaths, one thing caught my attention and it may be nitpicking but I think it is important. The two are frequently described as having died “in the line of duty.” They were not under any obligation to be there. It was not part of any military term or enlistment they had made. They were there by choice. That in no way negates what they were doing, or the tragedy of their deaths, but they put themselves in harm’s way by choice. Read More

Blazing a new path in your photography education

For me, blogging, like life, is most interesting when seemingly disparate things come together in unusual and thought provoking ways. A recent series of events got me thinking about photography workshops in particular and photography education in general. Since I studied the history of photography, work as a photographer, and teach a fair number of workshops, this is not new territory for me. What is new is where my thinking ended up at the end of the mental twists and turns that I recently went through. Read More

First impressions are lasting impressions with web sites

I look at a lot of photographer’s websites. Most times I am looking to learn who they are and what kind of photography they do. In some cases, I may be checking them out in case they are under consideration for a position as a reviewer in our on-line photo-critiquing system, Photo Synesi http://photosynesi.com/ Other times, they may simply be professional peers (or competitors.) In still other cases, I am looking because I am told they are the latest “hot” photographer and I am looking at their site to figure out why they are defined as so “hot” (and I am especially curious how they got where they did in their careers.) In all cases, I use roughly the same strategy in looking at photographer’s sites. A photographer recently asked me to look at his site, and I decided to review his site using the same system I use in looking at every photographer’s site. Read More

Failure is a requirement

I have been thinking about failure recently. What first comes to my mind when I say that word is the phrase, “failure is not an option.” NASA engineers made that line famous during the nearly disastrous Apollo 13 space flight. The phrase and its very focused message have long since entered our collective body of speech. The older I get, the more I think that at least for creative people, like photographers, failure is all but a requirement. For me this dichotomy is doubly interesting since, had I not become a photographer, I would have probably become an engineer of some sort. Read More

What’s in a name

I am in California, working on my project “Foreclosed Dreams,” where I have been photographing inside foreclosed houses. I am also teaching a series of classes. I am spending a lot of time on my new MacBook Air, running my photography business from the road. In between all this, I am working on building Photo Synesi ( http://photosynesi.com ), a new on-line critiquing system that connects serious photographers around the world. Through Photo Synesi, we help aspiring photographers get better through personalized feedback of their work. The title of one of the projects that was recently reviewed caught my eye because it perfectly described what we try to do. Read More