A Losers Guide to Photography

This post is a bit off topic. I've been having a bout of depression that's self-induced. I've been pontificating what's the purpose of life  once you have accomplished everything you desired? I've been having this thought for a few months now and I have tried to create obstacles to keep the depression held at bay. I was scrolling Facebook when I saw a post regarding a South Korean actress Yoo Joo Eun. I don't follow anything Korean, but I found this particularly interesting. She was a young girl, about my age. She was in a similar position where she was doing what she wanted to do, act, but wasn't really successful at it. Her suicide letter was interesting because it wasn't from a position of self-loathing, hatred, remorse or anything. It was almost like her brain said, "this is enough". Her sense of purpose in life was left unfulfilled - or maybe it was fulfilled in some masochistic way. There was another lady I watched on YouTube talking abou...

The Good Photo Recently I've been toying with idea of what makes a good photo. Besides following basic compositional rules and, arguably, even photos that break compositional rules are still following some obscure photo and/or graphic rule. Basically we are bound by rules.  I don't want to argue about a photos composition. I want to argue about the uniqueness and impact of a photo. I pose the following question, is a photo good if everyone has seen [with their own eyes] the subject? This is an interesting question - if someone has been inundated with a certain amount of material or style of material does the photo lose its impact? William Mortensen said that a good photo needs to have a high level of impact to retain the viewers attention.  Photography is subjective. Since photography is subjective, is there room for any absolutes? One could say it is true that a photo is objectively better by being unique, where there is little to no experience with the subject. By being uniq...

Defining Negative Space Wikipedia's definition of negative space is, " Negative space , in art , is the empty space around and between the subject(s) of an image.  Negative space may be most evident when the space around a subject, not the subject itself, forms an interesting or artistically relevant shape, and such space occasionally is used to artistic effect as the "real" subject of an image." Negative space is in nearly every piece of art. The major difference between art pieces [photos] is the amount of negative space and the intent of negative space. My personal definition of negative space is - a separate element of space within a photo that compliments the main subject or detracts from the main subject.  I believe negative space can be broken down into two components: additive and subtractive . I think instinctively we, the photographer and observer, know the feeling of good negative space. It's a calming feeling where the space around the subject c...

My main camera I use is the Fuji XPro-3 from Fujifilm. I love it. There are a lot of great things about the camera and there are a lot of things I wish were different or expanded upon further.  I believe the ultimate film camera will be a mash up of the Fuji XPro-3 and the Leica M-d Type 262 with a film advance lever.  Let's picture this. The body of a vintage Nikon F-1 or a sleek Leica body. Let's make this camera a rangefinder with the option to switch to an EVF (XPro-3). Let's add a nice feeling film advance lever. The software can have a conditional statement that says, "if film advance lever does not equal 1, do nothing. Else, advance to the next slide, set film advance lever to 0". Something like that. Digital double exposure has been around for a while now. I suppose I don't see a technological issue of saying the photographer doesn't want to automatically advance the film and let them manually do it with a film advance lever. A film reverse button ...

Definitions Before I get into "The Dilemma of the Omniscient King" I want to first define the vernacular used.  What is a Dilemma? Merriam-Webster defines a 'dilemma' as "a problem involving a difficult choice". This will be represented as the illusion in our Dilemma.  What is Omniscient? Merriam-Webster defines 'omniscient' as " possessed of universal or complete knowledge". The omniscient being in our parable is the all-knowing king.  The Dilemma... This is the story of The Dilemma of the Omniscient King. There was once an all-knowing king. This king believed he had complete knowledge of the workings of his universe. Of course, having complete knowledge of everything requires the king to be well rested. Knowing everything all at once is exhausting and rather draining. The king requires sleep. After a long period of time, the king awakens from his slumber like he has done many times throughout the infinite time of his universe. This time...

Perspective Compression, the New Way Background I had a conversation at work with a coworker about the benefits of Medium Format cameras. One of the main talking points was what he called "compression" or "lens compression", or what I think is a better fitting term Perspective Compression. I wanted to know what would justify the cost expense of upgrading from an APS-C or Full Frame camera to a Medium Format camera, other than professionalism. I wanted tangible evidence to prove Medium Format was worth an extra 100%+ dollars. We had a long conversation about "compression" and the confusion surrounding that term because of it's interchangeability with other components of photography, like JPEG or PNG. I spent some time thinking about a better term to define 'the background appearing closer to the foreground'. I came up with Perspective Compression because it can be measured in terms of high and low and the words describe what is actually happenin...

The Reclamation of TFP I want to start by saying I think TFP is great at the macro level. It enables new photographers a great way to enter the photographer sphere and learn new things about photography. It's great for networking and collaboration. TFP sets a more light hearted mood where everyone on set doesn't have to be so serious.  I use TFP because I am cheap, which is a bad habit. TFP was meant to be a subsection of photography. TFP wasn't meant for businesses to take advantage of photographers and other collaborators. TFP was meant for all people to collaborate and gain more experience in their respective field. While a lot of TFP collaborations still abide by that rule, I have been noticing a more sinister cancer growing under TFP. TFP has become the norm and not the exception. I'll explain this further because it's not blanketly true, but true enough to cause issues in the photographic community, which is why it's a cancer - it continues to grow and des...

Today I was talking with a popular photographer, Neil Kremer , about my future in photography. We discussed several topics ranging from:  industries that make money creating a 'you' style so a creative director can recognize your work  photography business stuff I really want to talk about my target audience and my 'style'.  Identifying Your Target Audience I have thought extensively about who makes the money in fashion. Aside from a few fashion photographers who are outliers and should be case studies for how to be a successful fashion photographer, there isn't a future in fashion photography. Neil confirmed my belief with his immediate interruption during my pontification of what I like to shoot. Magazines don't pay. Models don't pay. Designers don't pay, although they benefit the most. The market is completely saturated with fashion photographers who are all shooting the same stuff the same way. The only reason a photographer should shoot fashion/edit...