HT2227 - The Balance of Input and Output I can't help but feel that the path of an artist is one that balances input and output. If all we do is watch television, read, be entertained, it's difficult to be an artist. If all we do is work, produce, construct, it's equally difficult to be an artist. The key to the art life is finding the middle way, a balance input and output, where we take in, feel, think, and then produce with our response to the world....
Apr 14, 2025•3 min
LW1449 - The Goal of the Process As someone looks at one of your images, Is that the end of a process of the beginning of one? Is viewing your image the end of their engagement with it? Or do we hope viewing our image is the beginning of a small mental journey that engages their imagination, poses a few questions, or moves them to a further experience? All previous episodes of our weekly podcast are available to members of LensWork Online . 30-day Trial Memberships are only $10. Instant access, ...
Apr 14, 2025•13 min
HT2226 - The Least Camera Needed Ted Orland opened my eyes about gear. He advocated that we should choose a camera that's fit for the job but the least capable camera we can. His idea was based on the observation that the more capable the camera, the more complex, and the more complex it is the more it intrudes into the connection between us and the subject. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!...
Apr 13, 2025•3 min
HT2225 - A Selective Literacy There are so many photographers, so many books, so many exhibitions, that it's virtually impossible to achieve anything even close to visual literacy in photography. Instead, we each have our own understanding of photography based on a fractional appreciation of what's being and been produced. We all love photography, but what we mean by that is entirely dependent on our own selective literacy. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily He...
Apr 12, 2025•3 min
HT2224 - Printing Monochrome with a CMYK Press Most commercial printing presses that you might employ to print your book will use the four-ink process that is the standard in the industry. Simply said, these presses use a combination of cyan ink, magenta ink, yellow ink, and black ink to achieve a sufficient simulation of human color vision. That's where the trouble begins. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!...
Apr 11, 2025•3 min
HT2223 - The Annual Best Of Series Because I love reading short stories so much, over the years I've collected a number of anthology books that are "the best short stories of the year." This could be a pretty good idea for our photographs too, don't you think? What were your best images from, say, last year? What makes those images qualify as The Best? Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!...
Apr 10, 2025•3 min
HT2222 - Explore More Deeply Starting in 2009, I produced a series of annual projects under the title, Winter Trees. Each year for seven years, I produced a new five-image project for the series which was produced as a folio and as a PDF. To date, this remains one of the most difficult projects I've ever done for the simple reason that each year it became progressively more difficult to see the same subject in a new and different way...
Apr 09, 2025•3 min
HT2221 - Shadow Writing I've always thought it was curious that photography is defined by its very nomenclature to be "light writing," but what we actually do is write the shadows onto white paper. If we think about what actually happens when we make our photographs, it helps make better decisions about how we control the exposure and what processing steps we need to pay attention to as we write the shadows onto the white background....
Apr 08, 2025•3 min
HT2220 - The Lasting Impression Someone has taken time out of their busy life to attend your gallery exhibition, visit your website, or look at your book. What is it you want them to take with them when they leave the gallery, move to new website, or put your book back on the bookshelf? What is the lasting impression you hope your work inspires in viewers?
Apr 07, 2025•3 min
LW1448 - Project Photography Some thoughts on why we publish what we publish in LensWork. In particular, our emphasis on project-oriented photograph versus "greatest hits" images. All previous episodes of our weekly podcast are available to members of LensWork Online . 30-day Trial Memberships are only $10. Instant access, terabytes of content, inspiration and ideas that expand daily with new content. Sign up for instant access! You might also be interested in. . . Every Picture Is a Compromise,...
Apr 07, 2025•13 min
HT2219 - Ego Pixels Here is an interesting story about gear from a friend of mine who photographed portraits and weddings. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
Apr 06, 2025•3 min
HT2218 - A Convenience Camera There was a time when I searched for the one camera that would meet all my needs. How innocent I was back then. That camera was likely to be large, full-featured far beyond my needs, render the highest quality images I could ever imagine, and cost and weigh a lot. But sometimes, that camera is just too much camera. I've recently added a new camera I think of as my "convenience camera" for time where portability and light weight take precedence over the ideal. Of cou...
Apr 05, 2025•3 min
HT2217 - Paper Has Personality Photography is — still — a paper-based medium. Paper is a huge part of our lives. Different photographic papers might have different characteristics, sometimes dramatic difference. Other times, these differences are subtle. I learned the importance of this when I was working with Huntington Witherill on publishing his book Botanical Dances. It's crucial to explore a papers personality before committing to it for a big project. Show your appreciation for our free we...
Apr 04, 2025•3 min
HT2216 - Amazing IBIS Results Handheld photography is a new thing in my 50 years with a camera. The advent of image stabilization has entirely changed my approach to photography. In combination with burst mode, simply amazing results are possible. Here is my empirical rule of thumb. One over the focal length + 5. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!...
Apr 03, 2025•3 min
HT2215 - No One Cares About Our Plans It's a fairly common thing in photography to hear a photographer talk about what they are going to do. They haven't done it yet, but they announce to the world they are about to do it — as though we are supposed to care about their plans. Don't tell people what you are planning to do; tell them what you've actually done, accomplished, finished. That's the only thing that counts in the art world....
Apr 02, 2025•3 min
HT2214 - Every Work of Art Has a Title I mean that. Every sculpture, every painting, every poem, every novel, every song — they all have titles. So why do we photographers think "Untitled" is a reasonable title? Is our imagination that limited, or are we just lazy?
Apr 01, 2025•3 min
HT2213 - The Size of the Print, the Size of the Paper In my first photography class we were taught to leave a quarter inch white space all the way around our images. If we printed on 8x10 paper, the actual area of the image would be seven and a half by nine and a half inches. As my thinking about this has evolved over the years, I now leave space around the image that creates a mat board-like margin on all sides. In practice, this means I print 8x10s on 11x14 paper, 11x14 images on 16x20 paper, ...
Mar 31, 2025•3 min
LW1447 - Limited Editions Years ago, after showing my work to a gallery owner, I was thrilled when she said she loved my work and would like to represent me. It was a lifelong dream come true. She then insisted, however, that I limit my editions as a prerequisite to her representation. I passed. Mechanically, there is no limit on how many "copies" you can make. This is especially true in the age of digital printing. No one knows how many you actually make unless you publicize that. A designation...
Mar 31, 2025•13 min
HT2212 - Postal Code Titles One of my favorite photographers is Jay Dusard. A number of years ago we were preparing to publish a portfolio of his in LensWork and I had sent him proof pages to approve. He immediately got back to me and asked me to change the abbreviations I used in his titles, for example AZ as compared to Arizona. He explained "AZ is not a location, it's a postal code." If we're truly interested titling our prints with accuracy, perhaps we should include the ZIP code in our titl...
Mar 30, 2025•3 min
HT2211 - Ready at a Moment's Notice It's a fairly common occurrence that an exhibition space develops a crisis when a scheduled artist has to pull out for one reason or another. It leaves the exhibitor / gallery with a hole that needs to be filled quickly. Would you be able to respond if you were to receive an invitation that required an exhibition be provided immediately? Maybe it's a good idea to have an exhibition or two ready for any opportunity that presents itself. Show your appreciation f...
Mar 29, 2025•3 min
HT2210 - How Many Projects at a Time In my earliest days of photography I tended to work on one project at a time. I gave it my total focus and postponed working on others. To avoid that void at the end of a project I started working multiple projects at a time. As new ideas came, I added them to a list which became increasingly lengthy and unmanageable. I've since found the sweet spot by using a tiered strategy for managing multiple projects simultaneously. Show your appreciation for our free w...
Mar 28, 2025•3 min
HT2209 - Framing Is Its Own Artform In the late 1990s when we were doing the LensWork Special Edition prints, we offered them with or without frames. It didn't take long before we discontinued the framing options. Now, I never offer my work pre-framed. Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!...
Mar 27, 2025•3 min
HT2208 - Camera Ergonomics I loved that camera, but I couldn't wait to sell it and get rid of it. Have you ever had that experience? I loved everything about that camera except one button that I was constantly pressing accidentally that caused frustration and many a missed shot opportunity. I finally got so frustrated that I sold it with prejudice. The lesson I learned is to pay more attention to camera ergonomics than I do to technical specifications....
Mar 26, 2025•3 min
HT2207 - Never to Be Seen One of the realities I cringe to admit is that I know of the vast majority of my work will never be seen by anyone, ever. I also cringe to admit that I know this is silly, somewhat narcissistic, and impractical. I am my own audience, as each of us are, and that's probably the most important audience we should ever care about. Nonetheless......
Mar 25, 2025•3 min
