LensWork - Photography and the Creative Process

Episode #1530 from our long-running, weekly podcast On Photography and the Creative Process Why I Prefer Projects Words alone cannot tell a story until they are organized into sentences and paragraphs. Said another way, groups of words make much more powerful expressions than words could ever do without the power of sentences and paragraphs. Similarly, individual pictures can be wonderful, but whe...

Here's a Thought… #2800 with Brooks Jensen Lawn Chairs and Other Photographic Necessities The older I get and the longer I practice photography the more I'm convinced that photographs find us. Chasing photographs is a fine idea in our youth when burning off excess energy is a virtue. I have discovered, however, that chasing photographs is not the best strategy, at least not for me, and my aging kn...

Here's a Thought… #2799 with Brooks Jensen The Field of Search You've managed to carve a little time from your busy schedule and have an opportunity to do photography. Where do you search for your next photograph? In The Great outdoors? On a busy urban street? In your still life studio? Or could it possibly be waiting to be discovered in your Lightroom catalog? Become a member of LensWork Online a...

Here's a Thought… #2798 with Brooks Jensen Art That Is Not Pretty In this week's podcast, I was bemoaning the overload of pretty pictures we are surrounded with these days. A logical question then becomes What is an artistic photograph that isn't pretty? I think this question gets right to the heart of personally expressive photography. Become a member of LensWork Online and have access to all 270...

Here's a Thought… #2797 with Brooks Jensen Artmaking Is Problem-Solving I have a daughter who loves puzzles. Watching her attack a puzzle reminds me of the process I engage when working on art. The end can often be visualized, but the means to get there cannot. That could almost be the definition of a puzzle. To reach the end requires innumerable steps almost all of which are essentially trial and...

Here's a Thought… #2796 with Brooks Jensen Drive-by Misses The other day I was talking about my preference for base camp shooting rather than incessant travel. We've now been on the road for a month and I hate to think of how many things we've driven by that appealed to me photographically but were impossible to access because we're pulling the trailer. These drive-by misses are almost painful. Be...

Here's a Thought… #2795 with Brooks Jensen Megapixels versus Paper and Ink Some of you have unlimited budgets and can skip this thought. The rest of us have decisions to make. Do you buy expensive, high megapixel cameras that leave a smaller budget for paper and inks? Or, do you choose a moderately priced camera that allows a more generous budget for prints, better lenses, travel, faster computers...

Here's a Thought… #2794 with Brooks Jensen A Visible Difference The jump from 35mm to 8x10 is immediately visible. Because of this, photographers with roots in film axiomatically believe that bigger is better. By extension, 60 megapixel cameras are better than 20. But is that true? Is it a visibly true? Become a member of LensWork Online and have access to all 2700+ Here's a Thought… commentaries.

Episode #1529 from our long-running, weekly podcast On Photography and the Creative Process Pretty Picture Overload Maybe I'm just feeling ornery these days. I find I'm becoming less and less impressed with pretty pictures. Sometimes it feels like we are being bombarded from all sides with lovely images from every source. Exotic locations, idyllic scenes, super-saturated colors — it leaves me feel...

Here's a Thought… #2793 with Brooks Jensen When the Project Picks You I'll readily confess that most of my best projects are not preplanned, purpose driven, and not the result of conscious searching. I stumble upon them. They whisper in my ear. They hesitatingly reveal themselves. They are less a declaration that commands me and more an invitation that seduces me. They arrive as a hint, a glimpse...

Here's a Thought… #2792 with Brooks Jensen We Engineer-Artists One of the things that fascinates me about photography is that it lies at the perfect inflection point between technology and creative vision. I love the science of mixing darkroom chemistry or mastering software and computing. The engineer in me thrills at the challenge, and the sense of accomplishment from mastering a technology is u...

Here's a Thought… #2791 with Brooks Jensen Prevent a Disaster Photographers spend a lot of time thinking about how to be successful with their images, their projects, their art life. Might I suggest that another fruitful area of thought is to anticipate how to prevent disasters. For example, my first trip to China I took a second identical camera body with me just in case my main camera failed. I...

Here's a Thought… #2790 with Brooks Jensen Lessons That Last a Lifetime Years ago I used to subscribe to Popular Photography , Modern Photography , and PC Magazine . I kept them all on my bookshelves as reference material. But equipment changes and gear reviews fall out of date. With the passage of years I realized the information in those magazines were no longer pertinent to my creative life. Th...

Here's a Thought… #2789 with Brooks Jensen One Place Well Travel photography is surely an interesting way to take our camera out into the world. I've done a lot of travel photography and I always enjoy it. But over the years I've learned that there are two distinct approaches to travel photography that are mutually exclusive. The first kind is to constantly be on the move, looking for new location...

Here's a Thought… #2788 with Brooks Jensen Two Kinds of Archives Here is a self-observation that I'm wondering if others have, too. When I look through my past production and my archives, I find I have two kinds of images. There are those who have worn well over the years about which I'm still excited and proud. And then there are those that have not worn well with the passage of time and find I'v...

Here's a Thought… #2787 with Brooks Jensen The Plot Twist, the Dissonant Chord Literature and music share a common technique that involves the unexpected surprise. In literature, it's the plot twist. In music, it's the dissonant chord. Try as I might, I can't think of a single example in photography that employees the same idea. How would we introduce the unexpected in a photo project? One color i...

Episode #1528 from our long-running, weekly podcast On Photography and the Creative Process Art as Gift While Brooks is traveling this week, here is an audio recording of him reading the Editor's Comments from LensWork #44, originally published in Dec 2002. This audio is part of the archived of audio presentations of the Ediitor's Comments from the pages of LensWork that are available to members o...

Here's a Thought… #2786 with Brooks Jensen Distribution On a Budget As much as I resist the pragmatics of calculating the cost in production of our art, it is necessary to consider the costs for many of us. This includes not just the production of our work but also the distribution of our work. Wouldn't it be lovely if we could produce 20" prints with abandon and mail them out to everyone we might...

Here's a Thought… #2785 with Brooks Jensen The Transition to Art Mind One of the greatest challenges of my creative life has been the flip of mind that is required to shift from everyday mind to artmaking mind. They are different and mutually exclusive. I can't, for example, think about my art while paying the monthly bills. These two activities require a completely different way of processing the...

Here's a Thought… #2784 with Brooks Jensen The Virtue of Unknown Roads So many photographer I talk to go to known destinations. I don't think it ever occurs to them that the destination is known because so many other photographers have been there before them! The great advantage of going down unknown roads is precisely that you have no idea what you will find there. It's the discovery of the unkno...

Here's a Thought… #2783 with Brooks Jensen Removing the Unwanted After all these years in photography, I still believe the best advice I ever received was "remove the unnecessary." I've often joked that Ansel Adams' most useful fool was a12-gauge shotgun to remove unwanted tree branches from the scene. I remember in an early Lens-Work workshop I had everyone take a picture that purposely had somet...

Here's a Thought… #2782 with Brooks Jensen Of Course Your Family Loves Your Photography The first people to see our latest work is probably our spouse, our family, our loved ones. Their encouragement is lovely, but is it trustworthy? I think what most of us want is an honest opinion and useful feedback. The least useful feedback we can ever receive is "I like it." If you want feedback from a loved...

Here's a Thought… #2781 with Brooks Jensen YouTube Shortcuts Whatever happened to learning by doing, learning by trial and error, learning by falling flat on our face? Photographers no longer need to experiment. Whatever you might want to do to make an image, you can learn step-by-step with a YouTube video. That's wrong — you can choose from hundreds of videos! Is this a valuable resource or a thi...

Here's a Thought… #2780 with Brooks Jensen Go Ahead, Be Insecure If you are fully confident and unquestionably sure of your work, you are probable not taking enough chances. Staying inside your comfort zone does not mean the work is inferior, but it does mean you are not exploring the new. Insecurity is not an attribute to be avoided, but rather a fertile ground where artists receive a nudge from...

Episode #1527 from our long-running, weekly podcast On Photography and the Creative Process My Philosophy of Art in a Nutshell Each of us (both as art-maker and as art-lover) makes decisions about our relationship with art -- ours and other's. What is the purpose of our art? What art do we choose to surround ourselves with? Conscious of it or not, we all have a "personal philosophy" about art. Her...