Generator

Most of us got into creative work wanting to do everything, then spent years drowning in all of it. Sean McCormick did the opposite on purpose. Sean spent years as a public school special education teacher before he walked away from the steady paycheck, with two young daughters at home, to bet on one narrow lane: executive function coaching. He built Executive Function Specialists, founded the Exe...

"As soon as your age has a six in the front in Germany, it's very difficult to find another corporate job." That's where Jörg Kampers starts his story. He spent 35 years inside companies like Commodore, Dell, and CommScope, selling the Amiga 500 as a physics student in his university days and running PCs, networks, Wi-Fi, and 5G across the decades that followed. Last year the company got sold. At...

Most photographers will tell you the same thing if you ask them honestly. The shooting is the part they love. Everything else is overhead. Ashley Siegert heard that enough times that she built an entire company around it. Ashley is the founder of Vacanva, a platform that pairs photographers with nonprofits to run portrait-based fundraising campaigns. The model is built so that photographers show u...

I met Billy Thorpe on a bus. We were heading to the venue for Ecamm Creator Camp last October, he sat down in front of me, we started talking, and somewhere in that conversation he casually mentioned that he makes product videos on Amazon and that brands pay him to do it. I pulled out my notepad and started taking notes before he finished the sentence. Billy is one of those people who has built so...

Getting Good at Claude: Why Most Photographers Give Up Too Soon (And How to Fix It) Have you tried Claude once, gotten something too generic to be useful, and just moved on? This episode is the podcast version of my live webinar, Getting Good at Claude for Photographers. I'm breaking down why I switched from ChatGPT to Claude after two and a half years, what the cold start problem is, and why it's...

Generator Live: WPPI 2026 Recap - The Good, The Bad, and The Dance Circle What happens when you find yourself in the middle of a dance circle surrounded by phones at a photography conference after party? This is a solo Generator Live episode recorded the day after I got home from WPPI 2026 in Las Vegas. I'm sitting here with whatever plague circulates through Vegas conferences, no voice, exhausted...

Generator Live at WPPI 2026: Josh Beaton on Following Dreams, Self-Esteem, and Starting Over at 50 What happens when you decide to chase the dream you always thought was unattainable, even if it means starting over at 50 years old? Josh Beaton is a Chicago-based portrait photographer and fine art artist who also runs Tween Esteem, a 501c3 nonprofit dedicated to building self-confidence in teenager...

Can AI replace the human element that makes photography and retouching valuable, or are we measuring the wrong thing entirely? Nino Batista is a photographer, retoucher, and educator whose work spans commercial photography and fine art. He's known for his technical expertise in retouching and his thoughtful approach to how technology shapes creative industries. After watching AI infiltrate photogr...

What if closing your studio isn't failure but the smartest business decision you could make? Nine days into 2026 and I'm seeing patterns emerge that tell me this year is going to force a lot of photographers to make hard choices. Not because the industry is dying, but because the old models aren't working the way they used to. I walk through my predictions for where professional photography is hea...

Planning a live show format terrifies me, but staying stuck terrifies me more. I'm rebuilding Generator from the ground up for 2026. It's about creating something sustainable that actually serves the people who need these conversations. In this episode, I walk through the new show structure I'm testing, why I'm shifting from pre-recorded to live, and what it takes to run a creative business when y...

What if the perfect workflow you're building is just another way to avoid making the hard decisions? I screwed up a camera review this week. Made a factual error, took it down, and my first thought wasn't to slow down and check my work. It was to build a better system. A friend called me out: "You're not rushing because you lack a system. You're rushing because you're afraid of being irrelevant."...

Your brain is guessing what it sees. All the time. Understanding how vision actually works changed how I approach every portrait session. After learning about change blindness, mirror neurons, and how our brains process visual information, I realized something. The technical choices I make as a photographer aren't just about aesthetics. They're about communication. About helping someone see themse...

CAN PODCASTS SAVE PHOTOGRAPHY? Photography conferences used to launch careers. Now they're expensive reunions that most photographers can't afford. After watching traditional photography education collapse and virtual summits turn into forgettable cash grabs, I realized we need something different. Not another conference. An actual system. This is a solo episode where I break down what's broken. P...

What if the secret to a sustainable creative business isn't working harder, but starting your day differently? Angela Anderson is a portrait photographer and educator based in Tucson, Arizona. She runs a studio that doubles as an education center, teaching eight-week intensive courses that take beginning photographers from shooting in automatic mode to running a full photography business. After ye...

What if the thing you're best at feels too easy to charge money for? Tracy Matthews has built multiple seven-figure businesses, taught over 9,500 jewelry designers through Flourish & Thrive Academy, and lost everything in the 2008 crash before rebuilding from scratch. She's learned that most creatives are stuck because they think work needs to be hard to be valuable. Spoiler: it doesn't. I sat...

What do you do when your business feels personal and a bad year makes you question everything? Ashleigh Taylor is a portrait and boudoir photographer based near Los Angeles whose work blends editorial edge with raw emotion. She's built a reputation for creating images that feel like they belong in a magazine, but she's also someone who isn't afraid to talk about the hard parts of running a creativ...

What color was your childhood fridge? For photographer Ben Marcum, it was that unforgettable avocado green—and that odd little memory sets the tone for an honest, funny, and insightful hour about life, art, and connection. Ben, based in Louisville, Kentucky, has built a thriving portrait and boudoir studio rooted in authenticity. We talk about how his years in theater shaped his ability to read pe...

Episode Overview How do you create portraits that feel more like stories than snapshots? In this episode of Generator, I sit down with Judith Hill, a fine art portrait photographer based in Nashville, whose work is filled with texture, emotion, and intention. Judith has built a style that slows everything down, where connection is the point, not the afterthought. We talk about how she went from se...

Annie Marie has been working as a photographer in Minneapolis for over three decades. She’s earned the titles—four-time Minnesota Photographer of the Year, SYNC Photographer of the Year—but none of that has pulled her away from what matters most: making honest portraits and helping other photographers find their footing. Podcast Title: Generator Episode Title: Annie Marie - Still Thriving After a...

Matt Stagliano and return guest Sue Bryce dive deep into the wild world of photography and the many hurdles that come with chasing success in this episode. Kicking things off, they tackle the main theme: the notion that "The Photography Game is Rigged," a title that has sparked quite the conversation. We explore how the industry can sometimes feel like a minefield of outdated beliefs and myths tha...

You know that nagging voice in your head that just won’t take a break? Yeah, the one that tells you you're not doing enough or everyone else has their life together while you’re just here, existing? Well, let’s dive into the murky waters of our not-so-sunny thoughts. We’re constantly told to manifest positivity and speak good vibes into existence, but what happens when the truth is more shadow tha...

You ever finish a photography course and think… “That didn’t help at all”? You’re not alone. The coaching space is flooded right now—some of it’s gold, some of it’s garbage. And when we’re unsure of ourselves, we’re more likely to buy the hype. In this short episode I’m digging into the rise of photography coaches, why so many of us feel unfulfilled after taking courses, and how to become a better...

Let’s have a real talk about what’s happening in the photography world. In this short episode, I break down the game where photographers feel like they have to chase sponsorships, get reposted by brands, or land a partnership just to be taken seriously. You know the drill: content over craft, clout over connection. But here’s the thing… that game? It’s not built for you. It’s built to keep you run...

Jonathan Daige, a former law enforcement officer and veteran, is the founder of the Thin Blue Ride, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting veterans and first responders battling cancer. In our chat, JD shares his incredible journey of resilience in the face of multiple cancer diagnoses and surgeries, highlighting the importance of community and support in overcoming life's toughest chal...

In this episode of Generator, I sit down with Karinda Kinsler—an equine photographer, business coach, and the author of The Unicorn —to talk about what really happens when you stop following the rules and start building a business that actually works for you. Karinda built a brand photographing horses as well as a national reputation by doing things her own way. We talk about the mindset shifts th...