Crowd Sourced Art
I love when people are able to find unique ways to create art in the city. I was walking back to the hotel in Vancouver, BC and cut up through Yaletown and found this absolutely fun wall. Can’t wait to circle back and see the famous Pauls.
Pay attention to the scene?
I have started working on a new project that I think will end up mostly as a fine art portfolio of work. Lately I have become fascinated by people who spend time looking at cool stuff on a 4 in screen. They are creating and capturing movies and photos, but I have noticed that particularly with the [...]
Always in Flux from website Different Office
For the past few months I have been working with the folks over at Different Office when our schedules align for some photography for their various stories. This story is from Swift Industries located in the Seattle neighborhood of Ballard. It is an amazing space and team of people. You have to love people who [...]
New work at Different Office
My amazing spouse Lori Kane and her partner in crime Bas de Baar have released their new site Different Office. It is a site that is dedicated to people who have self-created, soul-satisfying work spaces. They have been working on collecting stories for a few weeks now and the first one is up and live. I have been [...]
What you leave behind
I had the chance to spend this past weekend with great friends, some new and some old, discussing the nature of art and photography. As we gathered in the great little town of Port Townsend on the Washington peninsula, I wasn’t sure what would come of day long discussions of the nature of life the [...]
A lesson from Blockbuster
As I was out and about shooting, I came across an abandoned out-of-business Blockbuster. It was the Blockbuster that we used to go to on occasion to rent movies. While they normally didn’t have much that we wanted (You have to go to Scarecrow for that), it was still a mainstay for movies for most of America. [...]
A new lesson learned (Critique)
I recently had the opportunity to participate in a blind critique session. If you haven’t ever done one before you basically submit your work and a person or group of people provide feedback about the work. The interesting aspect of the process is that the feedback is done in isolation without any dialog between the [...]
Inspiration is the greatest form of flattery
Sometimes when you stand on the shoulders of those who came before you, you can see farther than you ever thought possible. Standing on Weston Beach at Point Lobos forces you to ask a very big question. Do I want to see the world through my eyes or try to make my eyes see Westons, Adams, [...]
Collection of Photography Quotes
I am getting ready for Photoshop World 2012 in DC and was looking over some notes on the computer and came across a document with a big list of photography quotes. In the past, I have taken notes and posted some of my favorite quotes from the Photoshop World conference, and so I thought I [...]
Seeds of projects to come
The subconscious is a great thing when it come to creativity. The ego doesn’t seem to be able to operate in the subconscious so amazing things happen when it is given some time to play. So with the ego passing judgement on other things in my life, my subconscious has been at play with something that is starting [...]
New Black and White Work
I was on a recent trip to San Francisco and had a few days to wonder the city and spend some time photographing. I was a black and white photographer before I was a color photographer, so often times when I am shooting just for my own interest I tend to see and focus on [...]
“Close to Home” workshop
Last week I participated in a workshop led by Stuart Sipahigil and Ray Ketcham called “Close to Home” in Port Townsend, WA (which is actually close to my home in Seattle). The workshop was based on the Craft and Vision book by Stuart of the same name. I had planned to do a review on [...]
Why I spent the day with Zack Arias
On Wednesday this week, I had the privilege to take part in Zack’s One Light Workshop in Seattle. This wasn’t my first time to get to meet and listen to Zack. I have seen him at Photoshop World, watched his course on Creative Live and I own a copy of his DVD. You could say [...]
Developing a mission
A few weeks ago, I was in Maine at a workshop by John Paul Caponigro on creativity. It was a great opportunity to learn about exploring ways to see things and great exercises to push the envelop on what makes us artist. Along the way we got to have some great conversations about art, photography, [...]
10 things I learned while shooting for 24 straight hours
This past weekend I spent 24 hours shooting for a fundraiser for the Photographic Center Northwest. It was an interesting experience to shoot for 24 straight hours, and I had a great time while raising money for a good cause. You learn a lot by staying awake and shooting for 24 hours. It pushes you [...]
Focusing on what matters
There are times that I find myself driving on backroads somewhere searching for something that peaks my interest enough to get out of the car with my camera and create a photograph. Most of the time, I find myself seeing something, getting exciting and shooting the entire scene. Rarely, are these shots the photo that [...]
Dr Who and a crack in time
I have been a Dr Who fan for a very long time. At a trip to the Pacific Coast in Oregon a while back I was amazed at how much the sunset reminded me of the rip in time that the latest incarnation of the Doctor and his companion Amy Pond faced in series 5. [...]
I am not my niche
Niche: a distinct segment of a market or a place or position suitable or appropriate for a person and maybe the position or function of an organism in a community of plants and animals. I don’t know what niche matters to me as a fine-art photographer. I know that a huge volume of information tells me how important it is to have a unique voice and vision of the world. It is in that uniqueness that I will find my niche and define why [...]
Nature of Critique Part 1
I have been co-teaching a class with Jahnavi Barnes at the Photographic Center Northwest this Fall on the critiquing of work. It has been an amazing experience to get to work with a diversity of photographers at different places, wanting different outcomes and each having a very different shooting style and approach to working. The [...]
Nine simple photo things I recently realized surfing the web
Facebook has a hell of a lot of photos. It is estimated that users will upload 30 billion images per year based on 2009 usage. If I were to use a Nikon D3s, which shoots 9 frames per second it would take over 100 years to shoot that many photos by myself. Being a photographer [...]
Gray days and winter storms
Today in Seattle, it is a vey gray day. Even at 10am the street lights are on in some neighborhoods, and my car automatically turned on the nighttime driving lights when I went out. The day is a reflection of my state of mind. No matter what I look at or think about with my [...]
Alabama Mud
I am reminded of the classic movie My Cousin Vinny and the scene when Vinny gets his Caddie stuck in the mud. And, anyone who has been stuck in the mud in Alabama knows that no matter hard you hit the gas your tires just keep spinning. My photography is in the Alabama mud. When [...]
10 things
A day shouldn’t go by where you do not take a photo The best photographs are images that surprise in imagination and inspire the next image. Photography what you love and love what you photograph. Even if no one else understands your relationship. I have 9 cameras and not once have they ever photographed anything [...]
