Have you ever wondered whether hall of fame athletes from decades ago would still find success if the played their sports today? How about the same question, but applied to photographers? Would the historical greats of photography be brilliant across all ages, or were they simply pioneers and ahead of the curve in their generation? If they were just starting out today, which of the famous photographers throughout history do you think would still become renowned in the present day, and which wouldn’t?
Photographer Michael Freeman says that although things are getting tougher for professional photographers, the “consumption of imagery in all areas is actually increasing”. Professionals therefore need to think more about marketing themselves and specializing in a particular niche.
Here’s a video in which renowned street photographer Joel Meyerowitz shows us his method of doing street photography. His quiet, friendly, and “invisible” style is quite different from Bruce Gilden’s in-your-face technique. The New Yorker also has a great video on Meyerowitz’s photography.
Mario Klingemann created this interactive Arduino-powered Facebook Like button. It doesn’t do anything besides tally how many times it’s been pressed, but with the ubiquity of Facebook, most people will instantly know how to use it. Wouldn’t it be interesting if there was a fully-functional Facebook Like button next to every print in a photo exhibition? The buttons would help publicize the exhibition, and would show what visitors think of the photographs. Perhaps it’s only a matter of time before someone actually does this…
Photojournalist João Silva lost his legs to a land mine in Afghanistan at the end of last year, but — after months of intense rehabilitation — returned to work in July, landing a photo on the front page of the New York Times. On August 2nd, Silva visited the Bronx Documentary Center and gave a talk on his thoughts and experiences. Read the rest of this entry »
There has been a lot of discussion regarding social media sites and their scary-sounding terms of services that always sound like rights-grabs. Here’s what Photoshop guru Scott Kelby had to say after trying out Google+:
Of course, when it comes to posting photos on any social media site, the discussion always turns to copyright issues, and honestly I don’t personally have any problems with Google+’s terms. I don’t think Google is going to steal all my photos and use them for their own evil purposes (in fact, I’ve never read a single story about some big photo-sharing site misappropriating a photographer’s photos, or anything along those lines, so I just don’t sweat it. I know, I know….I’m totally naive—the big corporations are actually secretly out to get…..[wait for it...wait for it]…free photography).
Here’s what I do know: any time lawyers get involved in stuff like this, you’re going to have a lengthy legalese document that makes it sound like Google+ (or Facebook, or Twitter) is going to grab all your rights for now and eternity, when all they’re actually trying to do is keep their client (Google+ in this case) from getting sued.
Scott also writes that the magazine he publishes (Photoshop User) has similar scary-sounding terms that his lawyers tell him are needed to avoid “getting sued into oblivion”.
Stephen Shore is an American photographer known for his “deadpan images of banal scenes and objects in the United States” and for his pioneering use of color in fine art photography. At age 14, he sold three photographs to the Museum of Modern Art, and at 24, he became the second living photographer to do a solo exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In this video, Shore talks a little about his work and shares some of his thoughts on photography.
Back in 2006, Flickr user André Rabelo submitted the above photograph to the group pool of DeleteMe!, a group whose members vote on photos to weed out any photos that aren’t “incredible pictures, amazing, astonishing, perfect”. Sadly, the photograph was very quickly removed by popular vote. Read the rest of this entry »
Here’s a short inspirational video featuring Canadian photographer Jeff Wall in which he talks about his method of allowing his eyes to do “photography” first before using his camera.
A great way to get inspired is to listen to other people who are serious about photography talk about their work and things they’ve learned. Here’s a short video in which photographer Daniel Milnor talks about capturing stories through film photography. After getting into the “fast lane” by switching to digital, Milnor hit a wall and rediscovered his passion for photography by going back to shooting film with Leica rangefinders.
