Category: Blog News

We all know that all photography is fiction: as a photographer you make choices, which influence the photograph enough for it to be more of a fiction than a fact. That’s photography for you. That’s just the way it is. But the photojournalist’s task, no actually the photojournalist’s duty is to minimize the amount of fiction that enters her/his photography. We are quite aware of the problem in the news context – this is, after all, the context where the problems with image manipulation come up regularly – so we expect photographs in this context to be as truthful as they can be. The problem with Instagram/Hipstamatic in this particular context is it adds a huge amount of fiction to photography, simply by its aesthetic.

via Conscientious Extended | One size does not fit all: Context matters greatly.

I tend to linger on images and rework things that I should just move on from, I’m trying to do less of that. Keep making new things.

via MULL IT OVER.

It’s one of those things that I just got lucky, and I didn’t screw up. It’s about being lucky and not screwing up, and trying to be ready for some moment if you happen to be the right place.

via David Burnett’s Eighth Summer Olympics – NYTimes.com.

I knew this was really official when I received an email from my old boss Neil Leifer titled “WOW!” “I just got my new SI this afternoon and I love your 6 page spread in “leading off”. Congratulations, the spread look really great,” Leifer said.

via Mangin Photography Archive.

What was missing most of all in this year’s exhibition was artists who take risk with the photographic medium. There was no work that was challenging, trendsetting or relatively innovative. A fault of curation, not the photographers themselves. The lack of edginess and quality raises the question, can the old teach the new during these times of flux in the photographic field?

via Raw File | Wired.com.

There is no end to rejection in art (or I suppose in life), no matter how “successful” a person might seem. I had a heck of a last year. Lost of prizes, lots of shows.  I’m sure from the outside it might look like I’m on top of the world…. and to some degree I am. Hard work paying off feels great. But the part I don’t advertise as much is that there is still, and I am certain always will be, plenty of getting rejected. They way I see if you don’t get rejected every now and then you are really doing something wrong. Your art must be boring. Or you have become complacent and aren’t trying to push things. I figure the best goal is to keep one upping your rejection. Try to get rejected from increasingly impressive things, grants, publications, institutions, people, etc.

via photographsonthebrain.com.

So now that you’re a professional photographer, you need to capture the simpler things in life. All of them. It is your duty as an artist, after all. And there is nothing simpler than your pretentious foodie excursions. You posted an Instagram-ed picture of a handful of blueberries the other day. What would your day have been without those blueberries? Would you have felt a little less connected to the earth and, ultimately, yourself? Would you have felt guilty about letting all of nature’s candy go to waste? Or perhaps the real question is this: how disappointed would you have felt if your beautiful, plump blueberries got less than 15 likes? It would have made blueberry picking pretty pointless, right? But no, you are popular and people like to feel earthy and spontaneous by livng vicariously through you and your blueberry-picking adventure.

via McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: An Open Letter to People Who Take Pictures of Food With Instagram..

You know where iPhone photos look amazing? On iPhones. That’s where.

via Ask Me Anything About Photography – Zack Arias.

A small production company called Stillmotion led a workshop, “Proactive Storytelling Instead of Reactive Coverage,” with tips and advice for documentary filmmakers, but their backstory was its own lesson. They started out shooting wedding videos (sometimes considered a just day job by snobbish filmmakers) with basic tools and a small team. Their vignettes caught the eye of ESPN, who hired them to film The Season, a TV series about the NFL. Now, they’re producing a feature-length documentary, A Game of Honor, about the Army-Navy football rivalry, for CBS. And they’re still making wedding videos.

via Why Vimeo Is the Web Video Platform to Watch.

Seeing Houck’s show and subsequently investigating a number of other emerging photographers working in similar ways has convinced me that this “thinking like a software engineer” is a big white space that stands open for artistic exploration. As an approach, it applies a wholly original conceptual framework to the medium of photography, while still allowing for connections to traditional ways of seeing. I was intellectually and visually impressed by Houck’s projects; while I think the Aggregates are the meaningfully stronger of the two, I can’t remember seeing a set of underlying first show ideas that felt so promising.

via DLK COLLECTION.

I’d rather see so much stuff I don’t like (plus the things that I do like) than live in a world where all I see is what conforms to my current taste. What an incredibly boring and tedious world that would be, a world that would never give me a chance to move beyond that which I currently enjoy!

via Conscientious | Ten years of Conscientious.

Strick’s case should serve as cautionary tale for photographers entering into agreements with corporations that insist that disputes be settled by private arbitrators rather than a court of law. “I am devastated by today’s ruling by Judge Lichtman, our JAMS arbitrator, and feel that I have truly been denied ‘my day in court’ as the merits of this case have yet to be heard,” Strick said in a statement issued following the arbitrator’s ruling.

via PDN Online.

“I was under the impression that I was going to be photographing athletes on a stage or during press conference where I would take their headshots for our archives,” he explained. “I really had no idea that there would be a possibility for setting up a studio.” It was the first time AFP had been invited to participate in the U.S. Olympic Committee’s Media Summit, which was held this year, in May, at a Hilton Hotel in Dallas.

I work for a news agency and I wasn’t taking pictures for a Nike ad

via Pixels and piety: Photographing Olympic icons – Correspondent.

At around $4 billion, a Getty deal would be among the larger private-equity transactions this year. Investment bankers say credit is available at reasonable interest rates, but buyout firms still need to put up around 30% of a deals value in cash, which limits their ability to pursue very large deals. …these firms feel confident about Gettys business, which is stable and brings in regular cash flow…

via WSJ.com.

I shoot a ton of shit assignments that I hope nobody ever sees. It’s just the reality of the situation. That’s not to say you can’t make good work in tough situations, but sometimes, the cards are stacked against you.

via Michael David Friberg.

The blog named stopstealingphotos. tumblr.com speaks for itself. “Photo Stealers”, as it’s officially named, is a self-proclaimed wall of shame “dedicated to photographers that feel that it’s okay to steal other’s work and post it as their own.”

via PhotoShelter Blog and stopstealingphotos.tumblr.com

If you assume the role of a camera operator, DP or even a director – you will be in a work for hire position in most markets. Position yourself as a producer – shoot if you want to – and direct – but realize that you’ll be just one rung on the “content ladder”.

via Journeys of a Hybrid.

Susan White has been named Vanity Fair’s new photography director. White had been with Vanity Fair for over 20 years before leaving last year for a stint with Trunk Archive as its executive director.

via FishbowlNY.