Category: Blog News

The great underlying work of a director of photography is almost always (often quietly and below the surface) educating. Educating editors to appreciate pictures and talking about their best use. Sometimes a simple photograph makes the best statement, while at other times, a complex picture in a carefully orchestrated setting compliments the story telling. In some magazines, that extends to “educating” an art director who holds much power along with the editor.

Rich Clarkson – What should photographers know? via The Photo Society.

Virtually every letter to readers justifying a paywall and industry quote from publishers talk about The New York Times metered model.  When you have 33 million unique monthly visitors and high value content that model almost works.  The Times has been very vocal about saying that it is a holistic digital strategy that focuses on all their digital platforms.  Even at 390,000 digital subscribers they understand that they have a way to go to close the revenue gap and create a sustainable business model.  I’ve been in meetings where NYT executives caution that what works for The Times rarely works anywhere else.

via Paid Content StrategiesPaid Content Strategies.

If there is anything that is shocking to me about the subject at this point, it’s that the visual censorship of these wars has been so absolute that many today actually fail to understand why such scenes would even be important or relevant to see.

Read More Here: BagNews.

The paper, a tabloid instead of a broadsheet, has created a following mostly because of its now-famous Saturday photo stories, which combine thoughtful reporting and powerful photography. They’re run ad-free and take up the entire front page plus five additional pages inside, sometimes more.

The paper has felt the financial crunch effecting the rest of the journalism industry and revenues are down. But a strong local readership and the family structure of the paper have prevented a precipitous decline. Rumbach says the paper has had no layoffs and has given the staff a raise each year.

via Raw File | Wired.com.

(click to make bigger)
via, postcardsfromamerica.tumblr.com

“Picture editors and photographers are some of the biggest newsroom casualties” of budget cuts, he said. “So when you have a story laced with subtleties, it becomes key to really work to have the latest visual content and representation of that story.”

Five years ago, the Sentinel had five photo editors and the Herald had six. Today, each paper has two.

via The iconic photos of Trayvon Martin & George Zimmerman & why you may not see the others | Poynter. thx, Tom Q.

…photo editors or creatives got to know me from production calls. I wasn’t handing out business cards on the shoot [as an assistant]. I showed up, did my job, showed people I was the guy who could get things done. That’s when my conversation with clients began, and when I called them up later [about work], they remembered who I was.

Michael Clinard’s Professional Transition via PDN

Now here’s a thought to get our work into the mainstream: Why not bring back the Newsreel of yore to the modern age? If the film festivals play short docs before feature films, why don’t we show our multimedia features along with the movie trailers?

via My POYi Multimedia Judging Experience.

It’s so much easier. I haven’t called in a book for years.

I also think there are more decent photographers working today than there were 10 years ago. The economy has weeded out the field somewhat. I see a wide variety of photo styles being accepted by clients today, which brings photographers into the commercial fold where previously they wouldn’t have had a market.

Chris Peters, Sr. Art Producer at Colle+McVoy via, Wonderful Machine Blog. thx, Neil

Are things better now than there were 21 years go? Has technology made my job shooting spring training easier? Yes. Being able to look at my pictures on the screen on the back of my cameras during a game allows me to know if I have a certain image in the can so I can move on to the next subject. The image quality is terrific and the ease of delivering the files back to the office is a dream.

I’m glad I’ve been around long enough to work through all of these changes.

Brad Mangin via Raw File | Wired.com.

The British Institute of Professional Photography has answered to claims of irregularities after four of the seven judges in this year’s Professional Photography Awards received top prizes.

via British Journal of Photography.

I think it’s safe to say that in most cases, mailing out promos offers pretty much the same return on investment as giving your money to the printer and paying him to set it on fire for you.

Granted, whenever I visit a client or creative, there are usually a few mailers stuck to the wall or sitting on their desks — but there are generally a lot more of them in the garbage. And often as not, the stuff pinned up is either from photographers they’ve worked with before, or shooters who’ve recently won awards or garnered some attention elsewhere and are therefore already on their radar.

via planet shapton.

shoot personal work all the time because “thats what clients gravitate toward: your vision, your voice…”

…spread yourself across all of the different [marketing] vehicles. One or two is not effective [at reaching potential clients] …it takes a long time to create a presence.

via via, PDN Online.

when I stand in the middle of those vast plains and prairies I do not see or feel “emptiness”…  to me, the volumes of space, the wind rippling the grass, a breeze on my face, the birdsong, the flight of crows  –  this is the exact opposite of emptiness:  it is a fullness, a richness that I just want to drink in, that I want to have envelop me…  on the other hand, if you drop me into the middle of Manhattan, I just want to shut down  –  the hordes of people, the noise…  it’s just maddening to me, and something I’ve chosen to avoid as much as possible in my life…

via Colin Pantall’s blog: Bruce Haley’s Panoramic Landscapes.

Why should a meaningful piece of artwork take two days, two months, two years, or possibly much longer, to create? Why do we need to wait for the right inspiration, the right moment, or gather materials we have no idea how to use to create a piece of individual expression to hang on our walls?

…the constraints of time, finances, and physical or mental disposition no longer need to be our barriers. Braintone Art offers an alternative means of creating art…

via Braintone Art.

My photographs, almost always Include people. Pictures of most ‘things,’ even lovely landscapes or seascapes, I find overwhelmingly boring. Rarely are these pictures of anything that I haven’t seen before. People pictures, on the other hand, are never the same.

via The Works of David Lykes Keenan | SIP.

“Spoek used one of my images for a mix tape without asking my permission,” Hugo told me. “I phoned him up to berate him—turned out he was recording a new album around the corner from my studio. He came to the studio to discuss our dilemma, and by the time he left I agreed to do music video for him. He’s a super sweet talker.”

— Spoek Mathambo, “Control,” directed by Pieter Hugo and Michael Cleary.

via Photo Booth: The New Yorker.

thx, Jeremy