I Don’t Make Baby Photos

My dad years ago said I was missing the boat when it comes to making money in photography. "Take baby photos," was his advice. I was working as a photojournalist and still, he said, "Stop trying to reinvent the wheel, go where the money flows: Babies!" (Which always made me think of Rodney Dangerfield in...

Making a Senior Portrait on Black and White 4×5, (Not That Kind of Senior Portrait!)

I love having a job as a working photographer that permits me to meet new people constantly.When I'm between assignments or client work, which usually is Mondays, I open my studio to local senior citizens age 70 and over to come in for a complimentary portrait.I get to work with whatever camera I want since...

The (Quite Worthwhile) Cost of Film Photography

If a roll of film goes up by a dollar, it's still worth it. Yes, I saw the news--Ilford announced a 15% price hike starting August 15. That's the state of the international economy, a world full of supply shortages and the cost of making the best film on the planet. We need to support...

Teaching How to Make Magic in the Film Camera, To Print Photographs They’ll Hold Dear

It's a generous medium, photography.”Lee Friedlander I've been teaching film photography to several different people the past few weeks and it's so rewarding to see how they light up when they finally understand their camera and realize that they can do it, they see how it works, and that they can make actual film photographs....

Portrait Stories on 8×10 Film by the Muse’s Design

Sometimes I just feel like the writer taking dictation from the muse. As a portrait photographer making portraits of people I meet in public, I think of all the people I've photographed, and how little control I have over who I meet, who I approach, who says yes, who says no, who becomes a part...

My Satisfaction = Photographing Folks Where I Find Them

A photographer friend recently sent me a video link to a talk by a photographer named Adrian discussing photography and his expectation to fail, concluding disappointment was just a part of the process. In the notes of the video titled, The Curse of the Photographer, he wrote, "Photographers might be destined to permanently feel dissatisfied....

Grandma’s Gone With No Portraits To Remember Her By, Just Like in 1890.

I was talking to a woman at a yard sale last weekend and she said the reason she had so many photo frames for sale for 25-50 cents each, is because none of her children or grandchildren want the family photographs—she's moving to a smaller house and thought they'd want to have them. Wrong! She...

Reaching Out, Asking For What You Want

I was traveling through Illinois recently and stopped for the night in Champaign/Urbana. While there, I googled "photography exhibits" and one of the results was the Urbana Museum of Photography. What? There's a museum of photography right in the small mid-western town where I'm staying? And it's dedicated to analog photography? I'm so in. This...

What Are We Photographing For?

What's the plan, Stan? We get a car to drive places. We get a house to live in. We get a chair to sit in. We get a TV to watch shows. We make photographs... For what? I know I've asked this before but it keeps coming up. What are we making photographs for? Why,...

There’s Something About Portraits on 4×5 with a Graflex SLR

I went to the local lake with an Auto Graflex, one of the early 4x5 SLRs that didn't have a revolving back (RB) but a fixed back for horizontal photos. When I take a camera like that out in public, people respond with interest and wonder. It's a camera I picked up at a local...