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,...

Starting a 2022 Large Format Portrait Project

I'm inspired by many portrait photographers. Five I can think of right off the top of my head would be Judith Joy Ross, Duane Michals, Lora Webb Nichols, Gregg Miller and the masterful August Sander. August Sander. Young Farmers. 1914 Ross, Nichols, Miller and Sander because they documented people in a way that shows them...

The Evolution of a National Photography Show Exhibition Print

Click it to see it large on a desktop monitor. This photograph (Title: Surfside Motel Pool, Seaside Heights NJ) was selected for exhibition in the Louisville Art Association 28th National Photography Show. The show opens Memorial Day weekend and runs May 27-June 5, 2022. What a photograph. I love it. I am considering it as...

Art Photography Versus Documentary Photography–It’s Really Not a Competition!

I was reading on Twitter this tweet that got everyone's in the Twitterverse photography community feathers ruffled. (See what I did there.) Why do people have to tell others what to make and what is valid and what isn't? Like there's any truth to their opinion. There are multiple types of photography, from scientific to...

Photography Show House Concert/Art Opening

I was reading a story in the New York Times about a playwright, Matthew Gasda, who is making a name for himself by selling out house concert-style theater performances. Instead of staging his plays in a traditional theater, he's bringing actors and his shows to people's homes in New York City. And he's become an...

Anything I Can Do On Film, You Can Do With a Digital Camera (But Do You Really Want To?)

For me, the fun is in the shooting the vintage film cameras (Leica M2, Nikon F2, Nikon S4, Rolleiflex 3.5F) and printing a photograph from the actual film negative in a traditional darkroom, making physical prints. Sure you can print your digital photos on an inkjet printer. But for me, somehow that leaves me wanting....

Adding Words To Pictures for Greater Meaning

I like to add words to photographs sometimes. I am inspired by Duane Michals. Here are a few I've made in the past couple of years. The photographs have an added element since I can add an idea to the photo for the viewer. I can put what I'm thinking onto the actual photograph, where...

My Mantra: Make Your Photographs, We Need You!

I see a world full of people who don't try, who don't seek to have their work seen. Who don't believe in themselves. Who think they have nothing to say. Who are either unmotivated or inertia is just too great to overcome. Or the alternative--those who strive to be like someone else. Their idols. The...

We Have Choices Today. I Choose the Analog. The Tangible.

Like vinyl records versus digital CDs. Tube versus solid-state guitar amplifiers. Home-cooked meals versus microwaved. Hand-written (or typed) greeting cards versus emails. Film versus digital photography. Traditional photographic prints versus NFTs. I'm in the tangible art business!~Kenneth Wajda I make film portraits using 20th-century techniques and cameras and print in a traditional darkroom. For those...

Everything Doesn’t Work Out As Planned (and That’s a Good Thing)

I was working on a photo prompt "pairs" for The Photo Game, and I was going for the obvious, photographing a pair of pears on my light table. Alright, that's fair, meets the requirements. It's a fine enough photo. Something else, what else can I do--I know, I'll try them on the window sill. Then...