A Time for Documentary, A Time for Conceptual

I talk about making photos and my approach, and sometimes I forget that there's another whole way to make photographs. Not documentary. Not people that you meet in the street and ask for their portrait. Not street photography. A photographer friend recently commented that she is looking for more photo subjects, new ideas of what...

The Difference Between Going Out to Make Photos and Simply Going Out to Live (and Finding Photos)!

There is one way to make photos that involves taking the camera down off the shelf, dusting off its (n)everyready case, peeling that leather wrap off and setting it aside, removing the lens cap, putting the camera in hand and heading out to make photographs at the birthday party, holiday celebration, or ___________ (your event...

Here Comes the Flood, Save the Photos (What Photos?)

Last week, Hurricane Ida tore through New York and New Jersey and one of the towns that was hard hit was one I used to live in, Lambertville, New Jersey. It's a sweet river town situated beside the Delaware River just north of the Capitol, Trenton, and across from its more famous neighbor, New Hope,...

Time: It’s Always Been About Time–Photography vs Nowography

Stopping time with the intention of creating a memory. Time travel back to that day 20, 50, 100 years ago. I've got it! That's what photography is. It's all about time. That picture-making process which is about time--that's Photography. That's simple. Photography is about making pictures now to revisit at some time later. To recall...

The Camera In Hand Makes the Photograph

Which camera inspires you to make what type of photograph? There are times when I carry a small Leica IIIg with a tiny 50mm f3.5 or Leica II with its 35mm f3.5 collapsible lens in my front jeans pocket because they make me feel good having a small candid camera always at the ready, and...

What Made Photography Valuable?

Helen Levitt and Walter Rosenblum made street photographs in New York in the 1930s through the 1950s. Vivian Maier made street photographs in the 1950s through the 1970s. What made them relevant, what made their work valuable? It took a special person, a real photographic artist to go out in public and shoot film photographs...

A Photographic Revolution In the Air

I'm reading a biography of the legendary photographer, Alfred Stieglitz by Dorothy Norman. I'm finding it a fascinating read, how he challenged rules. When he was young and played sports, he often wanted to change the rules of the game. In his photography and his life, he wanted to not "hit the target, but hit...

Humor & Story in Street Photography

Everyone loves a laugh. I think that's safe to say as a generalization, because a joke is a story. But not all documentary and street photography can be comical. But some just are--that's life for you. I spent a day in New York City and was walking through and saw this scene below unfold. I...

In a New York Moment

There are no self-taught photographers. There is no photographer who isn't influenced by photographs they've seen. We all are exposed to a lot of photographs on a daily basis, and if we study the photographers who came before us, those considered the Masters--William Eggleston, Steven Shore, Robert Frank, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Helen Levitt, Vivian Maier, Joel...

Selling the Steak, But Not the Sizzle

I stopped at a camera store in Allentown Pennsylvania named Dan‘s Camera City and the building was a long tan and blue building that didn’t have an interesting creative exterior, the store's sign was partially overgrow with shubbery, and when I went inside and looked around I thought this is exactly how so many camera...