Learning Photography? Ditch the 18-55mm Kit Lens

I've recently taken on teaching middle school and high school students digital photography for a local private school. They each have given to them a Canon T5 Rebel and an 18-55mm kit lens to use. Here's my take: That 18-55mm lens is a terrible one to learn photography with. It has limited uses and is...

Goals and Projects + Deadlines = Work

I know photographers who work without deadlines. Writers and artists, too. None of them make work consistently because nothing is due. It's just a wish: "I'd really like to create a great _____. I want to be the best ever at _____." Do you really? You know how the successful ones, those who are recognized...

In a World of Struggle, I Choose to Photograph Joie De Vivre

Alfred Eisenstaedt, a Life Magazine photographer you know--he made the famous photograph of the sailor kissing a nurse in New York's Times Square at the end of World War II--is a photographer who I am a big fan of, the reason being while others were photographing the struggles of war, he was photographing joy. He...

Birds of a Feather Need a Visionary

Many creatives go with the trends, following the others. True visionaries strike out on their own, making a stand for a quality that only they can deliver. THEY FLY ALONE! Be true to yourself. We have everyone else. We need you. Your vision. How you see the world! If you want to see my view...

A 2023 Prediction: The Further AI Goes…

...the more value there will be for traditional photographers, especially those using film and creating photographs as a craft. Just like there's a movement toward film photography among young people, those same young people are the ones advertisers want to reach and those young consumers don't want fake images, doctored pictures, or AI-generated unreality. They...

Are You Happy with your Work?

The reason to make photographs is simple: For yourself. In whatever way that manifests itself. For me it's making documentary photographs and telling people stories. Putting together gallery shows of my work. The goal of a series of photographic monographs. Some people are technology fans and they like to buy and test out cameras and...

Choosing To Approach a Scene Differently

When I was a staff photographer at a daily NJ newspaper, I could measure the passing of the year if I was photographing a Black Friday story, an Easter festival or some other annually-occurring event. I'd pick up the assignment sheet and think, "Didn't I just photograph this? Has it really been a year?" Last...

Photography Hasn’t Changed

Cameras may have become better at creating an accurate exposure and making a sharp image, but that has nothing to do with photographic vision. If you say. “Anybody can take a picture,” what you’re really saying is, “I can’t see the difference.” Hopefully you're not the art buyer. Kenneth Wajda Fun fact: SLRs, point and...

Making Work Constantly: An Insatiable Desire to Create

I run a meeting in Boulder once a month for photographers where we each show twenty photographs via a projector and screen at a pub. It's great fun and inspiring to see what people make. I make a point of only showing work that I've made in the last month, photoraphed since the last time...

Finding Themes in the Street

There are certain things I will always photograph. Street vendors are one of them. There's something about going to someone who's working in a portable box all day serving up breakfast bagels, hot dogs, pretzels and knishes. What's there not to love? Like this group of photos from New York last month. They form a...