LensWork - Photography and the Creative Process Brooks Jensen
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- Arts
Random Observations on Art, Photography, and the Creative Process. These short 2-4 minute talks focus on the creative process in fine art photography. LensWork editor Brooks Jensen side-steps techno-talk and artspeak to offer a stimulating mix of ideas, experience, and observations from his 35 years as a fine art photographer, writer, and publisher. Topics include a wide range of subjects from finding subject matter to presenting your work and building an audience. Brooks Jensen is the publisher of LensWork, one of the world's most respected and award-winning photography publications, known for its museum-book quality printing and luxurious design. LensWork has subscribers in over 73 countries. His latest books are "The Creative Life in Photography" (2013) and "Looking at Images (2014).
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HT1927 - Fame vs Merit
Have you ever noticed how difficult it is for most unknown photographers to get published? In one of those dirty little secrets of the publishing industry, most magazines choose to publish the photographs of famous photographers because they want to ride the coattails of the famous individual. Needless to say, here at LensWork we've chosen a different path and try to bring to light the best work we can based on its merit.
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HT1926 - Good Teachers, Better Teachers
Having been a participant in workshops for 50 years (both as a student and as an instructor), I come to recognize that there are two types of instruction that are most prevalent. There are instructors who teach how to make images like they make. Then there are instructors who help you make the images that you want to make.
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HT1925 - Why Is Always More Important Than How
The technical questions of how to make a photograph dominate almost every YouTube channel, book on photography, workshop content, and much of our creative time. It has always seemed to me that the far more important question is not how, but rather why. Why do you want to make this photograph? Why do you want to share this photograph? Why do you choose to process this way rather than all the other possibilities? The art-life is asking why; our craft-life is asking how.
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HT1924 - Blotchy Blue Skies
For technical reasons I don't understand, aggressive processing in blue skies tends to create a blotchy appearance that is very unpleasant. This is true whether the image is color or black and white. I assumed the solution would be found in bit-depth, the Clarity tool, or possibly the new Lens Blur tool. Nope. So far, the solution escapes me.
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LW1405 - Others Have Already Done It, But No One Has Done Yours
Looking back, I wasted so much of my photographic youth by studiously avoiding going to the obvious and iconic landscape locations. If someone famous had photographed there, I reasoned that they'd "already done it" so there was no reason for me to go there to photograph the same things.
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HT1923 - Make It Personal, But Make It Universal
We are all advised to photograph from our heart. The temptation is, however, to jump to the conclusion that the more personal our images the better they will be. The problem with this is that if your images become too personal, only you will be able to relate to them. The trick is to make it personal, but still preserve a sense of universality.