On David duChemin and his eBooks

I feel that David duChemin is one of the best photography writers out there today. Perhaps some may think we’re conspiring by praising each other on our blogs every now and then, but what can I say – I respect the man as a photographer and I absolutely love the way he writes. Is that so wrong? :)

One of the things I love most about David’s writing is that while he talks about the philosophy and theory behind photography, he always keeps things very practical. After reading David's stuff you can go out and apply the knowledge to actual, real life situations.

When I first saw the title of David's latest eBook “DRAWING THE EYE – Creating Stronger Images Through Visual Mass” I thought, “Geez that sounds a bit heavy and abstract” but I was pleasantly surprised. Well, perhaps not surprised, because I have come to expect at least a certain amount of brilliance from the man and the last eBook is certainly no exception.

I won’t go into a detailed explanation of what the eBook is all about, I’ll simply direct you to David’s BLOG, where you can read David's own description as well as what other people are saying. I will mention this though; if you’re ready to step it up a notch and to really begin creating images with impact and some thought behind them, rather than simple snap-shots of exotic places and faces then “DRAWING THE EYE” is a must. As David says: “It’ll change the way you look at your craft”. Agreed. Even if like me you already look at your craft much the same way David does I always find that David’s eloquent and humorous writing really hammers home whatever thoughts I had in the back of my mind. He’s able to express his ideas so well and so clearly, the final message, along with the images just inspires you to push yourself a little further each time you lift the camera to your eye. For that I gotta thank the man. :)

Before I go, I absolutely have to mention David’s earlier eBooks “Ten” and “Ten More” . Again, read about them by clicking on the hyperlink titles. These two eBooks are particularly useful for those in the early stages of their journey into photography, but as is the case with all of what David writes about, anyone can get a surprising bit of inspiration and food for thought from his words. The best part about it all, these eBooks are knowledge that is accessible to almost anyone around the world. At $5 a pop, the price is something that you simply can’t complain about.

You can get all of David’s eBooks RIGHT HERE.

Now a brief word about me. I’m back in Minsk, getting over an annoying cold and finishing some of Tanya’s paperwork to go to Europe. I’ll make one more trip to the region of Braslav for a week or so, finish off some logistics in Belarus and if all goes right, in early November I’ll drive towards Romania, a country, which I have been curious about for too long not to visit it.

The fishermen brigade of Braslav (and some miscellanea)

A couple of days ago I finally managed to hang out with the fishermen brigade of Braslav. What a bunch of characters! My initial impression was that they were rude, mindless brutes. I’ve met people jut like them in India and Indonesia, but never felt the same, perhaps the fact that I could understand everything these guys said formed my opinion.  Every second word was a curse word, every joke was explicit and I think at least a couple of them may have had a good drink during the  work day.

It would be easy for me to look down on them or to get frustrated with their attempts to poke fun at me at every opportunity, this happened even more after they found out I was from Australia. “You have ostriches there right? Instead of fishing do you go crocodile hunting, right?” When I tripped, while moving around in my boots (which are a few sizes too big), one fisherman who found it particularly delightful to laugh at my expense said - “F-ck, watch your step, this isn’t f-cking Australia where the ground is all even and nice!” I found his comment funny and almost beautifully ignorant. I smiled and laughed. I guess that’s something I’ve learned to do regardless of circumstances, over time. As a photographer you almost can’t afford to have an ego, to get angry or to lose your temper, at least not while you are working and especially not while you are photographing people. You have to get a feel for those you are “working” with and while that’s happening, it’s better to shut up, smile and keep shooting.

When I got that feel for the fellows in the boats I realized that despite their brute nature, they were quite decent folks – simple people who work hard and get paid very little. They make the most of the situation and poke fun at each other almost as much as they poked fun at me. Me being with them was a somewhat fun departure from their regular schedule and so they couldn’t resist directing all their “enthusiasm” in my direction.

I guess I passed some sort of test by not negatively reacting to their jokes and just smiling and laughing all the way. They did do some funnily stupid things, one of the older men almost turned over a boat and nearly filled his boots with icy cold water in a desperate attempt to get to shore for a smoke. About half way through the whole fish catching process they stopped poking fun, I got more comfortable and started jumping from one boat to another and lying down on the wet nets, to get a better angle. The jokes turned to amusement and then, dare I say to something close to respect, they realized that I was working pretty hard, just as they were.

The images I got were not as “pretty” as I’d like them to be, the light became flat half way through and stayed that way for almost the entire shoot. They do however give you a bit of an idea of what the process was like. In any case, I’m hoping to get another stab at shooting this thing before I leave Braslav and head towards Romania.

By the way, if any of the blog readers live in or around Warsaw or Krakow, Poland, somewhere on the way to Romania in Hungary or in Slovakia,  then I’d love to meet you for tea/coffee and chat. Just email me from my website or post a comment.

Another thing, one of my images should be on display at the PDN PhotoPlus Expo (Nat Geo Traveler World in Focus Contest) in New York October 22-24. Apparently I won something, but I have not been informed exactly what, maybe it’s just the chance to be exhibited. In any case, it’s quite exciting. :) If anyone from NY will go to this thing, perhaps you can tell me if I actually won a prize and whether my image looks decent in print.

Sasha (middle) is the leader of the brigade, he does a lot of moving around and probably more cursing than anyone else, I guess that’s part of the job.

Sasha collecting fish from the nets. The young folks in green coats are picking out the fish which is smaller than 27cm (approx) putting them in the wooden box and tossing them back out into the lake. Such is the law.

This one’s pretty self-explanatory.

When all is said and done, the fish are placed into wooden boxes, loaded into cars and sent off to the fish factory.

That’s all for now folks. More to come soon.

The lonely Yosef Dorozhko

About a week ago we met a wonderful man by the name of Yosef. I spotted him from my car while he was pushing his bicycle up a hill. Immediately I wanted to photograph him. I turned the car around, caught up to Yosef and asked him if I could take a few photos. He smiled and said to go ahead. We spoke a bit, after learning that Yosef was 81 I was a little shocked. His bike journey wasn’t an easy one, even for a young person (there was lots of pedaling up hills to be done) and here he was carrying on very casually. I sorta invited myself over to his house and asked if I could take a few more photos there. He didn’t mind.

And so began our friendship with Yosef. It turned out that his life had taken a very unfortunate turn of late. He lost his wife and both of his sons fairly recently. He also lost his apartment in the neighboring Latvia, because the cost of all the bills exceeded his meager pension. Yosef had to go back to Belarus, to live in the house where he was born 81 years ago. To make his story more sad, the house where he now lives is fairly isolated and ever since his parents built it, there has never been any electricity. Yosef makes light with Kerosene lamps and instead of watching TV, he reads, prays and talks to his cats.

The crazy thing is, he never really complains about anything. He doesn’t drink uncontrollably, like many younger and much more fortunate people in the neighboring villages. He just goes on about his life the best he can, still managing to crack an occasional smile along the way. Yosef inspired me by his resilience and it seems like our visits to his home have given him a reason to crack that smile more frequently. Tanya and I have gone to talk to the authorities and hopefully he will have electricity some time in the not too distant future.

Yosef has a horse. It was time for him to work on the land during one of our visits and of course that presented a great photo opportunity.I got pretty lucky during my little photo-shoot. It had been raining most of the day, but soon after I arrived at Yosef’s house there was an opening in the sky. I got some good light and even a rainbow.

Yosef adjusts fire-wood in the oven which he himself made. He was heating up a kettle to make tea for us.

Tea time. Yosef sets up the tea glasses and the food for his guests.

Meeting people like Yosef again reminds me of how lucky I am to be doing what I do. These countless chances to meet inspirational people are something I enjoy immensely and when there is an opportunity to have a positive impact on the life of someone like Yosef, that’s sort of like the essence of being human.

More images to come.

Braslavschina - The most amazing place you’ve never heard of

I have just returned from Braslavschina – the region around the town of Braslav and as I mentioned in my last post, all of my expectations have been surpassed. There are plenty of old, traditional villages, wonderful, photogenic people and there are over 400 lakes – almost all of them ridiculously picturesque.

Perhaps it’s some sub-conscious thing about this region being a part of my “motherland”, but Braslavschina has quickly become one of my favorite places in the world. All I need to be happy is – something to photograph, some place to swim and some nice people to chat to. :) I can find all of that here, plus the kind of nature, which I only thought existed in fairy tales.

Ok, so I’ve fallen in love with this place, I really mean it. I’ve even enquired about prices of land and simple houses here and I have  found out that they are ridiculously cheap, at least by Western standards. If I find something suitable, I’ll soon have my own tiny piece of paradise, perhaps even one right on a lake.

Anyway, enough dreaming. Here’s a brief look at what I’ve seen so far. I’m in Minsk for a few days to sort out some paperwork on my newly bought ‘84 Volskwagen Golf II. It ain’t pretty, but it’s cheap, it’ll take me where I want and it’s mine. I’ll be coming back to Braslavschina as soon as I can. I’ve only scratched the surface, as far as photography goes.

Tolik and Vatsik – two cow herders taking a break. It seems like I’ve got this strange attraction to cattle herders and fishermen, wherever I go. More on fishermen in the near future.

Tolik herding cows with a whip.

Above and below are images of kind elderly ladies from two different villages with the same story. In the really traditional villages there isn’t much youth these days and the old are the living, walking, breathing embodiment of the incredible history of this area.

A prayer inside a church of the “Old Russian Orthodox” faith. It’s very similar to the “standard” Russian Orthodox religion, but all the prayer’s are written in ancient Russian and read accordingly. Only two people in this village can read them – this “Father” is one of them. The “Old Russian Orthodox” faith is almost extinct in Belarus. The three ladies in the background are basically the only attendees.

Father Akim (a very unusual name for Belarus) on his way out of the church.

Every morning this man waits by the side of the road to sell is milk to large government-run co-operatives. Here he is returning home after selling the milk.

Grandpa Alexei was very shy about being photographed. When it comes to photos initial shyness is a common reaction amongst most of the older people. They’ll usually say something along these lines – “Why would you want to photograph me? I’m not shaven” or “I haven’t even got my teeth”. To me however these faces are amazing, they say so much without the need for words. After a short chat and me explaining what I do everyone usually agrees to have their picture taken.

The modern way of preparing firewood – with a chainsaw.  The man – Vasily is one the few younger men choosing to live his life in the countryside. He does however work outside of his village, on construction sites in cities as large and as far as Moscow.

Back to the cow herders – Tolik and Vatsik having their dinner by the fire. I won’t mention what they were drinking.

Vova is another rare find, he is the only young man in his village. The rest have moved out and now live and work in Belarus’ larger cities.  Photographically speaking this is the sort of portrait I am enjoying shooting more and more these days - a shot where the person is surrounded by objects that tell you something about his her life/culture.

Ok, that’s all for now. Needless to say, I can’t wait to go back and shoot some more stuff. I have also filmed some interviews and some scenes that are best communicated through “moving pictures”, but unfortunately my ancient laptop isn’t powerful enough to edit HD video. Well, I guess that’ll all have to wait.

Get Lost Magazine

My image of “Kusti” wrestlers is featured as a double page spread on the inside of this issue of “Get Lost” magazine. Get Lost is a pretty awesome Australian travel publication which takes the reader far beyond the usual tourist destinations. I highly recommend it to anyone who can get their hands on it.

As my fellow travel photographer Jeffrey Chapman pointed out to me in the last post, I was also featured on the cover of the “Amateur Photographer” magazine. Obviously that’s cool and I’m pretty proud of the fact. :) The cover image is above.

I am now in Braslav and in all honesty the region has exceeded any expectations I had. I found exactly what I was looking for and I’ve fallen in love with the natural beauty of the place, as well as the wonderful locals.  A few new images will be up online very, very soon.

That’s all for now, folks!

Reflecting on our photography and looking at the “bigger picture”.

As I sit and type this blog entry in the lounge room of my wife’s parents’ apartment and wait for the “higher powers” (not supernatural ones, just ones with connections) to tell me when I can go out and photograph what I want, I realize – I haven’t shot anything meaningful since I left India. That was in March!

I’ve had an unusually long break.  When I travel, which is most of the year – it’s intense photography virtually every day, but for the past six months I’ve barely lifted my camera. While I’d like to photograph non-stop, all year-round, I have come to appreciate my time away from shooting. I try to utilize this time in the best way possible. For me that means marketing my work, sorting through thousands of photos to find ones which I will submit to contests, magazines and to Getty Images. This is also the time to learn more about photography, to read blogs and to look at other people’s work.

By doing things photography related, without actually shooting I’m able to distance myself from my own work a little, and by looking at all the other photography out there, I’m able to see where my images fit in the larger scheme of things, to see what role if any my photos play in the world so saturated with imagery. The time away from shooting allows me develop a self-awareness that helps one grow and evolve as a photographer or artist.

I really like what Alexei Brotdotovich, one of the first photography theorists said in regards to evolving as a photographer. I don’t remember  the quote exactly, but it was something along these lines:

“Once you develop a style and become known for a particular kind of work – turn in the other direction, stop being formulaic and re-invent yourself”.

The phrase is very idealistic and conflicts with commercially motivated things like branding and the importance of developing a particular style that sets you apart from others, but there’s wisdom here.  Personally, I wouldn’t go so far as to turn in a completely different direction, but I do try to change the way I shoot and the way I approach photography every now and then, sometimes fairly dramatically.

My hope is that people will still find a common thread throughout my work, but I don’t want my photography to be consistently predictable, I don’t want the viewers to be able to  pin down my images to some formula. A sort of semi-self-re-invention may even go down well with clients or editors. While they may not be pleased by a a completely off-the-wall new body of work, an element of surprise within limits might be very welcome.

An interesting “re-invention” quote that comes to mind is from one of my favorite filmmakers – Wong Kar Wai, whose visually distinct work has gained him a huge following over the years and started new industry trends.  In one interview a couple of years back Wong said – “Too many people are making Wong Kar Wai films these days, I’ve got to make different kinds of films now”.

Here’s a real example of an artist who’s reached a great level of success and fame, but is thinking of changing the formula that has made him what he is. That’s inspirational. In this case the artist is not bound by his work, he is a master and not the slave of his own creations, because he isn’t afraid of creating something new and different. Sure there’s a risk and the possibility of failure, but there’s always the chance that something amazing and genius will evolve from the new approach and to me that is much more exciting than repeating the same known formula time and time again.

Hopefully, in about a week, everything will be sorted out, as far as my plans to go out into the countryside and photograph in villages. In the meantime I might just put my own thoughts into action and shoot some stuff I usually wouldn’t, right here in the city. One thing for sure - all this time off is making my head swell with ideas!

Check this blog tomorrow, if everything goes as planned, the new eBook on light will finally be released.

Back in Belarus

I’ve been in Belarus for almost a couple of weeks now. Most of the time has been spent catching up with family and friends, not doing much photography, but I am making some “grand plans”, so to say. It’s fascinating to be back here. So much changes over the years; especially if I think back to the time when my family left Belarus, shortly after the break-up of the USSR. These days the center of Minsk, the capital of Belarus is not so different from centers of cities in the “Western” world. There are restaurants with foreign foods, expensive cars on the roads and all sorts of “super” and “hyper” markets, where unlike in the past the check-out-ladies say “Thank you for your purchase”. There’s even a futuristic looking railway station, albeit futuristic only on the outside.

But, in many ways Minsk is a time-capsule. Step away from the center into what’s called the “micro-suburbs” – neighborhoods with blocks of high-rise apartment buildings, where most of the population lives, and you’ll see the Minsk of 20 years ago.

In the the streets of the “micro-suburbs”, children still play the same games that they played when I was a kid, old grannies still seat on benches and gossip about their neighbors, groups of youth still hang out the front of the “pod’yezd” (entrances to the high-rise apartment buildings) and there are occasional drunks stumbling around the streets and pissing in elevators. Oh, the memories.

In all honesty though, there is a great vibe here during summer time and I’m glad to catch at least the end of it. I’m writing this entry from my grandmother’s house, about 30km outside of Minsk. She’s a fascinating and wacky character and I’m making a little film about her with the new 5D MKII.

Oh, almost forgot to mention. I’m now connected to a mobile internet, courtesy of my new, awesome cousin-in-law. So, I will try not to disappear for too long, as long as there’s coverage, I should be able to get online.

The light eBook is also coming very soon, but meanwhile check out the wonderful David duChemin’s eBook on 10 ways to improve your craft.

Above is an image of modern youth, hanging out by the leftover relics of communism.

Off to Belarus

It’s been a really busy couple of weeks. Too many things that I couldn’t finish before departing, one of them is the e-book on lighting. I’ll have to complete it in the first few weeks after arriving in Minsk, the capital of Belarus. So stay tuned, the idea has not been abandoned.:) It’s always strange going back to the country of my birth – so many memories pop into my mind as the plane lands. After all, we are most impressionable when we’re children and Belarus is where I spent almost all of my childhood.

It’ll be great to see the family, re-connect with friends, but I’m certainly going with the intention of doing some interesting work and I hope to share it here in the not too distant future.

So, till our next meeting in the blogosphere everyone.:)

Chiaroscuro – Sculpting with light

Since I’ve been pretty much consumed by all things light related recently, writing texts for my new e-book, I decided to write a post in the spirit of, you guessed it - light. When I’m shooting, particularly when shooting portraits I have an obsession with creating a sense of volume and depth, making my photographic subjects appear sculpted, three dimensional. Turns out there has been a word for this “look”, since long before photography. The word is - “chiaroscuro”.

Now, call me an idiot, or a bad student, since I’m sure we learned this in my art history class at university, but when I heard the word from a traveling artist I befriended in Indonesia, I didn’t really know what he was on about.

Of course I put on a smart, understanding face, the first time I heard it, :) but after he used the word a second time, remarking how much he loved the presence of “chiaroscuro” in my work, (which I was showing him) I could pretend no longer :) - “chiaro-what?”  He gave me a definition along the lines of what I later found later on Wikipedia:

“Chiaroscuro (Italian for light-dark) is a term in art for a contrast between light and dark. The term is usually applied to bold contrasts affecting a whole composition, but is also more technically used by artists and art historians for the use of effects representing contrasts of light, not necessarily strong, to achieve a sense of volume in modeling three-dimensional objects such as the human body.”

Today, as I was looking at some of my images, trying to explain the natural light in them and to break down into diagrams how it can be managed, I remembered the word and decided to Google it.

Caravaggio and Rembrant are two famous artists known for their mastery of “chiaroscuro”. I’m not making a revelation when I say that they’re masters for a reason. One thing is for a photographer to see the light and to position the subject in a way that will create the “chiaroscuro” look and another is to actually paint it. Every little detail is noticed and needless to say, the work of these artists is inspirational, even a few hundred years after its creation.

One important thing to note is that the masters were able to create compelling images without any of the amazing technology we have today (lighting or photographic). Many still do this there’s something to be said there. We don’t need fancy light set ups, artists have sculpted with light for hundreds of years. The first step for us as photographers is to see the light that is before us and understand how to work with it. There’s no sense in rejecting the creative opportunities that artificial light brings – that would be “counter evolutionary”, but there’s also no reason to ignore the power of natural light.

My stance is all for making the most of available light, in the literal sense of the word – any and all light available to the photographer on the move, that’s what I really want to explore in the e-book.

On a side note: I wander if any of the painters rave on about their gear or debate about which paint or brush is better, as photographers often do?

A blast from the past.

Well, again it’s been much too long since my last post. I’ve been busy – yes. But I did have a few ideas that I wanted to share here. Unfortunately my ideas for posts often take very long to cook up and when they do, they sometimes start morphing into something completely different.

I have many things on my plate at the moment. There are several things I’m working on  at once - one of them is another e-book. This one is going to be on lighting for travel photographers and those on the move. It’ll cover the use of off camera flash, reflector and of course natural light. The e-book will be similar format to “Understanding Post Processing” in that I will break down how certain images of mine were created. But there will be more examples, diagrams/illustrations of light set ups and lots of explanations. I’m pretty excited about it, but more on that in the coming days (or weeks).

The post from the beginning of the month “Some words to aspiring travel photographers” seems to have struck a chord with many and as I was sorting through some images from Indonesia, I came across photos from that ferry I mentioned. The one packed with goats, chickens, furniture, dry fish and lovely fellow passengers who chain-smoke and continuously spit on the floor.

And so, rather than bore you with a half-thought-out blog post, I leave you with images taken on the morning of our 16 hour, overnight ferry ride from an island called Lembata to one called Alor. The photo at the top of the page is obviously of the fellow passengers who didn’t impress me much with their smoking and spitting. I guess the image doesn’t do them “justice”.

The silly little things that come back to bite you in the …

The image above is from a spread of my photos in the “Gallery” section of “Digital Photo” magazine. The issue should be out in the UK in a week or two.

That’s great and all, but here’s a short story with an important point.

The pay for being featured in this particular section of the magazine, is not significant, it’s better than what most magazines will give for something similar, but it’s insignificant nevertheless. My main motivation for sending images in was not the money, but the exposure. “Digital Photo” is one of the most widely read photography magazines in the UK and probably Australia. It’s a great platform for spreading the word about what I do to thousands of people.

Ideally this is what I would want to happen - readers see my images, they like them, they go to my website and see what else I do. Hopefully someone wants to buy a print, someone else might be interested in a workshop and a few others may want to buy the ebook tutorial. Good idea. Well, not so fast. Why? Because the website URL is not there! Why is it not there? Good question.

When submitting images to “Digital Photo” you have to provide all your contact details, as well as a website URL, if you have one. All that info goes to someone, though I am not exactly sure to whom. I thought that since I had provided the URL of my website it would automatically be included, along with my images. Incorrect!

My initial reaction was a good amount of cursing, out loud. That’s my reaction to many things that frustrate me or make me angry, but once I get that out of my system, :) I take a deep breath, relax and analyze – what went wrong? The answer is simple – I assumed without actually communicating what was important to me, without verifying anything. I assumed wrong. Good opportunity wasted, lesson learned.

Editors have a lot of stuff on their hands and including my website info into a publication is likely not on their “to do list”, especially not if they haven’t been requested and reminded. Even when they are requested and reminded, things can and will go wrong and in that case the editor in question should have a good kick up the butt. Not the case here, instead, what I thought was common sense, a silly, little insignificant thing, came to bite me in the place where the uncooperative editor should be kicked.

The lesson is one that applies to anything in life – if something is important to you, go after it, let the relevant people know, remind them and remind them again. Sure you there’s a chance that you may come across as annoying, but I’d rather come across as annoying and have an opportunity to maximize the return from my efforts than be a nice, complacent fellow who gets almost nothing for his hard work. Simple as that. Don’t do what I did. :)

Some words to aspiring travel photographers

It may be borderline pretentious of me to be offering words to “aspiring” travel photographers, since until pretty recently I was only “aspiring” to do this thing myself. The reason for the post is a question, which I have received numerous times over the past couple of weeks, in various forms:

How does one become a travel photographer and go on to make enough money in this profession?

At first the question makes me laugh. Who the hell am I to be giving people advice on anything career-related? I’ve never had much of a plan and I always considered that a lot of my success was a result of pure luck. Regardless of whether I’ve changed from an “aspiring travel photographer” to whatever else, I have realized that I am now doing something that many dream of -  I travel, take photos and mange to “survive” off the income generated by these photos. On second look I think that there may be reason to my “madness” and perhaps my own story can be useful to other young people starting out. Here it goes. :)

To “become a travel photographer” I worked all sorts of shitty jobs, occasionally committed intellectual and creative suicide by shooting what I consider trash, I used every opportunity in sight to get on the road. There’s an interesting concept I heard somewhere on the net (probably Brooks Jensen’s podcast) - you need to dedicate 10,000 hours to something in order to become proficient at it. Sounds like a fair assumption. That’s basically what I did without realizing. I never quite thought of it as a 10,000 hour thing, but I did know that to be decent at shooting particular themes I needed to shoot them for an extended period of time and so I totally immersed myself in doing just that, while I went off on trips that ranged from six weeks to seven months.

After my third India/Nepal trip (the seven month one) I felt that I really had an idea of what I was doing and incidentally that’s when other things started to click. I began to get published in magazines, had an exhibition and made print sales (more though magazines then from the exhibition). As much as everyone today says that print media is on its last legs, I’ll say that it’s pretty important to get your work published. There’s just a certain type of validity that comes with having your work in print. It means that someone at least thought enough of it to spend their money on the required paper and ink.

With the publications, I saw that my work had some value and I asked myself this question: How can I generate a more regular income from my photos? I looked at image/stock agencies. Got a contract with Lonely Planet Images (on my second attempt), but terminated it before long – this isn’t the place to go into the details, Lonely Planet make great guidebooks… and let’s leave it at that. :)

I still wanted to have my photos represented by an agency, those who are seriously working with the big name agencies know how important they can be and so, I went on a search. A bit of luck, weeks of waiting, empty phone calls and emails, weeks more of being bounced around and I finally managed to get in with Getty Images – everyone’s “favorite” stock selling (not so gentle) giant. :)

This brings me to How do you make enough money? part of the question. Well, it all depends on what you want enough for. A comfy life in inner-city Sydney? There’s a very slim chance that your travel photography will generate enough income for that in the first years. But having your images make you enough to travel and live around the cheaper parts of the world? Very possible, that’s what I do. :)

After a couple of years of very intense photographing and relatively recent, almost equally intense attempts at finding ways to make money from it, I have to say that I’m still very very far from striking it rich. Every month Getty sells some of my work and probably makes me enough to get by in most of Asia. I am still submitting to magazines and looking for alternative incomes from my photos, I’m even still willing to sell my soul, to shoot what I don’t love every now and then. However, importantly I no longer have to do what I don’t like, my images are finally “working” for me. Even more importantly I don’t have to work in retail, restaurants or wherever else just to save enough for the next journey.

But still, in all honesty, the way that me and Tanya (my wife) live is not for everyone. Certain comforts must be forgotten, while you’re on the road with a limited income, you simply can’t afford them.

Of course much of the beautiful, amazing things associated with travel are completely free, but if you ever compare your experiences with those of a friend, who may have traveled the same route as you during his four-week annual holiday, you realize that the pleasure you get out of traveling is very different to his. Your pleasure has a perverted twist. While he enjoys sipping cocktails on a luxury boat-cruise, you jump on a ferry packed with goats, chickens, furniture and dry fish, with lovely fellow passengers who chain-smoke and continuously spit on the floor. The journey exhausts and frustrates,  and  by the end you reek of that damn dry fish and your own sweat. But you’ve made new friends, learned words in a foreign language and have one heck of a story to tell when you get home. The pleasure comes from the experience and from the fact that you survived it. Your friend didn’t “suffer” on the luxury boat, but nor did he experience the ‘realness’ of actually being in another country, among regular people from a different culture.

If your cup of tea is the ferry ride and you’re really into your photography, then perhaps things don’t need to be very complicated.

I’ll borrow words from Chase Jarvis. He’s not a travel photographer, but unlike me, he really knows what he’s talking about. :)

There are two things you need to succeed: to be undeniably awesome at what you do, and to persevere.

Applies to everything, even travel photography.

(The confused character with ski-goggles above is none other than me. :) I used to wear the ski-goggles when riding the motorcycle. In this image I’m riding in the back of a bullock cart during an early morning in Rajasthan’s, Bundi District. Didn’t get a good picture, but the ride was kinda interesting.

Looking ahead.

I turned 28 the other day. For me every birthday since my 21st has brought mixed feelings. I rarely celebrate ‘getting older’ these days. It’s exciting to become an ‘adult’, but once you are one, well, the excitement pretty quickly wears off. Every birthday becomes a reminder that the clock is ticking, time isn’t standing still and your days on earth are limited. As if I wasn’t conscious of it all already, the death of that rather famous pop-icon was yet another reminder that we are all indeed mortal.

That sure is a morbid way of looking at things, especially for a young person, many of you will think. Hey, just stating a simple fact that no one can escape. I figure that since I realize this, I can at least try to make the most of what time I do have.

The life I’m currently living is the life I chose after finishing university. It’s the life I wanted. A 9-5 job just never appealed to me. I have done it (though not for long) hated it; and what’s the point of doing something we hate most of our lives?

I am very curious and I always feel the urge to express myself creatively, so, to put it simply, I chose to travel around the world, explore it, experience its different cultures and people and photograph some of what I see along the way.

It’s not a life for everyone and it’s not even entirely perfect for me, there’s the constant financial uncertainty that’s attached to this lifestyle and as I work on it, I have to compensate for months of fun with months of pretty full-on work in front of the computer, sorting out through images, emailing publications and agencies (something I don’t like so much) all that in hopes of getting rid of the financial uncertainty completely, some time in the not too distant future.

But the life I have is great, no complaints for most part :). There’s nothing better than the feeling of being alive, of being so present in the moment that you don’t need to reflect on the past or the future, just see/feel what’s in front and around you right now. That’s how it is most of the time, while I’m on the road. What’s even better is the fact that I share all my experiences with the one person that really matters – my wife Tanya.

What’s the point of all this? Why am I posting these thoughts on the blog? Well, I simply want to share a bit of my philosophy, it’s relevant to any people not doing what they want with their lives and it seems like there are a lot of you out there. We often say to ourselves – “Tomorrow”, but one day tomorrow becomes yesterday and you missed your chance.

Whether it’s a dream photography project you’ve been putting off for years or whatever else, the window of opportunity eventually closes. We have to seize the chance or regret things for eternity.

I’m going to seize my own chance, a chance to see some of my family members on the other side of the world this August. I haven’t seen my grandparents for far too long and they won’t be around forever, one grandfather has already gone and neither me nor my father had a chance to say good-bye . I wouldn’t really be going to Eastern Europe at this stage of my life and my career, if it wasn’t for my desire to spend time with them, but I will make the most of this time photographically. Hopefully I can scrape enough cash for a used car (reason I’m not getting a 5D MKII yet) and explore Belarus, Ukraine and perhaps Poland and Moldova, and of course photograph a few things along the way.

Though my mind wants to go to Africa, South America, some place new or at least back to the warmth and familiarity of Asia, my heart is telling me to go see my family and to take Tanya to see her family (they live in the same country). I guess sometimes, and this will sound very cheesy, you gotta follow your heart. I feel like spewing after using such clichéd phrases, but that’s the truth and there isn’t any better or simpler way of saying it.

Above is an image of a mother and daughter from the Palesie region of Belarus. The the mother was 93, the daughter 73 at the time the photo was taken. The region is quite famous for ‘producing’ people who live long and productive lives. Both, the daughter and the mother were still working in the garden, planting things and doing house chores. Palesie is one region which I want to revisit and explore in depth during this trip.

Some quick news

I have finally rebuilt my website (click image above to see it), some things might still be tweaked/added, but for most part this is it.

I wanted it to be simple, elegant and easy to navigate. I limited the amount of images on there - just enough to provide a taste of my work. You can get to the images quickly, in two clicks, which I feel is important.

You can also find workshop information now, under ‘Learn’, more on that in a future post soon.

I’ve had my hands full with all this work that doesn’t necessarily pay off right away - doing the website, the PBase site, more photo sorting, photo article proposals to magazines etc. But I did set a few goals for myself, which I would encourage anyone in the early years of their career to do, same probably goes for the experienced photographers, the goals, of course would be different, but the idea is the same – making sure that things done.

Having at least five months at home, in front of a good internet connection and a fast computer I felt that I really needed to make the most of this time. It’s one thing to shoot photos and it’s another thing to sell them, get them in front of people. Some of that is done by Getty Images, but not as much as I’d like at this stage.

Sending your work to magazine editors is exciting, nerve-wrecking and frustrating all at once. I haven’t been spoon-fed any ‘connections’ nor have I been told what the right and wrong ways to approach magazine editors are. In some ways maybe that’s good, as I don’t want to be limited by previous failures of others. I keep it simple, maybe even a little naive and I have managed to get myself into a few publications which I like (more on that soon) so I guess my approach has worked, at least to an extent.

In theory you’d think that if you’ve ‘got the goods’ you can just cold-call/email, get your photos in front of the right people and ‘voila’ you have a feature on your work or of a story you shot. In reality that’s not always the case, at times you don’t even know whether your email was read or not (that’s the frustrating part) and a week later you may find out that some magazine does actually want to feature your images (that’s the exciting part). Then, when you have to give them what they need before their deadline, the nerve-wrecking part comes.

That’s about it for now. The tutorial, which I promised what seems like a long time ago now is in the making, it will be available before June 10th.

Thoughts on competing and comparing in the world of photography

A few of my photographer friends on the internet and others who I respect, have at some stage stated  that being competitive with your photography or comparing yourself to others is not something that is very useful for us photographers. I disagree.

In a world perfect for photographers, each one of us would simply follow our own creative path and not care about the market and its demands. We would create what we love, spend years on honing our skills and make a living from it. The fact that someone does what we love much better than us wouldn’t matter, because there would be enough work/money/resources for everyone who calls themselves a professional photographer.

Well, in a perfect world there wouldn’t be poverty and injustice, but our world is very, very far from perfect and the photography part of it is no different.

A few days ago I came across a blog entry titled The Sport of Business on the blog of Mark Cuban – former owner of Yahoo, now the owner of the Dallas Mavericks NBA team. Whether you like him or not, one can’t deny that Mark Cuban has been incredibly successful in his endeavors. I’m a big basketball fan and used to play pretty obsessively back in the day. I could relate some things from basketball to photography, so right away I understood where Cuban was going with his post.

Cuban compares the sport of basketball to the “sport” of business. He concludes that the sport of business is “the ultimate competition” . The dedication, the competitive nature and the hard work you have to put in, are the same in basketball and business, but the “sport” of business basically consumes your entire life.

He talks about having the edge over his competition and the “sacrifices” this involves, mentioning not watching TV, unless there is something he can learn from what’s on, not reading fiction, but rather searching the internet, newspapers and magazines for concepts that he can use in his business and “getting so jazzed about what you do, you just spent 24 hours straight working on a project and you thought it was a couple hours.”

Here’s another interesting phrase:

“Every day some stranger from anywhere in the world that you have never met is trying to come up with a way to put you out of business. To take everything you have worked your ass off for, and take it all away. If you are in a growing industry, there could be hundreds or thousands of strangers trying to figure out ways to put you out of business.”

While this quote is not directly related to photography (photographers are not necessarily consciously trying to put each other out of business), but whether we want it, like it or not, the phrase applies to many things in our world. Photography is no exception, we are competing with other photographers in our field. We compete for work, money, recognition, respect.

The demand for photography is limited. There will be only a few winners in a photographic competition, an advertising agency will usually hire only one photographer for a particular project, a magazine will only publish a limited amount of photo stories and a couple will only trust their special day to one wedding photographer.

A seasoned pro, who has been “dominant” in the industry for years may get complacent for a year or two and before he/she knows it,  dozens are ready to take his/her place.

The question is: Does it make any sense to think about this stuff?

I guess it depends on the individual and as always, I can only speak about my own approach.

Do I compare myself to other photographers? Most definitely. I look at photos online, in books, in magazines all the time. If I come across work that I like, I’ll search for the photographer, go to their  website, read about them, find out about their age, their experience and about what they are doing with their photography. I’m competitive and I’m very curious. I like to know where I stand. I don’t think this is bad and would even suggest to aspiring photographers to adopt this attitude.

But this comparing and competitiveness must have a purpose. It has to be done the “right” way. It’s not about simply looking at the work of talented young photographers, feeling they are so much better than you and lamenting on the whole idea for weeks. Neither is it about saying that all work except your own is rubbish.

If however you were to look at the work of a successful photographer you admire, if you were to compare where he/she is and where you are and stop to think about what the whole thing actually means, you could help your career move forward or remain at the top of the game.

When I look at the work of successful photographers, particularly my peers or those younger than me, I try to understand – What is it that has made them successful in a relatively short amount of time? What are the strong points of their work? Can I learn anything from them? If they are producing the same kind of work as I am, but are much closer to where I want to be, (creatively or financially) I want to know why. It’s surprised me how much I have learned through these comparisons.

Now about being competitive. I’m not talking about the sort of competitive, where you try to trip someone in a race to win. It’s about keeping things in perspective and driving yourself, striving for a level of greatness.

Feeling too lazy to get up and shoot on the streets  early in the morning – Some 19 year old is doing it, he’ll have the shot that will sell, that will win the competition, that will give him the edge and get his photo story into the magazine. Simple as that. If you’re not doing it, you can bet that someone is and that person will be the one rewarded, not you.

Not feeling inspired enough to do something with your work? Dreading rejection from a potential client? Well, the other photographer, the one who you thought didn’t have much talent is feeling the same, but he decided to do something anyway. He emailed the magazine, called the client and now his career has moved forward, and yours hasn’t.

You compete with those who are doing the same thing as you by default, and the same goes for your competitors. To have a chance to “win” you must put forth as much effort as you can, use all the existing opportunities and create new ones. If you have the talent and did it right, you will have taken a job or a magazine slot that could have been somebody else’s. The next time things may not turn out so well.

In the end if you really compete, if you give it your all and still don’t get the result, then just like in basketball or whatever other sport, you were usually beaten by a better team/photographer, you probably just weren’t quite good enough (or at times you were not playing the same game). The good thing about photography however, is that the game doesn’t stop when you can no longer run quite as fast or jump quite as high. You can try again and keep trying until you either reach your goal or decide that it’s not worth the effort.

Ultimately the comparisons are about learning, and the competition is about getting off your butt, doing stuff with your work and living life.

And what is the other option? Photographers can shoot mediocre stuff, never  compare themselves and never be aware of how mediocre that stuff is, until, if they are professionals it hits them over the head. Until a 17-year-old with an entry level DSLR takes their job.

If photography is just a hobby, enjoy it! But as far as professionals go, I feel that although some say they don’t get competitive or compare themselves, it’s simply not true. They’re doing it, even if they are not entirely aware, and as I said, I really don’t think that’s a bad thing.

I’ve been tied up with some submissions and I am quite close to finishing a new website. If all goes as planned I should have that tutorial available before the end of the month.

My workshop revisited and thoughts on the post-processing tutorial.

I know that I’m not posting to the blog very consistently, but hey, it’s challenging to think up meaningful content, while you’re also busy doing many other things. I’ll get better.

About the above photo - “Jodhpur Sweets-Maker”. It belongs to Kym Morris, the talented young woman who joined me for a private photo workshop around off-the-beaten-track Rajasthan. This was my favorite image of hers from our workshop. I remember that I was a little surprised when she showed it to me.

It’s not like Kym was clueless before the workshop, she already possessed a certain kind of vision, the stuff she was shooting was not captivating, but solid and the potential shone through. Once the workshop started I could see improvements every couple of days, but then in the final few days of the workshop I saw this shot and it was a few levels above anything else.

To me the image is the accumulation of much of what I tried to get across during the workshop (in regards to photographing on the streets) and that’s why I was so proud to see it. The things I spoke about – recognizing a photogenic situation, textures, color harmony and soft natural light – they are all here. On top of that there’s even a little motion blur in the hand, that makes the whole thing really come alive.

I guess some photography enthusiasts just need to be put onto the right path, then everything clicks and a transformation occurs. These are the people who can benefit most from a workshop (not just mine, I already mentioned some guys that I respect on my blog) and these are the photographers, Kym included, who I feel could find success photographing professionally.

Kym does not have a website yet, but she has a couple of images on "Onexposure". I'm sure there will be more soon. 

I’m thinking that it may be worthwhile to do a workshop in Indonesia next – Bali to East Java. This trip would really focus on what it’s like to be a travel photographer. The locations would vary, from tourist hotspots and spectacular landscapes like the Bromo volcano to absolutely unknown gems and photographing traditional villagers and fishermen.

These parts of Indonesia have lots to offer, just as much as India in many respects. Again I’d either make it a private workshop or something very small scale. My whole thing is reducing any impact on traditional villages. The last thing I want is more children running up to foreigners and screaming demands for pens, chocolates and money.

Once everything is in place, I’ll have the info on my website. Anyone who thinks this may be a thing for them, contact me here or via the email on my website. It’d definitely be a journey-of-a-lifetime type of experience.

To all those who have enquired about a post-processing tutorial – If I make one, I would like to make it rather good, spend a bit of time on it, go into detail. There’s some theory that I think is very necessary to understand before going crazy with new PP techniques and I’d like to touch up on it. There are just too many people replicating catchy post-processing techniques that just scream at you, but they’re doing it all wrong, without understanding. I don’t want to encourage that with my tutorials.

Anyhow, the tutorial would have illustrations, step-by-step how to, examples and a few words that touch up on the “Why?”. It’d take me some time to make one and I figure that charging from US$10-15 for a PDF would not be unfair. The money ain’t much for knowledge, but goes a long way for someone traveling around Asia - US$10 is basically a day’s worth of budget traveling in India:).

If anyone thinks that this way of delivering the tutorial is not a bad idea – tell me. If you think it’s rubbish, well, also tell me.

Photo Contests, self-critique and David duChemin’s book.

It’s been longer than I’d like between posts. I’ve been busy preparing images for various contests and magazines. Some of my least favorite work after post-processing, but I’m finding out just how important it is. You really learn to critically look at what you produce. It can be a little discouraging when you face the reality and see that a lot of the stuff you thought worked, doesn’t, but it’s an advantage to learn how to discern this yourself. I’m still learning and think/hope I’m steadily getting better.

There are people who aren’t crazy about photo contests, some have their egos bruised when they don’t win and others think the idea is stupid in general. I have mixed feelings on the matter and I do think that some contest  judges are on crack while making their decisions. However, I try to see photo contests for what they are – opportunities to get your work seen by a large number of people and chances to win – money, prizes, recognition. I think I have also understood that these things are extremely subjective, nevertheless the winning images that you see in “big” contests are more often than not inspiring, and that is never a bad thing. If the quality of your work and the timing complement each other, you’ll win, if that’s not the case – you’ll at least learn, if not from other people’s images, then from having to critically look at your own work and seeing what your weaknesses are.

While I’m on the topic of critically looking at images I’d like to mention a site with which I have been involved lately. I know that many readers have probably found me on this very site, but for those who didn’t, it is called Onexposure. I think the whole idea behind this project is quite brilliant. For those more serious about their photography it is a great alternative to Flickr.

It works like this: You have a weekly limit of image uploads and the images you upload are either published on the website or rejected.  After you upload,  knowledgeable photographers/enthusiasts look at your work, if it really sucks a “screener” instantly rejects it, if it really rocks it’s instantly published. More often than not the decision is not instant and the site members (including you, once you register) have to vote on what should be published and what shouldn’t. A decision not to publish is usually accompanied by a   reason/s e.g. – lack of impact, poor composition etc. An important detail is the fact that the whole process is anonymous. The voters don’t know whose image they’re seeing and the photographer doesn’t know who voted for or against. In my opinion this is great because it prevents rivalry, popularity contests and the ridiculous “mutual masturbation” that you sometimes see on Flickr – “Receive a star and give 5 stars to 5 other photos”. On Onexposure if your image is rubbish it simply doesn’t make it to the front page, when it does the comments are for most part of the positive and the congratulatory type and people can “favorite” your photo . In some way this is a page out of Flickr’s book, but on average, the crowd on OneExposure is much more photographically intelligent and with much less trash to look at, you’re really only presented with very decent to absolutely awesome work.

Anyway that’s enough about Onexposure, nothing better than seeing it for yourself.

Before I sign off, I’d like to plug the book of an internet friend David duChemin – a brilliant fellow and a very fine photographer. His blog is full of wisdom - inspiration, the business side of photography, practical gear related stuff, it’s all there and anyone interested in photography beyond snap shots must check it out. Needless to say, an author of such a fine blog is very capable of producing an invaluable book for all those who aspire to better themselves as photographers and it seems like David has done just that. The book is still about a month away from being available, but it’s looking good from the sample PDF provided on David’s blog. I urge you all to check it out.