Human pictures aren’t pictures of people. They’re pictures that mean something to people. And there are as many ways to create them as there are pictures to take.

Rules are great. They’re a great way to learn. They’re a great way to get moving. But they’re not an end. The structure we see and the values we assign – they’re our own artifacts. Impositions that allow us to make something out of the jumble. But there’s no referee in the sky watching everything you do, ready to throw down a flag, because you didn’t follow the rules. Communication is the goal.

Take this crazy, complex, overgrown world of ours, distill it down to something, and you’ve done exactly what you’re … Read more...

A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed, and is, thereby, a true manifestation of what one feels about life in it’s entirety” – Ansel Adams

Here’s what photographers do: They find meaning. That’s it. Forget everything else. If you can’t find the meaning, you can’t make people feel something. At least not reliably. Not predictably. We care how skillful we look. We care how impressive we are. Our audience just wants to feel something. The better you understand the way space, place, light, timing and everything else affect a viewer, the sooner you can create pictures that express what you feel. And the sooner you can do … Read more...

Here’s to 1 more year. 1 more month. 1 more day. 1 more second. 1 more instant. This instant. An instant in an absence of time, an absence of place.

Leave yesterday behind, let tomorrow come, but breathe here, breathe now, breathe deeper. Stand taller. Feel the texture of your own life. The beat of your heart, the rhythm of your pulse. Don’t lose it. Don’t let go. Ever. Hold on. Fight for it.

Make it happen. Make it count. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow hasn’t come. Connect the dots by living now, and tomorrow’s dreams and hopes will find you. Don’t do it the other way around. Don’t put anything on hold. Don’t focus on getting things off the to-do … Read more...

Either life informs art or art informs life. You either evolve, grow, and change, or you stand still and wither.

In the face of true living, change is assured. And, in change, there will always be deviation from the norm. Don’t fear this. Don’t run from eccentricity. Great artists, innovators, and creators lead lives of constant change. Their greatest achievements come in their most significant departures from the mainstream.

The greatest dangers of achievement aren’t the trappings of success but the fear of loss. Too often, modest accomplishment becomes conformity, as people try to hold on to what they’ve achieved. Fighting for legacy is antithetical to the cause. You can preserve success no more than you can keep water cupped … Read more...

If you’re born with a thing you can do and a few things you want to say, put it out there. Turn it into something. Make it a part of something more. Because if you’re born with a gift, and God comes a knockin’, when he asks what you’ve done with it all, you’ve gotta think that saying you just marked it up and milked it for what it was worth isn’t going to cut it. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying not to make a living. Just don’t only make a living. It used to be that we aspired to the iceberg and not the tip. Before life could be summed up in hash tags and feeds, it … Read more...