the RAW and the Muse
On this trip to Sumatra, I did what I always do; I shot in RAW. RAW images files are fantastic, they give you the latitude to make changes to your images while processing that JPEG files just don’t allow. This, of course, is old news to most of us. Nate Watkins, the buddy I was [...]
Tom Little, IGVP And The Need For Peace
A photo essay by John Stanmeyer about Tom Little and NOOR. (Click the photo to go to the story at VII) This post is a little out of the ordinary for me. But I think my readers will still be interested in the photos and the plea associated with it is important. By now, you’ve [...]
Aristotle, Excellence and the Photographer
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” Aristotle This morning I met with some friends of mine for coffee. My buddy Hans tossed out this quote he’d recently read in a runner’s magazine of all places. He thought it might spur some challenging conversation. We were discussing [...]
All dried up!
click image to view larger I am at a creative dry spot today. I hit it harder than usually. I feel like I have fallen down a well, hit the dry bottom now I am flat on my back looking up a small pin point of light. How did I get down here? I’m tired. [...]
Dear Beginner, You make ripples!
Recently I had an email from a reader who had some basic photography questions. He was dealing with some pretty common issues that most beginners deal with. He has been frustrated that his images, though taken in some very exotic locations don’t seem to grab the viewer. After I looked over some of his images [...]
I talk to myself. Do you?
I talk to myself. There – I’ve said it. I know, you think I’m nuts. That’s not new news–but that’s a whole other topic. The fact is, I talk to myself. Whenever I put the camera to my face, I talk to myself. Sometimes audibly, all the time in my head. I ask myself what [...]
The Mundane
There are several things taking my time up lately and most of them are rather mundane. I’m spending a lot of time keywording photographs. For some of you, this is not very important, all you need to do is keyword an image so you can find it quickly in your library. However, for many of [...]
Go with the flow, or in this case the light.
(Click on the image to view it larger.) Here is a lesson; hold on to ideas and concepts your shooting lightly and let things happen naturally. Go with the flow. One of the hardest things to photograph is an icon. Something that everyone knows and everyone has photographed. So how to you do it? Honestly… [...]
Guest Blog: Marco Ryan
I’m going to go down a bit of a rat hole. I’m even going to give it a name: value. You’ll already be wondering why a post that begins “I’m going down a bit of a rat hole” might have anything to do with Focus for Humanity – a newly launched foundation aimed at giving [...]
What’s all this talk about vision?
I don’t even know where this post is going. Partly, I’m posting out of discipline. Partly, I’m posting because I know there’s something in my brain that needs to be said; I just can’t put my finger on it. Vision, vision, vision, all this talk about vision. Very few people actually define what they mean [...]
A Promise is a Promise
The poet Robert Service once said, “A promise made is a debt unpaid“. I have several debts that need to be paid. How about you? Have you ever promised someone that you’d send them their photo and then just forget about it. Maybe on purpose. Maybe out of just laziness. Maybe your just too busy [...]
It’s Nice to Have Conflict
If you’re reading a story and everything goes according to plan, everyone gets along and there is no conflict at all in the pages of the book, that would be a very boring book. Conflict in a story, as in life can get your heart beating. Remember the time you had conflict with that particularly [...]
In a Perfect World
This is a dangerous blog post. Partly because it might step on some people’s toes. Partly because I haven’t completed my thoughts on this. So all in all it’s just plain dangerous. But, I need to fill the empty space and this is something I’ve been thinking about a lately. I’m not sure who first [...]
When We’re Simply Human
By Brian Hirschy Occasionally in the life of an NGO photographer things can hit too close to home. On April 14th at 7am my wife woke me up with the news that there had been a series of powerful earthquakes in and around Yushu, a town 500+ miles southwest of where we live and work. [...]
“Shares well with others.” or “Like it? Link it!”
Over the past few weeks, I have been having several conversations with photographers about sharing images and about copyright. I will be sharing two of these with you in upcoming Depth of Field interviews. The first is with Marco Ryan with Focus for Humanity; Marco explained in simple terms the principles and philosophy behind net [...]
Review: Easy Release app model release – The Best!
Last week I reviewed an iPod model release application that a lot of people really liked. It was called mRelease. In the comments there was talk about how it was virtually identical to another model release application called Easy Release. The author of Easy Release wrote in and said that this was really not the [...]
It’s all about Light and Relaxation
It’s been a quiet week around here. This week is my daughter’s spring break. So my wife and I decided to take Jessie to the beach. We pack up the car and took off with some friends to a small island off the west coast of Malaysia called Perhentian. There, we stayed at a small [...]
Damn the elephants! Full speed ahead!
By Shiloh Lane I almost got torpedoed on the way to work today. True story – sort of. To be completely accurate, a pile of torpedoes almost sideswiped my friends and I as our car vied for on-ramp space with a flatbed truck carrying said weapons and an army jeep. Strapped to the truck with [...]
The Last Lantern Maker
Sometimes there are days that nothing seems to get done. This time that day lasted a whole week. I’ve started 100 projects and finished none. By Wednesday, I’d had enough and decided to grab my cameras and just go out and chase an idea I have had for about six months. There’s an old man [...]
Another New Blogger: Brian Hirschy
Brian Hirschy is a photographer friend of mine who lives in Western China. He runs photo workshops in the Tibetan region of China along with doing a few other things to keep busy. The other day he posted a story about being freaked out in the middle of the night by strange voices. I haven’t [...]
Culture Stress: Can’t Win for Losing
The interview I had planned for today would be better as a Depth of Field podcast. So, left with a blank piece of paper, or screen as the case may be, I found myself musing about last week’s guest post from author Shiloh Lane. She ruffled a lot of feathers and, quite frankly, I was [...]
Esther Havens: A Report from Haiti
I met Esther Havens over twitter. I heard a lot of scuttlebutt about how she was this young attractive hotshot photographer out of Austin, Texas.
Saved by a $19.95
Contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as a universal press pass. No one pass exists that will to get you into every event your heart, or editor, desires, but there certainly are press credentials. These are often given by individual newspapers or societies. A credential or an ID does not give you [...]
Halabja
I have made it back home. Back to my wife and my child and my bed. I am going to take a few days to try to reconnect and get my health better. I had rough case of bronchitis the whole time I was gone. Physically this was one of the hardest I have ever [...]
I shoot for mostly NGOs and nonprofits. I photograph images of the unknown, the forgotten and the helpless. These are often the stories that most people overlook. 
