1. Road Trip I love road trips. Planning them, packing for them, and doing them. Unpacking... well, not so much. But road trips are one of the most fun and inspiring things you can do. I try to take small road trips whenever possible. Last week I was in Vancouver....

A recent heated discussion on a photographer making her political affiliations known led me to another thought... is there a line you won't cross in your work? Should there be? It is a competitive market out there. There are bills to pay, and gear to maintain, and...

Discussing the new expectations of commercial photography and creating new challenges and channels for the visual executive

A kind of a hodge-podge post this morning. I am deep into the final shooting for the Lighting Essentials II book to be published by Amherst Media sometime in the moderately distant future. These days it seems like a year from completion to seeing it on the shelves. I...

I discuss the third decade of my love of photography.

The 70’s and 80’s were a heady and exciting time for me as I started my commercial photography career. This is part two of the series on how I got started.

It was 1963. We were on a vacation in California, and my dad wanted to see the town of Carmel. We would do that as a family. Head out from Phoenix to places (usually west of us) and find things that were interesting to my dad. Mom didn't really care where we went, she...

Well, the hot days are here. Believe me. 110 in Phoenix today. We experienced three of the heat wave days in New York, and then some great respite up in Old Orchard Maine. This is a gathering of some things I think you may enjoy as we prepare for the long hot days of...

A photographer is preparing to make a photograph that may change someone's life, forever. An art director is considering a new photographer for a substantial editorial assignment. He is a little nervous about it, but he also knows that this is the right shooter for...

IMPORTANT NOTE: Registration for the contest has ended. If you missed it, look for our next contest in the Spring. If you did register, an email with important information was sent out on August 11. If you did not get that email, please let me know and I will find...

Well, it seems we have had some interesting discussions on the future (or lack of it) of photography as a career. I personally find the whining very unattractive, and somewhat arrogant. I found two different approaches to discussing the difficult changes facing those...

OK... this has been in the works for a while, but it is time to take off the wraps and announce a truly special workshop with yours truly and Kirk Tuck of Visual Science Lab. We discussed it a bit last month when I was in Austin, and yesterday we decided to pull the...

Today we look at two books on food styling directed toward the photographer and the commercial approach to food images. With the lowered budgets these days, the commercial photographer is being called on to style food on many assignments. And while the pure food...

Meet my friend Dave Siegel. Dave is a photographer in Phoenix, but works all over the country for major advertising agencies and destination resorts. He has several specialties over the course of his career, and is now focused on the spa/resort industry. I met Dave a...

I am so glad to welcome Gary Crabbe to Lighting Essentials. I met Gary last summer when he contacted me to discuss designing a new website for him. We hit it off pretty quick and I was really happy when he selected me to do the redesign of www.enlightphoto.com. Gary...

Selina Maitreya, a great friend to Lighting Essentials, is having a second Clarion Call. If you were on the last one, you will remember how cool it was. And if you missed it, you missed one of the most important two days of photography information in a long time....

(Photograph by Ryan Hyde.) (As was noted in the first comment, the CD who was the focus of this flap has replaced the website with something less onerous. That may take the heat off of the current situation, but it does NOT change the underlying situation,  does it. I...

From the series: Girls looking off camera at stuff." Well, it is Good Friday, and this weekend will be a blur. But I wanted to get some thoughts down before I hit the schedule for the upcoming Project 52 and workshops. First from the web: Some really good reads: From...

Have you ever needed some inspiration? Maybe the batteries were a little low and the doldrums of creative deadlock begin to swirl around your camera. Maybe you had to do something really creative and simply needed to see some stuff to “get the juices going.” And then...

What do you see when you look at a photograph? Simple question. How you answer it may reveal what you find important in imagery. I was once in a gallery at a large Arizona University. We were looking at a show of a photographer who had just completed his Master’s...