How To Get Better at Creating

I am out on a walk today and the thought occurred to me: how does stuff get created?

Creating stuff is how I earn my living.  Deconstructing my creative process; is that possible?

The last thing I created was a song with my music partner, Erik. As I walked I analyzed the process of creating new music with him.

I thought about how magical the moment of creating is. What control do I really have over this thing that I created?

Then I thought about all the pre-work, the woodshedding, the practice that brought me to sit across the room from him and play music.

That is step one...the doing: dream big but you must do the work. Get good at doing.

Magic and handwork go hand in hand when creating something new. This is an enigma that I will gladly hold true to my heart. Fingers, strings, and a piece of wood is an endless problem that I have no need to solve.  Yet, I know if I continue to put in the time and do the work, musical gifts will be rewarded.  That does not resolve my question, “how do things get created?”

We sit in this small room four feet a part.  Erik holding a Fender stratocaster, me holding a Fender Jazz bass.  We toss out musical ideas that we have been playing with... not songs, but small zygotes in the earliest developmental stage of music.

A groove presents itself. Something from nothing arises, something new.

We move into a state of repetition.  Simply playing the groove over and over to see what presents itself. We look up at each other and know that we have stumbled onto something good.

Repetition is step two.  Repetition is the next step after practicing. It's about going deeper into whatever may turn up. It's about exploring. Possibilities are discovered in repetition.  There is joy in repetition.

Great things arise out of shit.  It's an uncomfortable thought for sure, nonetheless repetition brought us to this new piece of music.

Music is now alive and with us, within our control. Repetition leads to release and the music becomes transformative. All academic approach to music is gone; fingers and string, revelations and reverberations...this is music.

Release is step three. At the point of release you no longer ask the question of why or how; conscious thought dissolves and you become a witness (or listener) to what has emerged. Release is a phenomena yet it is a phenomena with a purpose.

Erik and I are both “do-ers” of music.  We are good at picking up our instruments and running our hands up and down the neck.  Practicing our instrument is not a chore. Practicing our instrument is an escape.  Repetition leads to a release. That is the religious framework that sets us up to go deeper into the mystery.  Staying with the mystery is the mystical experience of where something new comes from.

Step four, stay with the mystery.

Creating things feels good. Writing this feels good. Playing guitar feels good. Whatever you create I am sure that it feels good. Being present at the moment of creating feels good.

Skeptics may criticize that my experiential ramblings are for not; that music is a scholarly skill that is rooted in scales and chart.  That creating is a scientific study not to be overly romanticized.

I will leave you with this thought:

There are three things that you can do in the image of God:
...love, forgive and create.

100 Straight Miles

I drove 100 straight miles today on the Ohio turnpike. 100 straight miles, no turns, no hills or no valleys in the roadway. The plains of pasture-land blended with blue skies, fluffy clouds and the graying horizon. This is what pure consciousness must feel like.

Grandeur without measure, glory beyond belief, 100 miles of straightness. The road was quiet. I barely passed a car or truck the entire trip. At times I was lost in the void of what is real. My wife and daughter both asleep. 100 straight miles of quiet. This is what pure consciousness must feel like.

I dreamed of walking 100 straight miles. Just myself, my breath, my feet and a journey without need of discovery. What would it be like to walk 100 straight miles in quiet? A walking meditation with no purpose, only to experience. This is what pure consciousness must feel like.

These thoughts, however obscure, ran throughout my head. My journey has changed in life. I needed to ask myself some questions. Those are always the hardest ones to answer. Sometimes you just don’t know. Then again sometimes you need to answer those questions.

I walk.

I am giving myself the month of March to go for walks, lots of them.

Turntable vs. Digital Algorithm in The Sky

Thursday morning at around 3:00am I am awake , yet again not able to sleep. I grab my iPad and start browsing, trying to connect myself to something of interest. Truth be told not much but sleep interests me 3am.

I hyperlink my way on to a page about record players. Note: to anyone who may be under that age of 29 reading this: a record player (a.k.a. turntable is the proper name) is what came before mp3, cd’s, tape decks but after live musicians and sheet music. A turntable plays big black vinyl discs with grooves that produce analogue sound waves. Not the flicker of sounds produced by zeroes and one (a.k.a.) analogue single converted by a computer then compressed into a digital sound wave as to be re-dubbed as digital music.

Torn, between yesterday and today, I love the convenience of all things digital. I miss the quality and stillness of the physical item. The idea alone of not having to find a place to keep a collection of, well...anything is great. Be it records, books or better yet photo negatives, put them all on hard drives and let me pull it up through a computer search when needed.

There I sit with iPad in hand complaining to myself about quality of digital vs real. For years now I keep thinking about getting a turntable. Then the question comes up, what selections of musics are worthy enough for me to repurchase them on vinyl? In the late eighties I walked into a used record store and sold my vinyl collections of LP’s, numbering somewhere over three hundred, to be traded in for cash so I could turn around and re-buy a lot of the same music on cd’s.

First, let me select music “worthy” for re-purchase. Bach: Unaccompanied Cello Suites performed by Yo Yo Ma, definitely first choice. Next, would have to be “The Right of Strings” by Clarke, Di Meola and Ponty. There is not a week that goes by that I do not listen to those two selections of music. I do feel that I should own the entire Beatles collection on vinyl but will probably not purchase them. “Born to Run” by Springsteen, U2's “Joshua Tree”, “Hejira” by Joni Mitchell would be a definite purchase and some Indigo Girls and Ani DiFranco for my wife would be a must.

The next question I ask myself, would I sit to appreciate the music? If the quality is better I should take the time to enjoy the listening experience. If it's only background music to fill up the silent space in rooms that does not deem itself to be worthy. Could I see myself sitting in a chair sipping Pinot Noir listening to the complete Cello Suites? Yes.

I need to find out who sells turntables and where I can get good quality vinyl. No problem there, type my question into the search engine box and hyperlink my way towards purchase.

While writing up this rant I am listening to Pandora (internet radio). Note: to anyone over the age 39: Pandora works like this: you select a favorite artist (currently, for me, its Elvis Costello). Then the digital algorithm in the sky goes on to play the artist of your choosing and pairs it with other similar artists, which you may like. If you like the selection you give it the thumbs up or if you wish to never hear that particular song again you give it the thumbs downs.

This is where things get maddening for me, I do not want a machine or an algorithm making decisions for me. What is the experience of music if you have no control over what is coming next? The real problem is that I love Pandora and the decisions it makes for me.

I lost the connection of falling in love with music that I felt in my youth.

Going into a record store and browsing the aisles of albums listening to what is playing on the store turntable; that is how to discover new music, while waiting for the tattoo hot chick behind the counter to come over and recommend something new for you. That is how you get into new music. Not by an algorithm in the cloud preselecting music for you.

Music is to be discovered, not stumbled upon.

Definitely getting a turntable.

Strange days indeed...

Friday 4AM

4am. Can't sleep. Decide to get up out of bed and write something. Laid in bed thinking about different rants that I could write about, after getting out of bed and setting up a writing corner by the fireplace I can no longer remember what to rant about. The fleeting muse is a mystery to me. She opens herself up to you in moments of drifting consciousness and leaves in wakeful moments of clarity.

Reading “Life” by Keith Richards & James Fox. I like that Richards gives credit to his co-author of the book. Too many books are co-authored by ghostwriters. Why not give credit?

A couple of years back I used to have an e-mail relationship with a ghostwriter. She would give me tips and encourage me to write in different directions. I enjoyed that relationship, sorry that it drifted away.

Writing has always been integral to me. As I move forward in this year much more time is dedicated to long journal entries. Much of last year was also dedicated to this, for some reason I did not share much of it. My journals from last year are in no way reflected on the blog. I may try to dig up some of that stuff and share it with you. I have a nice essay on “Faith & Creativity” that I think you might enjoy.

Back to “Life” by Richards, damn he writes great about playing guitar. He hits the emotion of what it is like to be intertwined with an instrument better than anybody else I have read. What is most surprising to me is that the reason I pick up the book in the first place was because it was listed on the best of business books by Wired magazine.

Everything happens in music first. If you want to be ahead of the game on marketing, advertising, branding and most importantly creativity start by studying the music business.

I have based my entire photography career on what I have learned as a musician. There is just something about the balance between extreme commitment (wood-shedding) to your craft and the ability to go out on stage and earn your audience.

Last thing ~ If you haven’t check out my wife's blog in awhile be sure to give it a look. She has been creating some killer stuff… (HERE)

Creative Non Fiction ~ Until the next death, Big Blue

Standing outside on the sidewalk on Wallace Street. Just walked out of the big blue funeral home. Directly in front of me is the church where I attended preschool. Hated that place. Who hates preschool? I did. Mean old lady teacher, still gives me flash backs of her yelling at us.

For the life of me I cannot remember the name of the funeral home that I just walked out of. Big Blue on Wallace Street is all I can ever remember calling it.

I have walked in and out of this place well over a 100 times. That is a lot of time spent in the house of death. It’s the family funeral home. My Grandfather was one of thirteen kids. They created quite a lot of offspring, in turn lots of deaths throughout the years. Top that off with the fact that I was an altar boy for St. Michaels Church right down the road from big blue. A couple times a month I would be standing next to Father John holding the smelly smoking incense as he recited the rosary for the mourners. More often than not it was someone who was somehow related to me.

Today I was at big blue paying my respects to Mrs. Waterston. I knew Mrs. Waterston my whole life and never new her first name. It was always “Hi Mrs. Waterston” followed by a hug and kiss on the cheek. A kind lady, she will be missed.

Mrs. Waterston is Jimmy's mother, my best friend from elementary school. This was the first time I have seen Jimmy in over twenty years, at his mother funeral.

Jimmy and I did not have much to say to each other besides the general niceties about our lives. “Kids?” and “Yes, two boys and a girl.” “You?”, "One girl. She is four, five this January.” Next I would have asked how his mother was doing but that topic of conversation was no more. He asked about my parents. I said goodbye to Jimmy then proceeded to kneel at the casket and say a prayer for his mother and to thank her for all the cinnamon toast that she made us.

It's nice seeing your first best friend, even if you have nothing to talk about. Talking, that should not have been a problem for us. We never did have much to talk about even as kids. Jimmy was smart and bad at sports. Me, I was not interested in school and getting better at sports every day. No big childhood break up; one day I went to the ballfield and he went to the library and that was that.

There would be one more time that Jimmy would come into my life before the death of his mother. Right after college we were both dating sisters at the same time without either one of us knowing it. My sister was here in Pittsburgh and his sister was studying at Penn State. The sisters did not turn out well for either of us, especially me.

So here I stand on Wallace Street, outside on the sidewalk in front of the big blue funeral home across the street from my preschool after having a short and slightly awkward conversation with my childhood friend at his mother's funeral viewing.

The street is dirty, littered with garbage day. My car is parked between two pickup trucks that are filled with junk they must have collected on trash day. You know those trucks that drive around picking up broken lawn mowers and old TV’s that no longer work? Those types of trucks.

I sit in my car and think about the fact that the only time I come back to this town is to go to the big blue funeral home. Nobody ever gets married here, they only seem to die. How odd is that?

Drove past the elementary school. Still the same but with a new playground. Drove past the ballfield that I spent the majority of my childhood at. It’s a mess. The basketball backboard is torn down. Two big metal polls are left standing where backboards used to be hung. The ballfield is over grown and the batting cage has been removed. My childhood ballpark is now a ghost town and is no field of dreams.

Drove my old paper route to see what has become of the place. Houses condemned, abandoned or just not kept up. This is why people only die here, I think to myself. There is no life left.

Drove past Jimmy's house on 10th street. Big yellow house with a For Sale sign in the front lawn. All I could think to myself was 'Good luck unloading that Jimmy.'

I had one of those moments where I could see the eight year old in me playing in that yard, climbing that big tree that still stands in the backyard.

I loved the town that I grew up in. It was old world. Everyone was Italian, we were all Catholic, and even the non-Catholic seemed catholic to me. We listened to Bruce Springsteen, drank iced tea out of paper cartons. I delivered newspapers to old ladies who would give me cookies and to old men who would let me sip the wine they made in barrels in their garages.

Today I am 41, Mrs. Waterston died at 77. I never even knew her fist name, never even thought about it until I started writing this.

Until the next death, Big Blue.

Ramdom Thoughts

The second day in a row that I had a bad night's sleep, feeling quite groggy and numb as I write this.

Last night there was a windstorm that woke not only us but also the house. The wind was so powerful that it set off the alarm in the house, twice. The odd thing was our reaction to turn off the alarm before making sure the house was not broken into. Simple lesson learned; give the house a walk through for burglars before turning off the alarm.

The morning sky was dark gray with moving clouds. The last of the leaves have fallen from the trees marking an end to the autumn season and the birth of winter for me.

Spent the last couple of days thinking about the digital-connectedness of my life (a love-hate relationship). I miss conversations with actual real people. My days are filled up with responses to emails, tweets, and facebook, but very little conversations.

I made the decision to redesign my blog to a simple and somewhat minimalist style. The purpose is to keep my focus on the format to be a “working portfolio”. A place for me to document my projects and keep a diary of my thoughts.

Last night our “Create | Connect | Grow” meet-up had a nice turn out with good conversation, which confirmed my feeling for the need of more conversation and less responding.

Going for a walk…

Nine Years Ago...

Today's date 9.11.10, city of Washington D.C., local time 6:47 am

I open the curtains to my hotel room that overlooks the city at dawn. Sitting in a chair drinking coffee I watch the city slowly come to life. A garbage truck picking up, a lady walking her dog, homeless person sleeping covered in newspapers in the park, window blinds starting to open in the Brownstone apartments letting the morning light in. Here I sit, I watch.

Nine years ago this city was under attack by a terrorist threat.

What am I doing here? Vacationing with my wife.

My day starts out with a long walk to a French patisserie; I did not know that words like "patisserie" even existed. LePain Quotidien patisserie, sounds French…isn’t that cool…in I-wish-I-could-pronounce-it sort of way. The menu reads organic ingredients, sustainable farming, and baked fresh everyday starting at 3am.

Next, this beautiful Ethiopian waitress with a poetic voice asks “Coffee for two?” “Yes, black please”. My wife orders a latté, I think the French invented the latte, not sure, sounds French.

Music by Vivaldi, four seasons plays over the house speakers, Vivaldi was Italian. I had my photograph taken outside the church he wrote the four seasons in. Beautiful selection music for this café.

Couples seated at their small table with their large coffee cups reading the paper together. Actually leaning into one anther reading the front page of the paper together. Who does that? This is something you only see in movies. Honey lets get up and do the crossword puzzle together. Here in D.C. people share the morning paper in cozy little nooks in quaint French cafés. It’s nice. I suck at the crossword.

Nine years ago this city was under attack by a terrorist threat.

Three days off due to the fact that nobody wants to get married on the anniversary of 9/11. "Anniversary" is an odd word to use for this occasion. No disrespect to those who do, but for me the word anniversary is saved for days of celebration. 9/11 is a day of remembrance.

Day of remembrance is what has brought me to write this.

I did not remember.

I am not in D.C. to pay respect or feel the loss that so many did on that day nine years ago. I am on vacation.

My wife and I randomly picked this city as a short getaway with the little time off we had. Four hour drive, a city neither one of us have been to since our elementary years. What harm? Take a nice drive down route 68 south, have a couple of good meals enjoy the shopping, have a couple of good drinks (J Paul's in Georgetown, good) take a long walk around the capital. Tried to get a tomato out of Michelle Obama's garden (this is not a good idea, do not even joke about this) Tax dollars do fund the garden, that's all I am saying. If you want to get a fresh presidential tomato, handcuffs should not be needed.

After LePain Quotidien, after the tomato fiasco we walked. The city is quiet, clean and green, very green. Trees line every sidewalk; it’s a beautiful sight. The trees provide shade which helps keep the noise down from the roadways. D.C. blended urban development with current eco-thinking, let Mother Nature provide as only she can. Even the hotel we were staying in gave me a seventy dollar discount because we drive a Prius. That felt good. Somewhere I think that somehow Al Gore and I are now closer to each other…

Nine years ago this city was under attack by a terrorist threat.

Nine years ago this city was spared of death, not of loss. The Twin Towers went down in New York City, Pentagon was attacked and a the fourth plane crashed into a field near Shanksville in Pennsylvania after its passengers attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected toward Washington, D.C.

There were no survivors from any of the flights.

Be Creative: Manifesto Part 2

Part 2 of 2

Have we lowered our standards of creative intelligence to wait and see what the machine replicates?

Great things come out of crap. A couple of examples: the universe, the soil, our food, death to rebirth. It is all based on the idea that great things come out of crap.

This gets me to the purpose of this manifesto on “Be Creative”.

What is the purpose of life? To entertain the rest of nature, Gary Snyder wrote that and it’s true. Humans were created last, be it of God’s will or the last thing the primordial ooze of evolution got to. We were placed on this planet after everything else was done. We are only here to entertain the rest of nature.

Create something new, daily, that is your purpose. Creativity entertains, heals and sustains life; it is what we were pre-destined to do.

If we leave creativity to the machines, it is as if we are committing suicide. Consciously attempting to will ourselves out of existence. What is left for humanity when creativity is done by machines? What then is our purpose?

You want to know how to live to your fullest potential? It is done by creating something new, daily. Great things come from crap. Make mistakes, fail often, this will lead to acts of discovery.


I have dreams of becoming a motivational speaker on “Be Creative”. You know; late night infomercials, book tours, conversations with Oprah, Barbra Walter’s 10 most fascinating people of the year. I foresee the whole gamut of possibilities in my head.

I believe in the power creativity, beyond that I believe it is our only purpose to live on this planet. I believe everything we do is a creative act if we purposely choose it to be. Education, child rearing, cooking, prayer, exercise. “Be Creative” is the forethought of the “why” of doing what we choose to do. What we choose to place purpose and effort into.

Being creative will cure disease, it will help you sleep better, it will help you lose weight, it will help you connect better with others…it is the fountain of youth. Can you now in-vision my conversation on Oprah (Welcome to the show, the guru on “Be Creative”. I’ll come out dressed only in white robes, it will be trippy.)

Ok, so I am getting a little new age-y. Let me finish off with one last new age-y thing then I will get back to the real life.

Embracing our artistic-ness is the next wrung on the evolutionary ladder of life. It is human nature to seek purpose…this is it.

Your purpose is to be creative. Go out into the world and create great things out of crap. If you work in accounting be creative, think different. If you work in construction, think out loud, share your ideas. If you’re a teacher embrace your ideas that are already swirling around in your head.

Creativity is only thought, don’t let the machine do it for you. Your purpose is to make this world a better place through your artistic thoughts and actions. Share what you created, give it away, brag about it, get feedback, share ideas and most importantly live…for that is why you were created.

Art’s purpose is to serve. Serve it well.

Be Creative: Manifesto

Part 1 of 2

I am beginning to feel more and more like a defender of the creative dharma. In all of my classes and workshops on photography I utter the phrase repeatedly, “you cannot purchase your way to being a better photographer.”

A photograph is everything that happens before the snap of the shutter. I do mean everything; every book that you read, every movie that you watch, every walk that you have taken, every conversation that you have had. A photograph is the history of the person holding the camera, a true perspective.

A photographer is only a photographer for his ability to see. To truly see the world though a lens equally physically, mentally and spiritually; this is how to create. Photographs evolve on their own, a photographer has to evolve to keep the creative dharma alive.

Photography is not “wait and see”. So many times I watch budding photographers shooting in Auto mode and critique their photos after capture. A photo is not a remix of what the computer inside your camera took. The purpose of a photograph is to create the image you want, not to wait and see.

I have started to ask the question: is the digital age making us less creative?

It seems that we are in a culture of mash-up and re-mixes of yesterday’s works. A culture of how to react without ever placing effort into the original act of creating a photo, or whatever medium you chose to work in.

The digital age has been a blessing for me, don’t get me wrong, I do not want to go back to the analog age (except for albums, bring them back) and I definitely do not want to go back to the darkroom or even film. Still the question that I raise is, “is our dependence on technology to fix things killing our will create things?”

More times than not I get asked the question for a “how-to map” on how to fix things after capture than I do on how to create things in camera. There is no map, only a journey.

Great things come out of crap. Believe it. A great cellist can play beautiful music on a crap of a cello. A pristine instrument is preferred, but the music is in the hands, mind and heart of cellist. Why should it be any different for a photographer?

It does not matter how smart our machines-computers-camera have become. Photography is about the person holding the camera, not the machine. People create, machines warehouse our work.

Creative in the Park

I am just now discovering Pittsburgh, which is odd to say because I grew up in this city. “In the city” is not the right words; I grew up outside of the city, literally right outside of the city about a half hour from downtown. PGH suffers from an “edge” culture in which people work in the city and live on the outside edge of the city. Suburbs to the city and back to the burbs, repeat this daily. This is life for most Pittsburghers.

In the past two years I have started discovering and enjoying this city. Mainly due to creative need (a lot of options in one place). PGH has been the backdrop to many projects that I have worked on. Waterfront is my meeting place for my “Photo Walks”, the parks have provided background to portrait shoots and the city skyline has provided me with countless nights to sit on top of the overlooks shooting night photography.

I am thinking about pitching an idea to the parks conservancy, “Creative in the Park”. The idea would be to have local artists discuss and teach their craft in the parks. For me, I could hold my photo walks. I could see writing groups using the landscape for creative non-fiction, between the nature and the people there would always be something interesting to write. Or maybe a painter teaching watercolors or oil painting, to the community. The parks blend the grounds so well with the city skyline. This is one of my favorite things about sitting in a park; to be seated on a vast lawn while the city architecturally surrounds me in the not so far distance.

What do you think? “Creative in the Park”; be outside, breathe fresh air, exercise and create something new. Let me know???

Tonight I went to Highland Park for a “Walk in the Woods”, an ongoing outing that is free and open to all. It is held every Wednesday evening in a different city park. More info can be found (here).

The tour guide gave a history of the park and introduction to what the park will evolve into. For me my part was to sit back and observe the walkers enjoying the landscape. What I enjoyed was seeing older couples holding hands while walking. It always gives me hope to see people holding hands, not enough of couples do that anymore. The only thing nicer than seeing an older couple holding hands is a father and daughter holding hands while walking in the woods. This little girl walking with her father has a future job working for Mother Nature. She loved the woods and the flora, she would stop to study leaves and petals never removing them from the plant, simple enjoying them.

You can see a slide show of my photos (here).

Sunday Morning Walk to the Park

This past Sunday morning I started a side project for PGH Parks Conservatory. It has taken me longer to get this project off the ground due to bad weather but I'm so glad I stuck with it. Hopefully, weather permitting, I will be shooting “Walk in the Woods” this upcoming Wednesday evening. Info about that event can be found (here).

On this hot humid Sunday morning after shooting a late night wedding I got out of bed and drove to Mellon Park, which is located on the corner of 5th and Shady Ave.

The streets were packed with patrons attending this event. I had to park about a half mile away on the far end of Shady Ave. just to find a parking spot. The walk to the park gave me a glance into the future of Pittsburgh or the present of what the city has turned into. The streets were line with hybrid vehicles, every other car seemed either to be a hybrid, flex fuel or clean diesel. The sidewalk was lined with bikers and families who just left church and young couples walking their pets.

Upon entering the park you could quickly see this is an event for the community; family friendly, age friendly and first date friendly. The park was crowded, it was the perfect blend for an outdoor event with enough room to lay down your blanket or set up your lawn chair but packed to the point that you were glad you came out to be part of the crowd.

One thing that I am starting to notice about PGH citizens is that they’re nice, very nice. Nice does not seem like something to brag about, but when you see yourself starting to notice the niceness of the community you live in, it’s a good feeling.

Walking through the crowd with a camera in hand, if I accidentally knocked into to someone I would turn around to apologize, they would quickly respond with a good morning and a pat on the back, nice isn’t?

Pittsburgh is growing in a new direction that embraces community, local economies and neighborly kindness. I am glad to be part of it. It's the reason I am writing this post today.

“Cello Fury” was performing as part of this ongoing classical music series, “Bach, Beethoven, and Brunch” that is held on Sunday mornings. Additional info about the series can be found here.

Three cellists, one drummer and I am interested…. You can see some of the photos that I took (here).

If you see a guy walking around with a camera with a long lens stop and say hi.

Photo Biz, Soil & Space

It has been to long time since last I sat down to write. Simply to write, without a defined purpose, a release to what has been on my mind. I do not completely understand it, but there is a sense of a cleansing when I sit down to write out my thoughts. Someday I'll have the dream of becoming diarist and essayist. Today I write, release and cleanse my psyche.

There has been so much to write about, sometimes too much for me to formulate the words, ideas and thoughts into a non-random pattern. What’s new?

New direction and opportunity in the photo biz have opened their door to us. It is a strange thing every time “E” and I discuss moving the biz in a new direction it never feels right. We do not want to force a new business venture, that never works out for the client or us. We continue to build our portfolio, picking and choosing side-project that interest us, in turn the right client finds their way to our door.

Another new direction is that this autumn I am partnering with various Pittsburgh Carnegie Libraries to teach workshops. You can see all dates on my event page (here) or also at the link at top of the page. If you are reading this on an RSS feed and have not stopped over at the blog in a while go check it out (HERE). I added new pages: Events, Who I am, and a Say Hi page.

Current life is a blend, better yet a balancing act of family, photography, keeping hydrated, running the biz, all the while doing our best to stay on top of the “all-of-everything” which is “E” and I taking care of each other, she is better at it than I am…

During conversations with working artists I like to discuss lifestyle economics. I am interested in the how, what, why and why not of managing their professional lives.

For us we enjoy life, not professional or personal but a life of deliberate living. Our home working space is designed more like a coffeehouse or a den than an office space. The sofa and the sound system are just as important as the desk and the computer. The space is purposefully laid out to be a place of creativity, work, quiet reading and play with our daughter (not all at the same time).

Mobile has also been part of our latest workflow. With the purchase of two smart phones and the iPad, life on the go can now be go, go, go or stop and pause whenever we want (or need). I am late to the game on mobile tools but there has never been a wanting to be "that" connected. In the home or out of the house, downtime from the digital connectedness of today's world is needed, if not required, to be a creative, clear thinker.

p.s. the phone is not an iphone, it’s a droid...judge me, its OK. Worse than not having an iphone is loving the droid. Steve Jobs please return my phone calls, I love your products, let's be friends again…I am in your cult, koolaid for me, please.

The droid is good tool and having Google as the operating system makes the jump to mobile seamless. Forgive me Steve, I bought the iPad and love that more than the phone. Friends? Tell Al Gore I said hi…

Today I finished my first e-book on the iPad, I loved it…both the book (The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larrson) and reading it on the iPad. How quickly I am converted, a purist for the physical book I thought I would always be. Before starting to write this post I started reading a new book by Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go. The first chapter gives me the feeling that I have discovered a new favorite writer. Holding the book in my hands has me yearning for the comfort and back-light of the iPad (call me Steve, hugs).

More and more I find myself falling in love with the screen. I miss music on vinyl albums; I will forever write in my moleskin journal, six strings and a piece of wood will remain an endless mystery (my acoustic guitar) but the screen is evolving into a mistress.

Watching an oil painter move to the pixel screen for their palette of colors interests me. The still image has greater opportunity to be seen on the screen. I enjoy the openness that Creative Commons Licenses offers me on the screen, otherwise it would not be much of a marketable idea if it was not for art moving into the medium of distribution over the screen. The book, the novel, something that seemed so personal and private as sitting in a favorite chair curled up with a good book has gone the way of the screen. Will I miss the smell of a book, yes, will I miss the feel of holding a book in my hands, no.

With the change of medium comes the change of venue; I miss browsing in a record store. Even though I can listen to music before I buy it online (iTunes..a.k.a. Steve Jobs’s jukebox...wink, wink). The independent bookstore has become a dinosaur in my hometown, but every opportunity I get to browse a small bookstore, I take, even though I can read first chapters online.

In the end it is about keeping my feet rooted in the soil and my head in the clouds; never would I have though the clouds would have been in cyberspace.

Update ~ Last Week

It is late on Sunday night as I write this, moments before midnight. I am tired. A creative tired from the past seven days of work. In the past forty-eight hours Elizabeth & I had two days of non-stop shooting. As I type these words it still feels like I have a camera pressed up against my left eye and the feel of the indent in my right hand from holding on to the camera for an extended period. The work was good; the light over the past 2 days was good. At times too bright and hazy, but all light is good.

Monday thru Friday of last week I wrote...a lot. I stepped away from my desk and wrote. I find it hard to sit at my desk and write. For me my desk is for editing photos, updating this blog and responding to e-mails. Off to write, to create (either with a pen or camera) I need to leave the desk. I sat in the library and wrote, I sat in coffee house and wrote, even ventured to my back porch and wrote. I wrote.

Filling up a journal is a good feeling. An addictive feeling and if you have ever filled up a journal there is a good chance that you will continue to fill up journals. Seeing a small stack of moleskin journals accumulating on a bookshelf is good (also scary, hoping that nobody but you ever reads them).

I walked last week. I walked as much as I could. The weather was nice so I did my best to stay out of my car as much as possible. On Thursday I had a networking meeting on the South Side of Pittsburgh at nine. Not wanting to use my car nor sit in traffic I decided to get up early and walk to the “T” (PGH subway/train hybrid). Forty minutes to get to the station, 15 minutes on the “T” and then another twenty minute walk to the appointment. The second half of the walk was a great experience. I walked down a street that I have driven on many, many times over the past twenty years.

Thursday I saw the street for the very first time.

I am going to finish my beer and go to bed. Will organize my writing projects in the days to come.

P.S. Wednesday I will be taking photos for Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy – they hold a “walks in the woods” every Wednesday evening (6:30) between the months of June through September. Bring your camera & I will do my best to help answer any of your questions (mini Photo-Walk).

Info about “Walks in the Woods” can be found here :
http://www.pittsburghparks.org/walks-in-the-woods

Walk, Faith, Creativity

I was out for a long walk this morning after dropping my daughter off at school.

The air smelled sweet from the rain that has been falling for the better part of the last forty-eight hours. The air was cold with a heavy humidity to it, never thought that humidity could exist in cold air, but it did. The sky, gray-white, overcast, thick clouds blanketing the horizon.

I have taken this same walk twice before. I call it my urban sprawl walk. It is a walk that takes me through a couple of different neighborhoods, small biz districts where I can stop at the post office, bank and the drug store. I like that. The walk ends on a long busy stretch of road, (noise) that leads back to my neighborhood.

I have a “thing” (thing is a poor choice of word as it is more like an obsession) about the creative benefits of taking a walk to clear the mind. It’s meditation and exercise at the same time. One activity with multiple outcomes. Not a bad way to increase productivity and turn over thoughts in your mind.

For years I have taken walks as I did today. This morning's walk was an odd thing for me. Usually my walks are in the woods where I can feel all Henry-David-Thoreau-like and get a sense of a connection to the divine. (Thoreau nor the Divine show up on busy roadways, it's just not safe.)

Walking on sidewalks, inhaling bus fumes while trying to block out the noise of…well everything. I miss the woods, but the urban sprawl is new, different and unexplored on foot. For years I drove to the woods for moments of quiet, never learning the landscape that I was driving on. Change brings creativity. That is why I was out walking in the first place. To think about creating something new; project, thought, idea. I get this feeling inside of me that I need to have a creative release to give quiet back to my mind.

Walking in silence when the world is erupting is an act of surrender. Quietness brings out answers to the seeking questions that I have been asking myself.

There is only one giant problem; I have no way of recording these thoughts in my head because I am out walking in all this noise.

Odd isn’t it – people have creative important epiphanies when they are nowhere close to being able to write them down (some magical curse from the Muse of creativity). Whatever fragmented thoughts make it all the way home must have been the finest ones. The Muse must send out the leftover mini-epiphanies to somebody else pondering in the streets, actually, most likely the woods. (Do you think people get these experiences when golfing??)

The reason for this specific walk: over the past couple of months I have been taking a class on spiritual journaling. Truthfully, I have not been journaling on my spiritual pursuits. I have been journaling, just not while asking God to speak to me through pen and paper.

Nonetheless, this class stays present in my mind, just sitting there begging me to write it out (not down, but out as in a release).

Faith & Creativity ~ this is one constant, recurring, ever-present thought that I should write about.

I need to figure out how to write down my story of faith and creativity and the effect it has guided my life.

By the time most of you have read this post I will have had my first conversation/meeting to bring this subject to life.

Is creating something enough to build your spiritual faith on?

Yes…

It is not the starting or ending point - it is the realization of the experience.

Brazilian girl & Chinese Lady

I see a Brazilian chick wearing a short black skirt just long (or short) enough to cover her girlie parts, canvas-hiking boots that are well past worn out, a beat up gray sweater that she could have borrowed from her Grandmother or purchased for five hundred dollars at Anthropologie. Wild, nappy hair, as if she used to have dreadlocks and has tried to comb them out, clumps of hair that are dyed platinum white and some that are died blond to give depth and texture to her brunette quaff.

She carries a persona that she is trying to pull off, defiantly an urban city girl with a love for punk edge – I bet she can hold her own. The only thing that is odd about her is her hands. Her hands look much older than the rest of her. The Brazilian chick is thin, young, olive skinned, 20ish, with style, but her hands look as if to belong to a woman in her seventies; a woman who has worked a lifetime with those hands.

Small, round red glasses perched on the edge of her nose while she sits with good posture having a video-chat on her laptop with a lady that is obviously Chinese speaking Mandarin.

A Brazilian chick speaking Portuguese to a Chinese lady speaking Mandarin and it is quite clear that they both understand each other just by all the laughter they are sharing.

As for me, OK, yes I do feel a little guilty eves-dropping on them but neither of them knows it. I am sitting in a coffeehouse on the upper east side of Pittsburgh, one table behind her and a row of tables separating us. It’s hard not to notice a crazy (but cool) looking Brazilian chick speaking Portuguese and laughing out loud while having a v-chat with a Chinese lady speaking Mandarin…Ok, I am not eves-dropping, just witnessing the spectacle.

Brazilian chick and the Chinese lady both start dancing to the Humpty dance song that has started playing over the coffeehouse stereo system.

The Chinese lady just kissed her monitor and pressed her breast to the screen while dancing to the music. Both start laughing painfully louder than before ~ they’re probably making fun of the creepy guy at the corner table eves-dropping while writing in his journal.

Educated by a Vagabond (myself)

I went to college but that’s not where I was educated.

College for me was a time of creativity and having my papers proof read, edited and typed by my girlfriend. College was a time of failing accounting class and trying to earn some money (an artist should never-ever have to take accounting, ever).

The launch of my education started about two years after college. I started traveling, (a lot) for a photography company that I was working for. Sitting on long plane rides reading a variety of biz books, curbside philosophy and random novels. Kerouac, Henry Miller and Nietzsche…these guys spoke to me. They had been the teachers that I was searching for.

Food was an educational tool. I wish I could say it was being exposed to different cultures but it was the food that was the teaching means of experiential value. Dinner in San Francisco is much different than dinner in Kentucky. And dinner from a street vendor in New York...well there’s nothing like that, anywhere.

Walking has been a good educational tool. Walking in the woods or down a city sidewalk, strolling through a small town. Go for a walk, you will learn something new.

My Father has always said to me “you go to school to learn how to think”. I agree with that. Now that I am a parent I want to expand on the words of my father.

You go to school to discover the passion and effort of how to continually think, expand and grow for the rest of your life.

Simple concepts that deliver…

Deliberate Living

Well over a year ago I had a conversation with David Burke about his travels through Africa. One sentence he said has sat with me but I have never written it down before.

“I went to Africa to photograph the poor…I photographed joy.”
~ David Burke (see photos here & here)

This is what I learned from that conversation:

There is no poverty when there is no consumerism to attach itself to. You only know that you’re poor when you know that the other person is rich. The notion of rich does not exist because the notion of poor does not exist.

This is not an anti-consumerism argument; it is a self-awareness discussion on deliberate living.

I do not want to idealize that the poverty of Africa is some un-recognized paradise. It’s not. Starvation, polluted water and death by mosquitoes is not paradise, it’s Hell.

“The poor shall inherit the earth” ~ Jesus

We live in a post-modern world. What does that mean? Our ideas and self-concepts are shaped by media exposure that we consume (or digest), not by deliberate living. We are who we are due to the fact that we like that movie, music, TV show, magazine or book we read.

Take away media (postmodernism) and you have the question “Who am I? Who am I left with? What do I attach my self-interest to? What’s left to influence me? Ourselves? That sucks I am boring without all my stuff.”

Consumption is not the answer to any problem.

Answer: your feet on the soil of the earth itself, your family, connection, conversation, community, food, the culture of our ancestors, communication of experiences, actually doing stuff. (Stuff can be an act of doing rather than an act of acquiring objects).

Taking a long walk to get water for drinking and cleaning for your family does not mean poverty; it means that you are a more extraordinary person than I am.

What do I do with what I just wrote down…no idea yet? But I hope you share in this conversation with me.

Slow Photography Movement

Let me start with a story of how this idea came to me.

Scrolling through the blog of one my favorite local photographers (&person) she had posted this photo.

When I look at this photograph I often wish I had the opportunity to take this photo.

I do not know how this particular photo was taken. I can’t even venture a guess, at least not a good one...yet. It has me thinking….maddening yet wonderful thought about how I can do this.

I am not looking to plagiarize Joanne's work but I desperately want to be a chameleon to it…

Joanne's photo paired with my recent workshops, photo walks, conversations and e-mail discussions has me thinking about what is a complete photograph?

For me the least important thing to a great photos is the snap of the shutter; I am most interested in what happens before capture.

Composition, environment, emotions & inspiration…

The things that I do not care to know: Type of camera, camera setting, what lens, software, and post-production work was done.

If I can make an artistic guess it would be that this photo was completed in Joanne’s mind's eye long before it was captured in camera.

This photo brings me back full circle to a question that I asked on Facebook last week: What is the “Right” problem to fix in photo-education?

Thank you to all who answered. Your responses were remarkable, appreciated and the foundation for this article.

The feedback I gained can be listed in three categories/problems that need to be addressed.

Ethics, Ego & Stuff

A photograph is none of these things. A photograph begins with a thought.

A photograph is not: an obsession with equipment, an ability to purchase gear, it is not biz skills nor people skills, it is not using auto-canned-modes on your camera, hell it's not even about being able to shoot in Manual mode. (Manual mode is super important…. it’s your foundation)

I would ask photographers to think about their craft as:

Art, Morals and Truth

Tackling the right problem, that is struggle. Expanding your range of options rather than narrowing your perspective. A photograph is about YOU, not buying into someone else’s techniques or tips. It is about you developing and eye and situational problem skills.

Joanne's photograph has me thinking about how to weave patterns to discover interesting stories. And to question the purpose of how it was imagined. And doing all this while removing boundaries of what my conception of visual art is.

For a good two weeks I have been thinking about this photo and never once have I picked up my camera to try to replicate it. I can honestly tell you that I am a better photographer today than I was two weeks due to this process.

Slow Photography Movement…what is it????

It a philosophy about photography on how to transform and include yesterday's foundation of photography with the technologies that photography has to offer today. It is about the all-encompassing topics of art, morals and truth.

This is the start of a conversation; join in…more to come on this topic.

Let’s discuss….

4am & a Thought

Woke up early, again, very early 4am. Coffee is extra good at 4am and the computer screen is bright at 4am, painfully bright.

Been thinking about getting a hand grinder for coffee beans. There is something about brewing a cup of coffee that appeals to me.

Finished reading “Change By Design” by Tim Brown last night. The book ended with a quote by Tom Kelly that has sparked a thought in me.

“Innovation begins with an eye.” ~ that is the photographers job; to create something new and different. A photograph starts with a thought.

For 17 years I have been working in photography and in that time I have never felt like an inclusive photographer. I am not techie, nor do I subscribe to any photo magazines and have no interest in the latest gear. For me, my passion and effort has been pulled towards the compositional aspects of art. I think of myself as “I create therefore I am”, type of artist….my ego just exploded, sorry for the mess.

Nature. I am drawn to nature as a teacher of the arts. I figure that nature has a 4.5 billion-year headstart; maybe there is something that nature can teach me.

This is my compositional process: read books and go for walks in the woods, feel philosophical about myself…good thing egos are self-regenerating; I am on my third one today. Is this the correct process for photographers? No idea but it is the correct process for me.

Working on a post for next week: “Slow Photography Movement”. Raining outside, going to read a book by the fire.

30 Days, Updates & Social Corporatism

I have been walking a lot these past thirty days. I walk to the bank or to the post office or I’ll take the train into Pittsburgh and walk to my destinations. The purpose is to do creative thinking and see my surroundings in a different light. Driving at 65mph does not give you a clear view of your surroundings. Walking two to three miles at a time opens up the universe to you.

I am thinking about buying an electric bike that has a small motor that kicks in when you need it. It would be nice not to have to use a car for short jaunts. I am lucky enough to be about five miles from everything I need. Which is food, books, wine, bank, post office and other random errands that my wife could send me on.

This week I will go out to do some scouting for nature and ambient photography. I’m looking forward to that. Thursday night I will be attending a book reading by a local writer. She is also the writer and teacher of a workshop I attended this past January that got me into short story writing.

As I am typing this my home is filling up with the aroma of butternut squash soup that “E” is making for us today. I will be cooking chili later in the week. There is something magical about aromas filling up a home. Slow cooking, slow walking, slow living; not a bad formula to be productive.


Current thoughts:
The term Social Corporatism has been swirling around in my head. Do we have choices? Is there competition in the marketplace today?

In Pittsburgh if you want to hire a photographer there are at least ten people that I could think of that would be our competition. And you know what? They’re good and they’re also our friends. That seems like a competitive marketplace; collectively you have to be good to stay in the game and your competitors, who are also your friends, help you grow and sustain a business.

I wish I could say that about my cable company or phone company or all of my utility companies that I pay monthly to.

In the healthcare debate the public option is good for the public and it is bad for those bigger than government, which is the Social Corporatism elite. We are a socialized nation. It is not controlled by the government, it is controlled by the corporations and that is not free market capitalism when there is no choice.