Would you buy a Ferrari and just leave it on cruise control the whole time?  Would you get cable and just watch the local network channels?  Doesn’t make sense, does it?  If you own a DSLR and leave it on Program all the time- that is essentially what you are doing.  You are stripping it of most of its power.  I’d like to make a quick argument for...

I managed to drag myself to the gym this morning to try and get in a little cardio.  I absolutely hate doing it- but it has to be done.  While I was there, I noticed a few things that were not too different from the photography world.  The people at the gym were having the same problems and making the same mistakes as photographers.  Sound far-fetched?  Let me...

It doesn’t matter where you are in your photographic journey – at the beginning or well down the road – we all want to get better. While there are so many ways to improve your skills, I’m a firm believer that nothing will help you to grow faster than entering print competitions. When you compete with your images, your competitiveness will...

If you are looking for a book to peruse this weekend – something a little off the beaten path- you might consider “Blue” by Michael Pastoureau.  I came across this book a while back and started reading it out of curiosity.  It was nothing like I expected! The book is basically an Art History book, but with a focus on the color blue.  I guess I...

When I used to coach my son’s football team, we had a saying:  “Know your role- Do your job”   What it meant was that if a kid didn’t know what his assignment was, it would be incredibly unlikely that he would complete that assignment.   A photography studio is like a football team in some ways.  Not everyone is cut out to be...

In the history of photography, few images are more iconic than Henri Cartier-Bresson’s “Derriere la Gare Sint-Lazare.”  Photographers often use the phrase “decisive moment” and this image is the ultimate illustration of that term. Cartier-Bresson created the image behind the Gare Saint-Lazare train station in Paris in 1932.  He says...