Claim OwnershipLensWork - Photography and the Creative Process
Subscribed: 1,266Played: 157,838
Subscribe
© (c) Copyright LensWork Publishing
Description
Random Observations on Art, Photography, and the Creative Process. These talks focus on the creative process in fine art photography. LensWork editor Brooks Jensen side-steps techno-talk and artspeak to offer a stimulating mix of ideas, experience, and observations from his 50 years as a fine art photographer, writer, and publisher. Topics include a wide range of subjects from finding subject matter to presenting your work, and building an audience.
Included in this RSS Feed are the LensWork Podcasts — posted weekly, typically 10-20 minutes exploring a topic a bit more deeply — and our almost daily Here's a thought… audios (extracted from the videos.) Here's a thought… are snippets, fragments, morsels, and tidbits from Brooks' fertile (and sometimes swiss-cheesy) brain. Usually just a minute or two. Always about photography and the art life.
Brooks Jensen is the publisher of LensWork, one of the world's most respected and award-winning photography publications, known for its museum-book quality printing and luxurious design. LensWork has subscribers in over 73 countries. He is the author of 13 books on photography and the creative life -- the latest books are The Best of the LensWork Interviews (2016), Photography, Art, and Media (2016), and the four annual volumes of Seeing in SIXES (2016-2019).
1658 Episodes
Reverse
HT2586 - The Data Hidden in the Noise
We click the shutter because there's something there. We feel it, we sense it, we may not be able to describe it, but there is data hidden in the noise. Our job is artists is to brush away the noise, the obscuring dust, sometimes the verbosity in our mind. Photography is not so much about taking as it is about revealing.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2585 - New Is Not Necessarily a Virtue
Photographers tend to get very excited about everything new. New gear, new techniques, new locations, new venues. The problem with new is that it can be a false promise. It's far too easy to equate new with better. My experience is that better pictures most often come from repeated visits and pushing past the new, past our first impressions.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
On this day as we post a milestone with LensWork Podcast #1500, let me quote one of my favorite novelists, W. Sommerset Maugham. "I think few serious writers can be entirely indifferent to the fate that will befall their works after their death. It is pleasant to think, not that one may achieve immortality but that one may be read with interest by a few generations and find a place, however small, in the history of one's country's literature." All I can add to that is my heartfelt thanks to all of you are fellow travelers on this path of personally expressive photography. Can't wait to see what the future brings!
HT2584 - Everyday Life Interrupted
It's interesting to look back at the artists' statement included with many portfolios in LensWork. It's amazing how many times the photographer begins by saying they were doing something completely disconnected from photography when all of a sudden they saw something that created a sympathetic vibration with their creative soul. They grabbed their camera and interrupted daily life to make art.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2583 - During One Sitting
If I really want to spend some time with an image to understand it, think about it, consider its implications and deeper message, I know going in that there is a limit to how many images I can connect with in a given sitting. Of course I can only speak with authority about my own experience. I know, from my Sunday morning book time, that I reach a limit at about a hundred images. More than that and my brain just locks up. Sometimes far fewer. I can scan quickly through more, but that always seems a bit of an insult to the artwork and the artist
This RSS feed includes only the most recent seven Here's a Thought episodes. All of them — over 2500 and counting! — are available to members of LensWork Online. Try a 30-day membership for only $10 and discover the literally terabytes of content about photography and the creative process.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2582 - Compositional Geometry
Consider one, two, or three. In geometry, one is a point, two is a line, three is a triangle. In photographic composition, one is a thing, two is relationship, and three is a movement. Which of these do you think makes a more interesting and dynamic viewing experience? Staring at a dot? Bouncing back and forth along the line? Or traveling in an almost circular movement?
This RSS feed includes only the most recent seven Here's a Thought episodes. All of them — over 2500 and counting! — are available to members of LensWork Online. Try a 30-day membership for only $10 and discover the literally terabytes of content about photography and the creative process.
HT2580 - Sometimes a Picture Is Just a Picture, Sometimes Not
In these Here's a Thought comments, I talk a lot about meaning and content and the philosophy behind photography. There is, however, a case to be made for just letting a picture be a picture. It's a matter of trying to find balance in the swinging pendulum between profundity and simple beauty. So much of photography is about capturing beauty and why not? If that's the only content of the photograph, image after image after image, one does eventually feel that the meal is all dessert and a taste of substance would be a welcome relief.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2581 - Visual Tinnitus
This morning I went to one of my favorite breakfast diners. While I was waiting for my food, I pulled out my phone to review a new PDF publication of photography. I simply could not do it due to the volume and bombardment of distracting noise. A loud radio, the conversation and laughter of the patrons, dishes clanking, cash register ringing, phones ringing, door chimes — I was drowning in an overload of the audible cacophony. Perhaps this is one of the reasons I dislike art gallery openings. The same can be said about web pages that pop up a never-ending stream of ads. Seeing artwork is best done in the quiet that allows us to connect with the work with the fewest distractions.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2574 - The Difficulty with Warm-toning
I learned about warm-toning in the mid-1980s. At that time, everybody created selenium-toned images that had a slight purple cast. Contrary to the popular zeitgeist of the times, I discovered Kodak Brown Toner and Kodak Polytoner and fell in love with warm-toned images. In the digital workflow, warm toning is very tricky because brown is such an odd color.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2573 - The Starting Point
My approach to processing is that with every image, the end point of processing is unknown. Aesthetics can evolve, ideas can blossom, expectations can change. Perhaps counterintuitively, I find that beginning the process at the same starting point is a surprisingly useful strategy. With every image I start with input sharpening, some tone mapping to make the image look normal, and even some cropping to straighten horizon lines or verticals. Essentially, I start with a normal looking image a straight photograph, without visible processing. That common launching point provides a solid foundation for exploring more exotic processing.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2572 - At Some Point the Goalposts Moved
For several decades after the invention of photography, the goal for all photographers was to make an optically accurate image. That meant with technical perfection, emulating human vision. Somewhere I can't identify in the history of photography, that objective was expanded and a few photographers began thinking about the medium as something else, something more pliable, something more personally expressive. I think this evolution also occurs in each of us individually and is a watershed moment in our photographic career — assuming we recognize it and embrace it as a new way of photographing.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2571 - Experiment with Abandon
My favorite capability in the digital workflow is undoubtedly Control-Z. The ability to experiment with abandon and then undo what doesn't work makes processing not only more efficient but it encourages experimentation. If, as I've proposed elsewhere, photography is a matter of choosing among variants, then the creative impulse is all about experimentation, trial and error, give it a go and see what happens. I try, at least as often as I can, to make three stylistic variants with each project before I make decisions and commitments.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
I remember with aging nostalgia when we would feel so proud about a new image we'd created. "Wowee," we'd proclaim, "Look at what I've done!" We were told that 10 new prints a year was a good crop. Now, here in 2026, I'll receive an email announcement about once a week with this same excitement. "Announcing my new print." I wish I could be excited about such pronouncements, but they leave me feeling underwhelmed.
HT2570 - Macro Viewing, or Tiny Screen Syndrome
Can you imagine what a thrill it was in the first half of the 20th century when the means of making a photograph evolved from the contact print to the enlargement? Bigger prints were breathtaking and that trend continues even to today. There is today, however, a reality about viewing fine art photography that should make us photographers a little uncomfortable. Most of our images will now be seen on a tiny screen that is smaller than a 4x5 contact print.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2569 - A Few Clunkers
I have no idea why, but I felt compelled this morning to look back through my 180 projects published in Kokoro, the first of which was completed in 2015. Ten years, 36 issues, 180 projects. I wish I could report that they were all brilliant and have withstood the test of time. The reality, however, is that there are a few projects I now see as clunkers. That's the thing about the art life, we always produce with enthusiasm but occasionally mature with a cringe.
This RSS feed includes only the most recent seven Here's a Thought episodes. All of them — over 2500 and counting! — are available to members of LensWork Online. Try a 30-day membership for only $10 and discover the literally terabytes of content about photography and the creative process.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2568 - A Portable Gallery
Here's a story about my friend, the late Kevin Raber. Whenever we would find ourselves discussing an image or a photographer, he would immediately pull out his tablet and bring up the image we were discussing. His tablet was, I think, primarily his portable gallery. He carried with him the entire set of LensWork, a good percentage of his own photography, lots of images from photographers he admired, and an assortment of images that were important to him. My portable gallery is limited to images retained in my memory. Kevin's portable gallery is a much better idea.
This RSS feed includes only the most recent seven Here's a Thought episodes. All of them — over 2500 and counting! — are available to members of LensWork Online. Try a 30-day membership for only $10 and discover the literally terabytes of content about photography and the creative process.
HT2567 - Moment Is Not Quite the Right Word
One of the things I particularly like about the Seeing In SIXES concept for photography is its ability to expand or stretch time. Instead of the instantaneous photograph, with six images we have the capability to express a moment. I've never been comfortable with that term. Describing the unit of time for a Seeing in SIXES project is difficult. A moment is too short; an hour is too long. I think this is so because it's not a measure of clock time but rather of conscious attention. Somehow, "unit of consciousness" seems a bit clumsy.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2566 - Appreciating Technical Accomplishment
I had an odd revelation at a concert last night. Afterwards, at dinner, the general consensus was that the pianist was incredibly talented and accomplished. Although I enjoyed the music immensely, I realized I had no ability to appreciate her skill. I don't play the piano i.e., I have no context for the difficulties of the performance. I have no way to judge her talent other than I like it or I don't. I wonder if this is the same with the public as they look at our photographs. They may not appreciate the technical accomplishment because they have no criteria against which they can measure what they see. Their analysis is reduced to I like it or not.
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2565 - The Updating Dilemma
Major software updates have become a part of our photographic life. Some of these updates in software features are subtle, but occasionally an update introduces a major game-changing capability. What are we to do if a new update in software processing allows us to make a significant improvement in one of our images from yesteryear? Do we go back and "fix" the images processed with older software? If so, where do we draw the line?
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
HT2564 - I Saw This Very Cool Thing
Here's another thought experiment about producing artwork. I looked back at all I've done and divided my productivity into two piles. The first pile was photographs that essentially say, "I saw this very cool thing." And the second pile was the artwork where the essence of the work was to say, "This is what I have to say about this thing." I found I had way more work in the first pile, but that the most meaningful work I'd done was in the second. I wouldn't be surprised that you might find the same divisions in your work. If I'm right about this, what does that say about those projects we are yet to complete?
Show your appreciation for our free weekly Podcast and our free daily Here's a Thought… with a donation Thanks!
Download from Google Play
Download from App Store
United States
Interesting thought. Would you argue that this holds for AI generated photographs as well, so long as the artistic concepts in the prompts is relevant/innovative and the result artistic? It seems like this is the next logical step given today's technology.
Brooks Jensen has a great way of making the creative side of photography feel approachable. I’ve found a lot of the “Here’s a thought…” snippets surprisingly thought-provoking for how short they are—nice quick hits of inspiration https://karlaannephoto.com/.
Their team of professional editors is highly trained to match your style, ensuring your creative vision is always preserved. Every project, whether big or small, is handled with meticulous care, attention to detail, and a strong focus on customer satisfaction. https://cerafphotoediting.com/service
great podcasts by the way all your wanted camera updates I fully agree with, I did contact Panasonic a long time ago about implementing on screen picture review and determining focus. I suggest to them maybe they could highlight the in focus areas of the screen about like the manual focus highlighting. I thought this would save a lot of time zooming in and out.
So glad I happened across this podcast - two episodes in, I'm hooked! Thanks for the production.
I find this to be the most continually inspiring and insightful podcast on the creative process of photography and of creativity in general. Brooks has the perfect vocal style and pace for podcasting, which I think adds a good deal to it's overall success. I've heard all of them and have started over recently.
Lenswork Magazine is the finest photography magazine, bar none. It has superb photographs and thoughtful essays about photography. These podcasts are in the same tradition, thought provoking and inspiring short essays on why we photograph. I would not miss a single one. Start from the beginning if you can, they are worth it.
Brooks Jensen's random thoughts about photography are brilliant and thought provoking observations that every person with an intrest in photography should listen to. Brooks is truely a great word smith in addition to a very skilled photographer and one cannot help but be inspired by his words.