Style, Stunts, and a Tiny House

About this episode

The episode discusses the importance of personal growth for photographers through a story about Jay Maisel's advice.

I’ve shared this story before, and regardless of whether it’s true or just the stuff of photographic legend, it’s so good that I think it bears repeating every so often. The story goes that a photographer was presenting his portfolio to the great Jay Maisel . He asked Jay how he could take more interesting pictures, to which Jay immediately replied, “become a more interesting person.” It may sound trite, but I think it’s often easy for makers to become myopic in terms of the types of things that inspire them. Painters are often looking at other painters, photographers look at other photographers, musicians are often listening to other musicians, and so on. If you’re always looking (or listening) to what’s familiar, the odds of you arriving at something that’s unfamiliar (even if it’s only unfamiliar to you), are pretty slim, which is why it can be helpful to look outside of your comfort zone for inspiration. I’m interested in almost everything so as you might imagine, my feeds are pretty eclectic. While I’ve gotten away from posts like this over the years, I think I’d like to jump back in and offer up an occasional look at some of the things that have caught my attention, and…

Topics covered

• photography
• personal development
• storytelling

Keywords

• interesting pictures
• photographic legend
• myopic

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