A Little Vacation Time

It is time for me to take a little vacation from my busy life. It is time for some down time. It's has been two years of non-stop activity and go-go-go and it is time, so in the month of Sept, I am taking the month off from blogging. I am focusing on family and creating again. I will resume with my blogging activities again in October.

Until then... keep creating.

Vacation for the Heart and Mind

Inland

Abstraction of Light

This is my 700th blog post. That is a lot of posting. I started my vacation inland taking in the natural beauty the Earth provides with a little help from the Light of Sun.

My goal with this vacation trip was to shoot everything with natural light and my new Vivitar 70-200mm lens. I accomplished those objectives for the most part, using my Tamron 17-50mm lens for only a few landscapes.

The image to the left is an abstraction of light illuminating the leaves of a tree through the forest canopy. This was done intentionally, using the natural light bouncing off the tree leaves and a naturally darker area that fell in the shadow and I moved my camera to create the movement.

Contrast of Light and Dark

Again, using the natural light falling through the forest canopy to allow the light to fall on the subject and leave the background in shadow I was able to capture and isolate the subject.

This is a technique I have been working to master for a couple of years now. Like all things in photography, this technique requires some compromise of others choices, such as composition as the shadowed area might not always be in line with how you may want to compose the image and depth of field with adjustments to the aperture. Another compromise is exposure, in which the subject might not be as brightly lit as you would like due to the low light; see the middle image below as an example.

Delicate Fern

Lightly Lit Leaves

Bloom in Contrast

Ocean Side

Patterns

Heading to the beach, I found natural patterns as well as man-made structures.

The patterns that can be found in the sand are as varied as the fingerprints on the people in the world. All you have to do is look around with an open mind.

 Observing the patterns is as simple as looking at the bigger picture and ignoring the smaller details from the onset. Once I have captured the patterns I then move in and look at the details.

Sand Patterns

The above photograph and the photograph to the right we both shot within ten feet of each other.

Again, just by looking, I was able to find both of these photos. It takes a shift, an intentional shift, in the way I see to be able to see the patterns. It can be difficult. It is a lot like trying to the forest for the trees or trying to see the sailboat in the middle of a poster of patterns of static (popular in the early 90s).

Once the shift happens I start seeing the patterns everywhere. I see the patterns in wood, sand, gravel, asphalt and even in crowds of people. After practicing for years, I can now switch from one mode to another and back again.

It just takes time to develop the ability to switch it over if it doesn't come to you naturally.

Fossil Love

Sandcastles in Triplicate

Metamorphosis

Aquatic Adventures

The sand of time lead to the sea

I have a huge fascination for waves. I will let those images speak for themselves.

Patterns in the Waves

Green Crush

Afternoon Light

Back to Back

 The best way to photograph waves for me is to shoot in the light of the afternoon sun, but that is because I am on the left coast. If I were to be standing at the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, I would shoot early morning, an hour after sunup. This is what helps makes the waves glow.

Aloft

Subjects in the sky are always of interest for me. But I typically don't shoot things that are directly overhead because the underside of a bird isn't as interesting to me as it flying at me.

Goodnight Moon

Burning Sky

Sun Sets on Another Day

And Finally, I love it when subjects in the sky make their way to the ground.

That's all for now. Do yourself a favor, take a few days and find your artist. It is an amazing journey.

Creativity Does Not Require Mastery

During a workshop hosted on EscalateLive, a few quotes were being published by several fellow Tweeters. One of the quotes that rubbed me the wrong way, slightly, was:


"You can't be creative without mastering your tools" ~ Julieanne Kost

I don’t agree with this, as it is quoted. It may have been quoted out of context, so I don’t want to complete flame Julieanne, but creativity is not a tangible tool that is handed to you. It is not a magic wand that instantly takes you from zero to hero on the creativity meter.

The main thing that irks me about this quote is that this is, in its very essence, out of context or not, another way of breaking the creative spirit. I am sure that this was not Julieanne’s intent with her statement, but in the quote as it reads, it is the same thing as saying “You cannot be a photographer unless you know everything there is to know about cameras, composition, light, Photoshop, actions, tone curves, textures, etc.” Talk about an overwhelming de-motivator. I imagine a lot people starting out reading this quote and thinking, “I have to know all of this to be creative?” This is absolutely not the case.

You can’t give a kindergartener a paint brush and show them how it works and expect them to paint with the likes Van Gogh or Pollack. A photographer can be a master of his camera, knowing all of the controls and settings and their purpose and uses, but absolutely lack an eye for photography; composition, light and artist detail. Creativity is developed and nurtured. It is honed. I may not have a command of the English language like Mark Twain or Edgar Allen Poe, but I can write creatively.

To master something means to know everything there is to know on the subject. Name one photographer who claims to know everything there is to know about photography and I can name a photographer who is liar. Creativity is, at its roots, experimentation. Creativity is learning. It is through this learning that we find our voice. It is through this voice that we discover the tools needed to share our voice.

You do not have to master the brush stroke to be painter. You do not have to master the fine art of composition to be a photographer. You don’t have to master the oven to be a baker. All you have to do it try.

I will admit that understanding the tools will help you along your creative endeavor, but it will not make or break a creative being. If everyone had to master their tools before being creative, I suspect that we would all still be living in caves and poking the ground with burnt sticks. If I were to reword that quote, I would say, “You can be creative without mastering your tools, but by mastering your tools you can be more creative.”

A video discussion about creativity and education

My friend John shared with me this video about creativity and education after reading my blog and I had to share with all you.



This kind of supports what I was trying to say about the school system, but this really nailed it for me. Thanks for sharing with me John.

The Global Castration of Creativity – Part 3: The Birth of Courage:

Enlightenment

My creative-life wasn’t all bad and fear-filling. Yes, I had a number of significant negative experiences during my creative development, but I also had a few positive ones as well. Choir was something that I actually excelled at. While I gave up on drawing, writing and crafts-related creativity, music was something that I enjoyed and I was actually encouraged to pursue. My amazing voice (not my words, but the words of my choir teachers, peers and family members) has since left me, a use it or lose it type of thing. But all of the way through high school, I excelled at music. I taught myself how to play the piano, by ear (I can’t read sheet music fast enough to play it). I taught myself how to compose music (again I can’t read sheet music fast enough to play it but I can write it and make it sound good).

Music was such a huge part of my high school life that three of my seven classes were music related for my sophomore and junior years of high school. During my senior year, music was the first four of my seven classes. Yes, over 50% of my classes were music related. Another class, my last class of the day was drama. So 5/7ths of my senior year was creative learning and expression.



The Bridge

 When I sang with a group, I was strong. I had a wide vocal range. I sang bass by choice, but when another group was having trouble with their part; my choir teacher put me in their section to sing their parts with them to strengthen them. I sang bass, tenor, alto and soprano parts on demand. I was the strong when with a group, but when I sang solo, my nerves just about killed me. Think of a long tailed cat in room full of rocking rocking-chairs; that was me singing solo. While I had a strong voice and a musical gift, admittedly the repeated blows from past creative failures and subsequent creative beatings had left me with the self confidence of a boy who had been turned down by every girl in school, except one, and he has to ask her to the prom.

Why did I not pursue music or theatre outside of high school? A few things happened to crush that dream.

My mom and father figure (non-biological dad type) divorced after thirteen years, at the end of my junior year and my mom and I moved out of town, ten miles away, but I went to same high school. Since my car died my senior year I was stuck riding with my mom. I tried out for the school’s spring play, Arsenic and Old Lace, and landed the role of Teddy. When I told my mom, she said there was no chance I would be doing that because she wouldn’t be able to, she refused to, wait around for my rehearsals to be over after she got off work. And when I told our play director, well, she simply flipped out.



My Moon

 Then, near the end of my senior year I had a one on one session with my guidance counselor. What is it with guidance counselors? I really don’t like nor trust them, and maybe this story is the reason behind it. When he asked what I wanted to do after high school, I told him that I wanted to teach music. And his response, after reviewing my transcripts was; “You haven’t done anything with math and to be a teacher requires a lot of math. College requires a lot of math. You won’t be able to go to college.”

Well at that point in my life, math was truly a weak point in my scholastic career. I hadn’t taken any math since my sophomore year (it wasn’t required) so basically I was being told that teaching music wasn’t an option and I gave up. Guidance counselors, to quote someone from somewhere (I think it was the Pirate DJ Happy Harry Hardon from the movie Pump up the Volume; “If a guidance counselor knew anything about careers, would they have been guidance counselors?”

So instead of pursuing my passion, I joined the Navy, because I felt it was expected of me. I served for four years, got out and floundered in and out of jobs got married, because I felt it was expected of me and then came kids because I felt it was expected of me. But I wasn’t happy.

I wasn’t creating.



The Mountain

 My Creative Rebirth:

I was 32 years old and taking some classes at a local community college and it was here that I met my first creative coach, a mentor. And although she was only in my life for twelve short weeks, she was the most influential person in my creative resurgence. She was my creative writing instructor. The first day of class, the first thing out of her mouth after introducing herself was the following, and I quote:

“Welcome to creative writing. You will not be graded on grammar. You will not be graded on spelling. You will not be graded on punctuation. When you turn in your homework, I want your shitty first draft.”



Love in Solitude

 I nearly fell in love. Not once was I graded on the imperfections of my work, but instead I was provided an avenue to express myself freely without judgment. The class was hard. Everything was written by hand, her way of ensuring she was getting our “shitty first drafts”. The in-class work was intensive. The homework was heavy on the work, but the class was rewarding and motivating. During the course of the class I wrote the first chapter of my book, Bullied (still to be finished) read it here http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/2007/09/bullied-chapter-1.html and I wrote several short stories including Un-born; read it here with a warning; it is graphic and includes a detailed description of a rape, so with that said: http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/2007/09/un-born.html

I was reborn from that experience. My creative nature was nurtured into life and a lot changed for me from that point. I bought a bass guitar, separated from my anti-nurturing wife, moved in with my sister, divorced said wife, started playing music with my future brother-in-law and bought my first digital camera. It appeared to be like some form of mid-life crisis and even some called it that, but I call it an awakening to what I was supposed to be.

Two months after buying my bass guitar, my sister, her boyfriend and her roommate played a gig at a little gather of people from my sister’s church. We played a seven song set. Again, this was two months after buying my bass guitar, which I had never played as in instrument before.



Church on a Hill

 It was when my wife and I first connected that things started to really happen for me; she was my sister’s other roommate when I first moved in. One day I looked at one of her sketch books and absorbed her talent with drawing, and I admitted to her that I couldn’t draw, which was the truth at the time. She proceeded to give me the basics, gave me the right type of feedback that allowed me to grow. You can see some of my sketch work in this blog as well.

A few years later, after we were married my wife took on the challenge of painting a full wall Noah’s Ark mural in our niece’s bedroom. But it was overwhelming for her. So I stepped in to help. I hadn’t done any painting since my horrid experience in seventh grade art class. But we painted and it turned out pretty good…




http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/2007/11/noahs-ark-mural-phase-i-ii-and-iii.html

http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/2007/12/noahs-ark-mural-phase-iv-and-v.html

http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/2007/12/mural-phase-vi-completed.html

It was soon after the mural was done that I found my love of photography again. I was being nurtured all along by my wife and sister, but it wasn’t until I met my good friend, Shawn, that I had any realization of my true potential with photography. I had loved photography for many years as the result of my experience with Enlightenment which you can read about here… http://the-monkeyspaw.blogspot.com/p/about-me.html .



Flying High

 One day in 2007 I woke up and found that I was surrounded by people that could see my potential and encouraged me to go further. Because of the nurturing and positive feedback that I am getting from these people, I am taking it further, one little step at a time.

I used to ask myself, “What if these people had been in my life from the beginning?” Such as, instead of my fourth grade teacher, what if I had my creative writing teacher. What if instead of my seventh grade art teacher I had someone similar to my wife coaching and guiding me or instead of my guidance counselor, what if I had someone like my good friend Shawn urging me to follow my dream.

My life might have been so much more creatively fulfilling. But alas, would have, should have, and could have. I can’t go back in time and change these things so I need to stop living in that past. What I can do is move forward from here and carry with me the lessons that I learned from those experiences and make them a part of my future success.



Together Alone

 These are the lessons I have learned over the course of my creative life. I hope that any one of these lessons can help a single one of you because if it does, then my purpose on the world is one step closer to being fulfilled and if not, I will try again to fulfill it. Here are my lessons:

• Be confident in what you know but be honest about what you don’t know. By being open with what you don’t know, you are opening the doors to the opportunity to learning something new.

• Take all feedback, positive and negative, at face value. Positive feedback from anyone can be as damaging to your creativity as negative feedback can. Positive feedback and feed an eternally hungry ego and close off the ability to learn and adapt just as negative feedback and bruise the ego and force you back into your creative cave. All that feedback should be to you is that a person either likes or dislikes your results. It is their opinion. Opinions are like assholes, everybody has at least one they usually stink. This does not mean ignore the feedback. Instead take what you can from the feedback and use it to better yourself and your art.

• Find a balance between your creative life and your personal life. Many time people, including me, can go off the deep end; the pendulum swings hard to the right or hard to left. This is a difficult life to lead, especially for the people around you. When you see the world as “I can either create now or never again” you become unbalanced. This can lead to bitter relationships, where you blame your loved ones for your lack creativity or even bitterness towards your boss or employer. The way you balance is through planning. Make dates, physically in a calendar, for you to go do creative things and make dates with loved ones, again physically in a calendar, to spend quality time with them. Find that balance and maintain it and your loved ones will be more supportive of your creative endeavors.

• Surround yourself with like minded people. People who share your interest, your passion. I am not recommending a divorce here, although I mentioned my own divorce above. I am saying that you need to get connected with people either through a local or even international club. If you are a photographer join Flickr. If you are writer, join a local writer’s guild. If you are painter find a local artist in action group.

• Find your vision of the world around you and find your voice to share that vision honestly. Your vision is not found by mimicking others in your creative field. Your vision is not found by sitting on your ass. You vision is found by actively pursuing your craft and tuning your work to be decidedly yours. You voice is found by being honest with everyone, including and starting with yourself. Be honest about how you see the world. Be honest in your communications. Be honest. If you are honest all things will come to you. Be Honest. If you are honest, others will be honest with you. BE HONEST! If you want to give the world the middle finger; do it. If you want to give the world a hug; do it. Just be honest about it because if you aren't, the world will know.



• Don’t be in a hurry. When you rush mistakes are made. When you take shortcuts important things are missed. Plan your path, visualize your path, assess your path for risks and then execute your journey. While you can’t plan for everything and an eventual bump in the road will occur, go back into planning mode to smooth your path back out, assess your path again execute from where you left off. Don’t rush it, don’t be in a hurry.



One View



In closing of this series, I would like to say thank you to everyone that has helped me get to where I am and to those that have been the road blocks as well. All of you, helpers and blockers, have made me the creative person I am today and will continue helping me become the creative man I am meant to be. So to all of you, thank you. And for those that are struggling to get your creative life in order, have patience, find your path, be honest, keep a balance and continue learning. If you do this, the things you desire will come to you and the creations hidden deep inside will surface.





The Global Castration of Creativity – Part 2: What Kills Creativity:

My Original Sketch

What kills creativity? In two words; everyday life. That is my answer. The things we encounter every day, from the moment we are born to the day we die, interact with our creativity. From day one we are told what to like and what not to like. We are educated about what is acceptable and what isn’t acceptable. We are bombarded with ads about good things, bad things and all things in between. And while some of the things we are taught are good teachings, such as “Murder is bad”, many of the teaching, especially around creativity are horrible teachings based on personal biases of the teacher and strictly matters of personal opinion. Coloring outside the lines is bad. Making macaroni patterns in our dinner plate is bad. One of the first lessons a child is taught is that not following the rules is bad and following the rules is not bad, therefore good.


Parents have the ability to nurture creativity in their children, but so many parents do the exact opposite of that. Parents generally want their kids to live fulfilling and successful lives. But based on the programming they received, to do that you have to get good grades, go to college, get married, have kids, have a demanding career and blah, blah, blah, blah. There is such a stigma associated with creative people’s lives; they are poor, unfulfilled, starving artist that become alcoholic, drug-using-mentally unstable individuals. This is not always the case, but it seems that this is the perception.



Childhood

 Parents are preprogramming their kids with the notion that they only way to have a good life is to following those rules, their rules. Parents believe this because those rules worked for them. And they learned those rules from their parents, who learned from their parents and so on and so forth. For the few parents that do guide or sometimes even push their child for creative success, it ends more times than not with the parents pushing the creative talent to a competitive level. The sad part of the creative competitiveness is that it takes only one competitive failure to start building the fear that encompasses so many lives.

Why do you think there are so few “successful” writers? Sure, there is Stephen King, Sue Grafton, and the lady who wrote the Harry Potter series. But for each and every “successful” writer there are dozens of unpublished writers who have talent and have a story worth telling, but live in fear and therefore never get published. Fear of the rejection letter, fear of being told they suck, fear of being publically humiliated; fear.

Fear is a powerful and real emotion. But it is our reaction to fear that separates the men from the boys. It is our reaction to fear that sends us down a one of two paths; Fight or Flight or as I like to phrase it, Try or Fail.



“Well, I guess we can see that creative writing and drawing is
not for you.” - My Fourth Grade Teacher

 I hate labels and avoid them like the plague generally. “Successful”, “unsuccessful”, “failure”… these are labels that do not fit in a successful creative person’s vocabulary. There are only two ways to fail as a creative person; don’t try and don’t learn. If you don’t try, you aren’t going to learn from the attempt. If you try, but don’t learn from the experience, what was the point of trying?

But my definition of creative success and failure isn’t what we are taught. The education system is all about grading all forms of work; they are the judge, jury and most times the executioner. Yup, I just said it; Educators, not all, but for the most part are creative executioners. While their type of grading mentality may work on a fact based subjects like a social studies, mathematics and Spanish subjects, when judging a creative result, there should be no grading outside of try and learn or didn’t try; pass or fail. Creativity is strictly objective, based not on facts, but on style, taste and preference. But the education system feels that testing is the only solution for the entire system. Can the student draw a straight line? Pass or Fail? Is the subject of the student’s photograph interesting and well composed? Pass or fail? Is the student’s story compelling? Pass or fail? Was the student’s music beautiful? Pass or fail? These are all subjective. Composition that works well for one person, doesn’t suit another. A written story no matter how compelling isn’t guaranteed to satisfy anyone, let alone everyone. A classical pianist is not going to be everyone’s cup of tea. So who are we to judge what is good and what is bad.



Handpainted Mural for my niece by me and my wife

 This judgmental-educational method/mentality is programmed early on. Penmanship is one of the first school related learning situations that is based on creativity and interpretation. No two people write in print or in cursive the same way, but the school system teaches kids that there is a right way and wrong way to make each and every letter in the alphabet. So when a child experiments with writing the letter S in their homework, their creativity is judged, graded and a letter is assigned to the final result. A, B, C, D or it is an F? How do they judge someone’s creative expression, whether it is their penmanship or their finger paintings or their poetry or their portfolio? Who are they, other than the pompous arrogance produced by the educational system, to say pass or fail? If anything, the system is the failure.

Another tactic used by schools is the red pen for grading. Students are required to use blue or black ink or gray pencil (good ole reliable #2) on their assignments. When the graded paper is returned it comes back with red marks and scribbles all over it indicating where the failures happened. The red ink stands out, no, the red ink jumps off the page screaming “Failure!” Public schools, for the most part, and their teaching staff, again for most part, are the guillotine of creativity.

Finding "Sex" in Junior Mints - It's there

This continues through college for most kids. Professors place rules around school work. I once had a math teacher that started his class out with this phrase; “50% of your grade will be based on the punctuation, spelling and grammar of the papers you turn in.” I was utterly baffled. A math class where half of my grade was based on an aspect of school not even math related. I deduced rather quickly that if I were to get only 30% of the math problems right and get 100% on spelling and grammar then I could still pull a C. That means I don’t have to focus as hard on learning the math and focus more on grammar aspect of my math homework. That is too bad because I am going to need as much math as I can get to prepare for my Engineering Degree.

Entertainment is a great killer of creativity as well. Television shows, movies, music, the internet and even literature are true killers of creativity in not only adults, but our young as well. In the era of the www.this and www.that, people are becoming complacent with instant gratification. Look at the housing market collapse. People were buying house they couldn’t afford simply because they wanted it and wanted it now. If you want a song, you can download it. If you want learn something, you can browse for it. Your phone, most likely, allows you to get directions without asking directions.

Entertainment today is about technology and technology is reducing human connections to 140 characters or less. Creativity is based on human connections. Every word written in a book, every drop of paint added to canvas, every pixel captured in a photograph is there to connect to a person. But these days, it is not unusual for someone to send a lunch invite via email to someone sitting two feet away rather than actually turning and talking to them. People are not connecting with people any more. People are connecting with 0s and 1s. This is why I hate text messaging. While I have a texting plan on my phone, it is only because people in my life refuse to not text me. It drives me crazy, but what can I do… not respond? Hmm… I think I may have a new strategy.

The Joy of Fall

Now, I know that stating something like technology is killing creativity is a bold statement, but I am here to make that statement. Technology is killing creativity. Technology is deepening our need for instant gratification. Technology is deepening our dependence on it for entertainment. Creativity is not as important as the fun-factor is. How many video games been made in the last twenty years? Most of the video games are based on common themes and story arcs, yet they continue selling new version of the same crap year after year. In the last twenty years, how many new video games released have been sequels or even sequels of sequels? In an essence kids are being taught through entertainment that you don’t have to be original, you just have to be fun.

So why would a kid want to write short story for the simple purpose of being creative and expressing themselves when they can sit in front of the television and kill zombies all day. Why take the four hours to read the book when the movie only takes 90 minutes to watch. The kid wouldn’t write a short story because writing takes a long time to see results and killing zombies can happen in minutes. The kid wouldn’t read the book because they aren’t getting the visceral visuals and audio blasting at their senses. The movies and games don’t require the use of any imagination. And the downside to that is imagination is like a muscle. Exercise a muscle and it becomes strong, dependable and enables you to do more, but if you stop using the muscle it becomes flaccid, weak and eventually becomes useless. Please don’t’ get me wrong. I love entertainment and movies, video games and other forms of digital entertainment have their place in the world and definitely in my life, but considering the current consumption rates of these technologies, they are making people creatively impotent.

Parents are to blame for this. Parents are responsibly for teaching an important lesson in balance. But the lesson in balance usually falls behind in priority to convenience. Today, parents now have the simple task of keeping their kids entertained; by keeping the computer, console game or internet connections up lazy parents have a live-in babysitter. Never mind what that babysitter might be teaching their child, parents are free, thanks to the technology babysitter, to pursue anything that doesn’t involve being a parent.



Don't Kill Your T.V.

 In the end, the loss of creativity is the road to complacency, laziness and unfulfilled non-creative lives. It isn’t just kids either. Many adults these days don’t know how to be creative. They don’t know how to create. Why would they need to? If they want something, they can go buy it, and probably don’t even need to leave their house to do that.

I am not one of those bumper sticker types, but if I had one bumper sticker, it would say, “Unplug three days a week”. I am not a fanatic, like those “Kill Your Television” types, but I believe that there is a benefit to disconnecting several days a week. If you are unsure of what to do with the time unplug time try reading, hiking, talking with your family, meditating or volunteering. Better yet, take a pair of scissors and a folded piece of paper and make a snowflake and then share your snowflake with the world!

Read Part 1 Here
Coming soon... Part 3: The Birth of Courage

The Global Castration of Creativity – Part One: The Death of Creativity

The Global Castration of Creativity – Part One: The Death of Creativity

As the title indicates, I am here to talk about how creativity in the world is dying and its death is rapidly accelerating. I know what you might be thinking; “With new mediums of expression and new art forms and literary pieces being pushed to the market daily, how can you think that creativity is dead?” Well, it is easy if you keep one simple statement in mind; to create is not to copy.

When was the last time you saw a movie that was ground breaking and truly original in the story that was told? How many authors have been published for the first time in the last year that haven’t been compared to another author with quotes like; “In the style of Stephen King” or “is like Edgar Allen Poe meet Mark Twain”. This happens because the author writes like those authors mentioned and doesn’t have his/her own voice.

Now, many people I know like to call on the movie The Matrix as a reference to a recent groundbreaking and original story? I would argue that the Matrix was a new way to tell many of the stories of the bible; they even used biblical names and themes such as;

• The name of Morpheus’ ship was Nebuchadnezzar - In the Bible, Nebuchadnezzar was a Babylonian king who searched for the meaning of his dreams.  
• The Greek name Morpheus was the name of the god of dreams. In the movie he is the leader of a group of rebel forces that tries to wake others from their dreams (in the Matrix). And Morpheus seeks out an Oracle to interpret reality--which is really a dream. 
• Neo’s Matrix name was Thomas Anderson. Anderson means Son of Man or Man’s Son, a direct reference to the messiah in the bible, by the end of the third film, is lifted into a Jesus Christ pose sans the cross. 
• Neo is killed by agents in the first film only to return to life confirming to everyone that he is the one, much like Jesus Christ did in the bible.

I could go on, but alas, this isn’t about how many references I can make between the Matrix and the bible. I just wanted to prove that the Matrix was not an original story. If you still don’t believe me, try reading the book Neuromancer by William Gibson and then try to argue about the originality of the Matrix.

The Matrix isn’t the only movie out there that is a new way to tell the same story. Look at all of the remakes of movies from the past. Today, it feels like more movies are being released, in all genres that are remakes of movies shot before. Don’t believe me, take a look at the list of movies that are or have been remade.

• List of Film Remakes A-M
• List of Film Remakes N-Z

Even music has failed to be inventive for years. Lyrics may change, but the message is always the same. The rhythm make get mixed up a little, but sampling has been around for years. Rock, Country, Punk all suffer from lack of creativity. Do you think that rap was an original art form that was invented back in the 80s with the advent of hip-hop and break-dancing? Try again. Johnny Cash sang a type of rap with songs like Boy Named Sue and Cocaine Blues. The actual origin of Rap is found in African Music. But it was musical comedy acts like Rudy Ray and Blowfly that are thought to be the forefathers of modern day R&B and Rap music.

My point is that we are in the midst of a generation where creativity is dying and it isn’t by accident.  It is tough to try to be original. Originality tends to be a “succeed or fail” path, with no gray area to dwell in. So many people tend take an easy path, copy something that has proven successful before and replicate it for their own success. Photography, drawing, music, just about every creative form of expression is failing to be creative; failing to be original. And the reason why it is failing is because of fear.

Death of Creativity:

I have spent forty-one years on this planet and it wasn’t until I met my wife six years ago that my creativity was truly nurtured. I spent my whole adult life in fear of doing something original. I used that fear to make statements affirming my inabilities to create like; “I can’t…”, “I lack…”, “I need…” and “I don’t…”. There are so many other negative statements as well and all of them drove me away from my natural desire to create.

My first memory of the source of this fear is an experience I had in the fourth grade. The assignment was to write a story based on a movie we had seen. I wrote my story, six pages with illustrations. I was proud of my work and I was excited about sharing what I had created.

We had to read the stories to the class. I sat in my chair listening to several others read their books, sort of. As a child of A.D.D. for which there was no term or diagnosis for at that time, I faded in and out between listening and fantasizing about the glory I would receive for my story. I applauded other students when they finished reading right along with the rest of the class, even if the story was about the girly things in life that did little to capture my attention. I will say, some of the stories were pretty good or at least I remember them being so.

When my time came, I read my story with pride. I read the book like I was the teacher. Showing the class the illustrations I had drawn as I read the story aloud. And when I finished, there was no grandiose applause like I had thought there would be. As a matter of fact there was no applause at all. But it wasn’t until my classmates actually ridiculed me that I felt some shame for my otherwise creative story.

But the real nail in coffin was when my teacher actually told me, “Well, I guess we can see that creative writing and drawing is not for you.” I was near tears when she said that. I was humiliated, ashamed and felt completely A-Bombed. I had just been creatively castrated and it hurt as bad as it sounded.

From that point forward I kept my creativity to myself whenever I could. Sure I continued to be creative, but I refused to share it except when I had to and there were times when I had to.

In the seventh grade, I had to take two classes; shop and art. Shop was not my thing. The funny thing about these classes was that students are actually graded for their creativity with an A-F scale. Imagine if you will that your art was given a pass or fail. Now image, if you will, that project after project getting the grade “Epic-Fail”. I made acrylic dice that had the holes drilled too deep so the clear acrylic cubes had these white lines all the way through them at all sorts of angles. Epic fail! Image a flipbook cartoon in which the stickman is running to the edge of a cliff and falls, but I ran out of flipbook paper before the stickman splats on the ground, and therefore it ends with him falling for eternity. According to my teacher; “Epic Fail”.

Epic fail after epic fail, after epic fail… Soon fear of these public failures and the humiliation that came with them forced me to not finish school projects and even other homework causing me to fail not only my art classes, but most of my classes. It wasn’t that I was dumb or lazy or even unable to learn. I was unmotivated and fearful of turning anything in. I feared the negativity. I feared the ridicule. I feared that I truly sucked and by not completing the assignments, I wouldn’t fail, which is known as failure by not trying.

As a result of my poor performance in school I was grounded for most of the summer, 7 of the twelve weeks. My mom had a rule with grades; every D was a week of being grounded and every F was two weeks. Seven weeks was the result of me receiving two Fs and three Ds. Yes… I actually passed two classes, gym and choir. The amazing thing about my groundings is that it was like solitary confinement. I was grounded to my room, door closed and no radio. Other than that I could do what I wanted to.

So I spent seven summer weeks in solitary. I could hear the kids outside playing and having fun. I could hear what my parents were listening to on the television. I was allowed out of the room to use the restroom and eat meals, but immediately afterwards, it was back in my room. I was also allowed to go to family events, like visiting relatives and the occasional grocery store visit; but I wasn’t allowed to play with my cousins outside and come on, how much fun is grocery shopping? Well actually after about week two, grocery shopping was like a trip to Disneyland. The bright-side of this tale of dungeon adventures was that I learned to be creative on my own and I didn’t have to share. Also as a plus, I am also much less likely to develop skin cancer than all of the other kids in my neighborhood, because with summer over half way over, by the time I was allowed outside, I was still a pasty white kid while all the other kids had their summer tans well on their way to the aged leather looks.

So this is what happens. At an early age if a child is not extremely gifted out the gate, they fail at creative activities, first ridiculed and judged and they are punished for their creative failures. Most are probably not grounded to solitary confinement-like conditions for seven weeks like I was, but still no parent is excited to see Ds and Fs and facing that music from a kids perspective is not a moment to anticipate. So not only is the child being ridiculed and judged for failing, but they are being punished for it as well. Talk about setting in motion a sense of worthlessness in child.

Coming soon... Part Two: What Kills Creativity. Then in part three I will discuss how I recovered from a lifetime of creativity killing in: Part 3: The Birth of Courage:
 
Stay tuned!

Senior Portrait Outtakes

Saturday proved to be a great chance to get a little practice and experience in shooting senior portraits.

I went with @n8smith on a shoot he had booked. The subject was his nephew Dustin. Contained within this post is a collection of outtakes I was able to capture during the process.

Oh what fun we had. This first outtake was shot during a clothing change. Appropriately, Dustin was only changing his shoes, but that didn't stop @n8smith from hamming it up a bit.

We started the shoot, at the request of the mom, at the family farm capturing some of the safe shots. The farm itself was absolutely beautiful with a great deal of backdrops to work from.

Here Dustin is in front of a broke-down GMC truck that was located in a barn that had seen a similar number of years of neglect.

I was able to capture an occasional shot while @n8smith worked on changing his lenses. No artificial light here, just pure natural late afternoon sunlight warming the surfaces of just about everything.

Dustin was a great subject; patient and open to experimentation. A graphic artist himself, Dustin proved to have a fantastic grasp on the creative process and offered some of his own ideas for poses and shots.

The shot to the left is of my own design. While many of my shots were taken in conjunction with @n8smiths breaks to change lenses and configure settings, @n8smith did allow me some freedom to pull Dustin away for some shots of my own.

I tried to keep at a minimum, since I was invited to help with the shoot, but occasionally I stole Dustin away to take advantage of a backdrop that hadn't been used yet.

In the shot on the left, I fell in love with the window and the reflections it cast. A little Rural Grunge to contrast the clean look of the subject, Dustin.

Like I said, the location was ripe with natural and beautiful backdrops.

On to the next

Once the mom-approved safe shots were done, we experimented with different locations in town.

And while the different locations in town were contained within a couple of square blocks, each location was it's own goldmine of textures and shapes and lines.

It was a little slice of heaven in a rural town.

I decided to play around with a little creative coloring to give to Dustin. Something a little different that he can keep for himself.

Selective coloring is, for the most part, an overdone effect, but there is something about it creatively that I like. And while I don't do it a lot, I do it occasionally to give a client something unique that pinpoints something unique to them and helps make their experience unique.

So the image on the right and below are colored to highlight things that make Dustin unique, at least in the way that I perceived him.

Above, I selected his headphone and shirt for the coloring because in a day where teens are sporting tiny ear buds and in a world were smaller signifies better, Dustin's headphones stood out as a truly unique feature to him.

His shirt, in the above photo, was colored to accentuate the headphones. Because another trait of Dustin is that he has style.

To the left, I chose the jeans because the cool blue of the jeans made a great contrast to the hard sharp feeling of the background. The fact that I was able to coax him to bust a move speaks to just how comfortable his is in his own skin and to me that just speaks volumes of cool.

I was looking to deliver to Dustin a rock star shot and I think that I did it in the photo on the right.

Not much else to say about that photo.

An finally, The Wall. This wall is a the actual exterior wall of a local business. Talk about the dream back drop.

So that it is for the outtakes. Now to finish producing the rest of the images so I can get them delivered to Dustin.

Thanks @n8smith for letting me come along. It was a great experience and I look forward to doing this again with you.

To see Nathan's fantastic body of work, fo visit him at http://www.smithfineart.com/.

My Trip to the Jurassic Park of Light

In terms of shooting in the worst light possible, nothing compares to a trip through a poorly lit display like the dinosaur display at the Oregon State Fair.

First, they create a moody, somewhat scary (at least for small kids), environment with low lighting. This low lighting allows them a darker environment to allow more creative lighting, which is cool to look at, but really creates an issue for being able to shoot with faster shutter speeds to freeze the animatronics.

 But then add to this low light the fact that they use colored lights to light the dinosaurs, you get the most frustrating lighting situations to work with: A Dino Rock Stage.

Prepare to spend hours in Lightroom or Aperture making adjustments to each shot, because each shot has its own unique lighting issues, which cannot be addressed with a simple White Balance adjustment.

While some are lit with green lights and some are lit with red lights, others are lit with a mix of red and blue lights. The colors are crazy and unnatural. They are cool looking visually, but they don't lend themselves to great photographs.

So how does one tackle low intensity and multiple colored lighting situations like this one?

Like I said; one image at a time. Treat each image separately. Sure it is a lot of work, but as you can see, it is worth it.

Let me address the shooting issue. Low light is not a photographer's friend to begin with. Low light that is lit by colored lights are even less friendly.

In dealing with the low light, the photographer needs to open the aperture, slow the shutter and bump the ISO.

In opening the aperture, the photographer needs to make sure to get the key elements of the subject in focus. Opening the aperture, lower f/stop number, creates a shallower depth of field. In doing so, if the photographer were to focus on the dinosaur's nose, in the in the case of the triceratopa to the left, it's cheek, the photographer will lose focus on the eye, which is the key element.

The shallow depth of field caused by opening the aperture can lead to more light being let in, but can also create a photo that draws the viewer through the image.

When looking at the dinosaur at the right, your eye is automatically drawn to its eye. But from there, because my choice of using a shallow depth of field, the viewer moves from the eye to the mouth.

The viewer's eye almost completely ignores the background, because it is not in focus.

So by opening the aperture to f/1.4 not only did I provide more light to sensor helping freeze the subject, I created a shallow depth of field allowing for natural movement through the image for the viewer.

But if I failed to get the focus locked onto the eye, this image would not have worked the way it does. So be careful when using a shallow depth of field because it is less forgiving for using auto-focus.

When slowing the shutter down, you need to be careful that you don't let too much motion into the photo.

These Dinosaurs weren't too cooperative in posing. They were moving. In the shot on the left, I really wanted to get a shot that used the perspective of the scene to make it seem like the dinosaur was about to take a bite out of some one. Because I had to use an open aperture, the perspective effect I was going for was not as good, but allowed me to speed up the shutter to freeze not only the dinosaur, but the people in the background.

To help balance things out, bumping the ISO up helps bring the shutter speed and light to acceptable speed and levels.

But ISO comes at a cost. Higher ISOs bring more noise. All of these images were shot at ISO 400 using my older Canon Rebel body. ISO 400 is the highest I can go with this body before noise becomes unmanageable.

Knowing your max ISO allows you to make sure that when you get home with those prize photos they are not spoiled by unmanageable noise. Let me explain the concept of Max ISO. While your camera may go a maximum ISO of 3200, at 3200 the noise is likely unmanageable; meaning you have reduce the noise in post processing to a point that the entire image loses its detail. So your max ISO might be several steps down, like ISO 800 or like in my case, 400. This is where you can manage the noise created by the higher ISO without removing too much detail from the image.

In dealing with colored lights, like stage lighting, the easiest thing to do is to take the image to Black and White.

By doing do, in the image at the left, the viewer isn't distracted by the bright red background or the red highlights on the Tyrannosaurus brow and chin. The viewer is also not distracted by the blue lighting used to light the dinosaur in the foreground. Instead the viewer can focus on the details of the composition choice and details in the subject.

One last thought, you don't have have color issues force you to use Black and White. In many cases, Black and White can be used to allow the viewer to simple enjoy the textures of the image (Thanks to Joel Zak for that advise).

As the Oregon State Fair winds down and my hectic week comes to close, I find myself with a lot more photo smarts than I had the beginning. I learned a lot from the various presenters I viewed and I also taught myself quite a bit in the presentation I put together and presented as well.

Hopefully next year you will be able to join us at the fair and when you leave you will raise your photography out of the Jurassic Park and into the modern age. I know that while I have a long way to go still, I am closer to coming out of the park than I was a week ago and it is direct a result of my journey through the fair.