Sometimes things are pulled together at the relatively last minute, like this shoot for the Educational Theatre Association. A shoot like this could take weeks of planning, propping and styling, but in this case it was a week long scramble to prep and was shot over a holiday weekend. Pulling something ambitious like this off in a short amount of time requires a talented cast. In this case the acting cast of 17 characters was just one person, comedian and actor Mike Rock.

Every year the ETA hosts the national Thespian Festival in Lincoln, Nebraska, a place where high school-aged actors gather to “put on a show”. It’s a week of acting instruction and plays, a chance for like-minded students and theatre teachers to practice their craft and to compare notes.

This year the ETA (more specifically, their publishing arm, Dramatics Magazine) chose the theme of “occupations” and they were searching for a way to express that in their annual Festival program. They immediately thought of long-time Festival instructor Mike Rock, a talented comedian and actor based in Los Angeles. Mike had been attending the festival since he was a high school student in Wisconsin some years ago and now shares his knowledge as an instructor. He is well known and respected by the students and would make a great figurehead for the program.

Mike was chosen to portray 17 different characters (including himself), all expressing either a career choice (from rock star to plumber) or a character in a play that would be recognized by the students (Willy Loman to Momma Rose). With just one actor and a number of characters in mind, Mike was required to spend the better part of a day in makeup to pull off a few female characters.

So, while most of America was celebrating the Memorial Day weekend, myself and the Daylight Photo team, the crew from the magazine, Laurie the makeup artist and our lead actor were hard at work in the studio, moving from character to character.

Everyone was pleased with the shoot, it was a great deal of fun. We even managed to sneak in a grill out at the end of day two. There are many observations that could be made about working on a project like this. I’d like to share some of the thoughts that first come to mind, all worthy of a post of their own:

1. It’s great to work with professionals. Everyone, every single person on the set, made a contribution. I really enjoy that about the creative process. It’s also the reason I gravitated toward commercial photography: the collaboration is a lot of fun. That old adage about “hiring great people and letting them do their job” really rings true in a situation like this.

2. Yes, I keep talking about problem solving on prophotolife.com. I can still clearly picture how Laurie handled wardrobe for one of the female characters. Without hesitation or explanation she picked up the two cabbage halves from the chef photo and used them to, shall we say, create one of the female figures.

3. I remember a time when the world didn’t move quite so fast, when scheduling was easier. When we met to begin photography on Saturday morning we’d all been working non-stop for many, many days and were all visibly tired, right from the get-go. But it’s amazing to watch someone like Mike, from the very first minute to the very last, putting careful thought and complete energy into each character. It’s infectious and keeps everyone wanting to achieve more. Every character built up the energy of the cast and crew.

4. Going into a shoot like this we all get mental images of what each character might be like. From the very beginning it’s easy to preconceive what we will consider our favorite character. Very often the ones we assume will be easy, turn difficult, and the ones considered a huge challenge become a favorite. As a result, I don’t spend as much time on preconceptions as I used to.

Hmmm, maybe that’s what years in this business have taught me. Surround yourself with good people and keep your eyes, ears and mind open throughout the process, that way the limitations begin to disappear.

Photographers often find inspiration by studying the work of other photographers. I certainly do. For both professionals and amateurs there are amazing resources like the contest sections at PDNonline. With something like 3 million photos uploaded to Flickr every day there’s certainly no lack of photographic diversity and inspiration there. The internet is an incredible resource for finding images and technical information. Looking at photographs isn’t the only way to find inspiration, though.

I began photo assisting straight out of high school and, as a result, never attended college. Lacking a formal art education I’ve had to educate myself through visiting museums, the public library and meeting artists and other creative people through the course of my work. A large part of my personal inspiration comes from looking at what creative people have done and are doing in mediums other than photography. Painting, sculpture, literature, music and film all inform the way I look at the world.

Here’s what I’ve tried to pick up from other mediums:

Sculpture: I envy sculptors because they work with three dimensions, molding all dimensions into their desired vision. You’ve often heard the phrase “painting with light” but I prefer to approach photography as “sculpting with light”, in pursuit of capturing that three dimensional quality.

Painting: All of the art books told me I should appreciate the great impressionist painters. Well, I didn’t get it. Even a visit to the Art Institute in Chicago wasn’t providing any great revelations. Then I walked away from a collection of Monet’s paintings and looked back over my shoulder, viewing them from about 50 feet away. At that distance they became luminous and drew me back in. Then, for whatever reason, I “got it”. As a result I really like photographs that both provide a quick read and then have something for the viewer willing to stick around for a bit, the same effect Monet‘s paintings revealed.

Literature: Being totally honest, I don‘t make a lot of time for reading fiction. But ask me about Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath” and a very strong mental image comes to mind of the Joad family trucking through the dust bowl during the Great Depression. I’ve also been “On the Road” with Jack Kerouac and am glad to have made it out alive. Literature provides the ultimate form of images, unrestricted mental images that aren’t limited by time, place or technical ability.

Music: Musician Tom Waits is an acquired taste. His vocals are rough and raw and his music is considered a collection of discordant noises by some. Waits’ signature is that his music often takes a good look at the downtrodden and often overlooked. For me, as a photographer, that’s a good lesson: seeking to present viewers with what they may otherwise overlook.

Filmmakers: Some of the strongest visual images I can recollect come from films. From the iconic black and white scenes in Fritz Lang’s 1927 silent classic “Metropolis” to the tension of Jim Jarmusch’s static camera in “Stranger Than Paradise”. It’s all storytelling with 24 still images per second.

Whether I’m always conscious of them or not, these are some of the things that influence the way I see the world and also the way that I photograph it. Where do you find inspiration?

- Jim T.

Aspiring professional and enthusiast photographers work hard to find their own particular style, a visual look that sets them apart from the crowd. Your style is like your own personal signature and it may revolve around the use of a particular lens, color palette, camera or post-production technique. Or it may be the way you communicate with your subject and the responses you elicit and capture. It may be a combination of many of these things.

Do you have a style? If you’ve ever found yourself frustrated, unable to find your own style (or voice) with photography, maybe these suggestions will be a help. After twenty-five years in professional photography I can identify a few things that have helped me get over creative humps:

1. I mentioned the word “process”. Many photographers wait for a bolt of lighting to come along, inspiring them to see the world in a completely new way. Well, it’s never happened like that for me, I’ve had to work at it, taking many little steps along the way. The photos that accompany this article were a simple experiment in soft focus one day. I grabbed a plastic sandwich bag and held it over the lens, really liking the foggy diffusion it created.

2. Working a process means trying new things and, this is very important, not fearing failure. Don’t expect things to go right every time. Remember the invention of Post-It Notes? It was a huge mistake, an adhesive that failed to stick very well. Or so it was initally thought. That failure has gone on to be a huge success. Don’t be critical when something doesn’t turn out the way you want, just try to improve upon it next time.

3. I would never knowingly copy someone else’s work and present it as my own. But for the sake of experimentation, emulating images you really like can provide great lessons. Do you see an HDR technique you really like? Try it. Is there a low key portrait you really like? Try it. These are just experiments, part of the process.

4. Everything doesn’t have to be a final, finished photograph during this process. Shoot fragments and pieces of things that interest you. One of those fragments might be a key building block to a further style.

5. This is an important one…ever hear the phrase “out of sight, out of mind’? Don’t waste your hard efforts and seeming failures by tucking them away and forgetting them. I like to keep my experimental images in a catalog where I can scan through everything when I’m looking for ideas. I may have shot something 6 months ago that was forgotten because it didn’t succeed on it’s own. But if I see it in the same catalog with something shot yesterday it might just “connect the dots” on what I’ve been after. I’ve yet to use the “sandwich bag soft focus” technique on a commercial job but the knowledge gained is always there with me.

6. And, if you haven’t figured it out, this all means shooting lots of photographs. Yep, that’s always been the biggest help to me: shoot, shoot, shoot. It’s important to look for inspiration and it’s important to buy new equipment. But if you want to develop a new style the most important thing is picking up a camera and clicking the shutter.

thirty seven s…

volume 1 2006

By Jim Talkington

Book Preview

In 2006 I started a photo blog and decided to publish a photo a day. There was a definite purpose to this. No, it wasn’t so much to get my work seen by a bunch of people, it was so I would commit to creating new work. It was a way to force me to continually create. As a professional commercial photographer I continually photograph for clients. You might think the last thing I’d want to do is shoot on my days off. Well, I happen to love photography and it was time to explore a bit outside of the commercial studio.

The photo blog was partially inspired by Tiger Woods, Yes, it’s true and I’m not even a golfer. Tiger Woods, at the height of his career, decided to make a major change to his swing. Imagine that, the guy was already the best ever and he decided to change the way he does things, realizing there would be penalties in the short term. His game may suffer for awhile. But, in the end, he would benefit (or so he hoped). The big thing is that he realized it would take the dedication of an entire year to enact a change.

In 2006 I was trying to change my swing. My plan was to create a bunch of work without being judgmental, to just let it go where it wanted to go. Some things might work and some might not.

That visual diary, which I called 37 Seconds, is still floating around out there on the internet at 37seconds.my-expressions.com . I didn’t meet the goal of a photo every day but there are hundreds of images there. It’s a big ‘ol gob of photos that I added to off and on for awhile.

Okay, so that was the sketchbook. What were the results? What did the experience lead to? Now, a couple of years later, I realize that my year long experiment produced these rewards:

• My recent show, Forgotten America, at the Carnegie Arts Center
• A book of images from 2006 that I self-published: thirty seven seconds
• This series of images from a road trip down Highway 61 **NOTE: the gallery is still functional but the rest of the site is no longer functioning
• Publication in the B&W Magazine 2007 Single Image Contest Awards
• The sale of a few prints

At the time it seemed like a year completely dedicated to just experimenting would be a risk that might not pay off. After thinking about it, maybe it’s time to start planning another “photo a day” for 2009!

Have you ever been in a creative rut? The ideas just aren’t coming to you and when they are, the results are disappointing? I’m sure we’ve all been there. This is the story of how I dealt with one particular creative drought.

A couple of years ago my photo studio was doing very well but I was just “going through the motions”. Nothing was particularly exciting and it seemed like every job was repetitive. Thankfully, a photo assistant helped pull me out of the doldrums.

We were on a location shoot for a company’s capabilities brochure. This type of job often requires shooting locations, people at their jobs, and manufacturing processes. Sometimes the days are hectic and a number of bases have to be covered rather quickly. One of the strengths of our studio is that we think quickly on our feet, solving problems and delivering quality photography that tells a story.

On this particular job we had to do an impromptu product shot on the manufacturing floor, nothing too complicated (or so it seemed). The product was made from composite and recycled materials but it had to look like wood. After spending some 15 minutes lighting the product it just wasn’t working. Yes, there were Photoshop alternatives to make it work but I was frustrated at why the shot was eluding me. I voiced my frustrations about lighting this product to Beth, my assistant, and mentioned that there seemed to be an easy solution I was missing.

Beth reminded me that I’d been talking about “how things were done in the days of film”, and simply asked, “well, if you were shooting film, how would you approach this”?

There was no hesitation on my part. I pictured the Hasselblad in front of me with a roll of freshly loaded Ektachrome. “Well, I’d move the light here, put a black card there and use a grid spot right here”. That was it, the answer became apparent thanks to her question. The shot turned out very nicely after that and no post-production was required.

I’m not sure why that jogged me into a productive solution but it did bring about a realization. I had become too reliant on my digital tools. Instead of strongly previsualizing a photograph, as was necessary with film, I had begun sort of put a shot together and then looking to my LCD and computer screens for confirmation and validation. My film approach was more thoughtful and methodical. With digital I would shoot something, check it out on screen and then shoot again, then check it out, hunting and pecking and stopping when something was, sometimes, “good enough”. After years (and years) of shooting nothing but transparency (slide) film for clients, I knew how to expose properly yet I was relying on my digital screen for exposure. For me, as an experienced professional, this was putting things backward.

I decided that it was time to start thinking like a film photographer with digital tools, if only for a time. My personal “fun” camera was a Nikon D70 back then. I grabbed the D70 and put black tape over the LCD screen. No more chimping for composition and exposure, I’d just have to get it right. If I looked at a scene and new it would need +1/3 exposure then I’d make that adjustment, compose carefully and shoot one frame. No bracketing “just because I could” and no hunting and pecking for the best composition.

A couple of years ago, 256 MB was a common size for compact flash cards. Since the D70 recorded around 44 images on a 256 MB card these became my “rolls of film”. The D70 with black tape covering the screen, a lone 24mm f2.8 Nikkor lens and a handful of 256 MB cards became my personal shooting kit for the better part of a year. It was kinda sorta like my old Nikon FE with Kodachrome and a 35mm Nikkor…the good ‘ol days.

The results? It brought a new joy back into photography for me. I was looking at things more carefully and working more methodically. And it was just downright fun to not be chimping the screen, instead waiting until a card was full to see my results. Watching the images come up on the computer screen for the first time was akin to viewing a freshly developed roll of film, pulled right from the wash. To this day I still approach much of my personal work this way, just without the black tape covering the camera’s screen. It’s not really necessary because I’d rather just “wait and see”.

This method has worked to get me back on track, both creatively and technically. Would it work for you? I have no idea. But I would suggest, if you’re in a creative rut, trying to identify what it was about photography that attracted you in the first place. Then think of creative ways to recreate that feeling. Maybe it has something to do with the equipment you’re using or, if you’re just starting out, maybe it’s about trying something completely new and different.

Have you ever been in a creative rut? How did you find your way “over the hump”?