I’m not on Twitter, but I follow what’s happening there as an interested observer. I recently heard of a tag called #cnnfail. It’s a way that Twitterers are tracking stories that CNN hasn’t done its homework on. That’s starting to become an internet meme, appearing on various blogs and other channels. I’ve always expected social networks to take over the job of news media. I thought that reporting would happen from people at ground zero in catastrophes, atrocities and other events. I didn’t envision it would serve to hold the industry’s feet to the fire. Though, having heard of it, I highly approve. I wonder what CNN thinks. (It’s probably the easiest target, but it certainly isn’t the only target.)

In another realm, Chase Jarvis picked up on a story that’s been bubbling out of France. There is a prestigious photojournalism award that is annually awarded to promising photojournalism students. This year’s recipients got up to receive their award, and dropped a rather large bomb. They unveiled that that their compelling photo essay was entirely fabricated. Using their peers as actors, it had been carefully crafted to appeal to the selection panel through trends that they’ve witnessed over the years. This from Horses Think:

The winners claimed that the idea was hatched a year ago when they looked at all the work students were competing with for the 2008 prize. They realized that the “world view of this work was limited and seemed more like vacation photographs as opposed to photojournalism. The photographs depicted small children with big wet eyes in order to illustrate the misery abroad.” Speaking to Le Figaro, Guillaume Chauvin confided that they “wanted to enter the contest in order to show the codes used too often in photojournalism and to prove that something real could be translated into something staged.”

There’s lots of discussion and further links available on Chase’s post.

I think there are rather serious and exciting implications from these efforts. I’m fascinated by where these are going. Will they be a sobering reality check to the mainstream media? Or will they push them one step closer to simply not caring at all anymore — thus, taking another step toward their demise? I’m really curious about this. It has great bearing on how all of us explain the world to each other. Recognising that our media constructs are all houses of cards is a good first step.

In a recent comment, I mentioned that I try to write about photography in ways that are universally applicable. Not this time. This is a photo-specific, techno-geeky post.

Livebooks is a Flash-based application, and has become somewhat of an industry standard. As I have a very strong bias against Flash in most cases, I won’t be a subscriber. But that doesn’t stop me from visiting their site. They are maintaining a really good blog on the industry as a whole. I particularly liked their latest post that deals with something all photographers are wrestling with right now:

Five video-savvy photogs weigh in on still vs. motion

It’s a balanced, though-out understanding. Stills and motion are similar. But different. But similar.

Props where they’re due. I hope Livebooks is doing putting this out there without expecting that everyone reading it going to become a client. That would be disappointing on both sides…

One of Communication’s preoccupations is in the intersection of public and private spheres. Someone talking on a cellphone in a restaurant has just made (at their least half of) the conversation public. That’s obvious, right? What might not be so obvious is that they’ve looped the entire ambient public sphere into a private conversation. A quick snap uploaded to Facebook might tell the world far more than someone in it would ever have intentionally disclosed. That person might not be the subject of the photograph. This stuff is happening all the time!

I find it ironic that people are simultaneously more and less in control of their image than ever — and there’s never been more interest in it. Your profile picture on social media may have been taken on your very best day (make-up, hair, etc.), or it might not even be you at all. But someone else might post a picture of you with bedhead, and all your posturing is undone. The cool tools have rapidly outpaced the cultural ability to inform them with social norms, or even legislation. (Like, you’d think “don’t text and drive” would be pretty self-evident, but apparently not.)

Social news spreads like wildfire. In a gasoline-saturated field. Lit by a flamethrower. If you want to be ahead of a personal story, you seriously gotta move fast. My friend Carrie experienced that firsthand. She is now engaged (congrats, Carrie!), but had to have a prioritised communication plan in place before she started telling anyone. She explained that she had to make a list of all the people that might possibly be offended if she didn’t tell them personally. And then rip through that list as fast as she could. Because at any stage, somebody is going to post this on Facebook. Or someone’s going to text a mutual friend. Or let it slip on the phone. Where Carrie was trying to manage the channels, pushing toward face-to-face where possible, or at least voice, to others it was just exciting information and the channels didn’t matter. Frankly it was a losing battle right off the bat.

Trying to define this problem is tricky. It’s not a case of ruined confidentiality or exactly broken trust. It’s not even like an embargo was broken. It was just the natural consequence of the multitude of communication channels available, and the complexity of trying to manage them from within a state of constant information overload and overstimulation.

Fundamentally, people are telling each other stories that aren’t theirs to tell. It makes sense, though. Look at the stories our media tell: celebrity gossip, corporate scandals, massive catastrophes. For decades journalism has eroded barriers of dignity, distance and perspective. It’s our normal. When you unleash social media into that type of culture, suddenly everyone’s in everyone else’s space.

We badly need to reclaim narrative — to slow down and allow people to tell their own stories. And to listen with patience and sensitivity. That’s what enables each of us to make sense of our lives. That’s the only way to make the accelerating, berserk tornado we’re living in spin a little slower and a little less wildly.

Considering that summer just started three days ago, might it perhaps be a wee bit premature to call something the best of the summer? In this case, not a chance! I actually enjoyed the first Transformers movie. It seems like its sequel has a whole different level of expectation. I think the best line in this review is “it looks down on ‘over the top’ as if from a great height”.

Check it out here:
Michael Bay Finally Made an Art Movie

One day back in university, I was casting about in the library looking for some meaningful quotes I could add to a research paper. According to my assignment, I needed to find something in a discipline other than Communications (my chosen field). I ended up looking in some pretty scholarly, quite abstract journals in both art and psychology. I bumped into this whole train of thought that I found fascinating and bewildering: the impossibility of perfection.

Science continues to put tons of work put into making things perfect. Perfectly captured, perfectly transmitted and perfectly reproduced. But the whole effort goes entirely against nature. In an imperfect world, we can’t do anything perfectly. And the more we try, the more we fail. Not because things get worse – actually technology is radically improving in this regard – but because the whole effort is a lost cause. Even an exact reproduction viewed in precisely the same conditions will induce a different reaction at a different time. The digitalisation of our world pushes us to believe that everything is tending toward being perfect (eg VHS to DVD to BluRay). But it’s just not possible. So then, should perfect replication even be a goal? It’s worth thinking about.

Imagine with me the system that allows a camera to autofocus. There are complex algorithms and protocols, deploying many carefully calibrated sensors on one end, and resulting in a series of mechanised adjustments of optics on the other. Though now taken for granted in every class of camera, this process is not, as it would seem, stacking blocks of certainty on top of each other. Far from it. It’s a myriad of interrelated systems, each of them foibled, that are seeking to impose engineering’s order on the world. Each one is dealing with tolerances, failsafes and redundancies. They are powerful tools, and nudge us closer to the illusory threshold of perfection. But nothing can outright promise perfectly, exactly, precisely sharp images every time.

Now let’s apply this idea to the creative process. There are scads of rules related to how to understand photography, all of which are supposed to help you create better, too. But neither the rules nor the tools can deliver you to a perfect piece of art. Because art comes from the imperfections, the happenstance, the unreproducible. Or, if you will, the human. Doing it all ‘right’ will get you to a reliably good result. But won’t ever get you to a great one.

A new friend today observed, “God has quite the sense of humour.”

And I responded, “Yeah, but you have to be pretty sharp to get it!”

For some reason we both thought that was pretty funny. I wonder in the course of a day how many of his jokes I just totally miss. I can just picture an exasperated God saying, “C’mon Brad, this is my A-class material!”

Good thing I can trust that he doesn’t miss any of mine. Though there are a few long chapters of my life still waiting for a punchline… :-)

There are so many times that I have an idea, or a question to ask, or a passing thought. More often than not I squash whatever impulse before it’s anywhere close to reality. “It’s too complicated.” “It’ll take too much time.” “I won’t be able to make it work properly on my own…” I can talk myself out of just about anything. Where does that ability come from?

Okay, be honest, there are a few times when you’ve taken a risk and got absolutely smoked for it. But, wait, it wasn’t really that bad being told no, was it? I mean, even if she said “Drop dead, jerk!” you didn’t, right? (Though if you did, and you’re reading this, I want to talk to you! Of course, I bet the feeling’s probably mutual…sigh.) In the grand scheme of things, ‘no’ isn’t such a scary thing. What’s becoming scarier to me is the concern that I’m not putting myself in the danger of hearing ‘no’ enough. Because that means I’m not pursuing opportunities. Or giving ‘yes’ a chance.

I’ve taken to risks. As you may have gathered from previous posts, I’m not talking big, extravagant risks. (Because while riding a KLR650 through the snotty mud of Bolivia certainly qualifies, it’s not what I’m choosing as my day-to-day.) I mean little risks. Like asking someone if I can shoot their portrait. Or proposing an idea that involves someone else in some nominal way. Or going into my imagination to craft an image that I want to shoot eventually, and actually working on a plan to make it happen. You know what? It’s starting pay off. I’m starting to make connections in really cool places.

Okay, and here’s a connected thought: I’m taking myself less seriously. (Now, I realise that that sounds like a line you’d expect from some spoiled celebrity-guest on a late-night talk show, followed closely by “I’m getting comfortable in my own skin”. Don’t be fooled – I’m neither rich, nor famous. Sorry.) It’s actually remarkable how that’s snuck up on me. There are things that make me cringe about myself – the same things that kill me about the “awkward comedy” genre (The Office, Napoleon Dynamite, etc.). But suddenly, for some strange reason, I find me laughing about those things, when I’m all by myself. There are some outrageous things that I’ve said and done, that I am starting to find flabbergastingly funny. That’s absolutely a first!

If you’ve been bowing to that stifling little negative voice in your head for too long, don’t just ignore it. Rebel against it. Make a cunning plan to outwit it. Plan something. Act on an impulse. Go for it!

I’ve been pondering the ingredients go into success. There are lots of plans, dreams, and many type of investment, but there is some degree of intangible — of luck. There are great photographers (or insert your field of choice) who never achieve success. And there are name-brand photographers who are derivative and gimmicky.

There is a touch of wild in the level of risk that’s needed to achieve big dreams. I had a high school Phys Ed teacher who instructed us on that, but I swear from him it sounded so disingenuous. Or maybe the height of his imagination was to win the next rugby match. To me, rugby was always too shallow a goal for the level of risk (certainty?). I suppose the most critical step to this 1,000 mile journey is to pick the direction you’re going.

There’s something to be said for risking it all. For throwing it all against the wall — yourself even, to see if you stick. It sounds desperate and make it or break it. Because, if it doesn’t work, then what? Well, frankly, if it doesn’t work, you do it again. And again. Actually, that sounds relatively straightforward. After all, you have to be in the right place at the right time. And if you aren’t taking the risk to be at the right place, you will never be there at the right time. Taking the risk is the thing that bends luck to your will. At least a little.

I’ve read many posts on this subject over the past while. I felt it was just important to hear it in my own head in light of some recent experiences. So if you’ll excuse me, I have directions to pick…

David DuChemin (Pixelated Image) has been on my “good guys worth knowing better” list for a number of years. We show up on each other’s radars rather too infrequently, though it’s always good when we do.

David recently published a book called Within the Frame that is going viral in the best possible sense of the term. He invited a handful of photographers over to his place for a get-together and a book-signing. I appreciate his effort to write something important, yet offered with humility. And I especially like the self-stated goal of putting something out there that he wished he could have read when he was getting started. Within the Frame (I can’t bring myself to turn that into an acronym!) is a dense exploration of vision. It’s his attempt at making the elusive lucid.

So far I’m finding it a hard book to get through. Not because it isn’t conversational and engaging — it certainly is! Rather because every paragraph is making me want to grab my camera and experiment, not sit and read. I’ll have a more complete review to add here when I finish the book. (Obviously, that may take a while…)

Oh, the above signature was his response to my request to write something insulting. Hey, now part of my “brand” is that I’m a quirky Pentax shooter. Could be worse! :-)

This little video is bound to give you a headache. Especially if you’ve got itchy, red, raw allergy-eyes, like I do right now. But Seth Godin pulled a great meaning out of it. His post is called Guy #3.

His point is that it could never have gotten to critical mass until the third guy joined. It’s a risk and it’s a commitment, so it takes courage to be Guy #3. And the world needs more of them. Because Guy #3 changes it from being a fluke and “just weird,” into a movement. Interesting perspective from within a culture that says that it’s way more significant to be Guy #1. I like it.

I just wish Camera Guy had something better than a phone to shoot this with. Have I mentioned recently that I hate cellphones?

Update: Chase Jarvis also picked up this clip and added commentary. It sparked lots of reactions over on his blog.

Update 2: I just head that this clip is really raising the profile of Santigold, the band that made this song. It’s so unpredictable what gives what a boost in our brave new world. Also I heard that this happened in an isolated corner of the festival — if they’d seen it, Santigold probably would have kept the music going. Probably until the whole festival was in the mosh pit. :-)