A reminder: "The Art and Business of Photography"

I invite you to join us at the UW for my program. First class is Saturday, September 28, 2019. Bring your desire to succeed and your willingness to work hard. Here’s the link, check it out:

https://www.tacoma.uw.edu/professional-development-center/photography

“Taking pictures has always been my passion”

*Me at 11 months, bathing with my camera (with a touch of post-production help and humor)*

Given my choices I would spend the day documenting my world as seen through my eyes. However, at the end of the day, no matter how passionate I may be about my art, I and photographers like myself must pay our bills, put food on our tables and roofs over our heads. We must attend to that aspect of our lives that isn’t art. Others may call this “jobs”.

And so, with a little luck but mostly having worked like a madman to make a successful business career from my art, I am often asked to give lectures, presentations, or workshops about the art and business of photography.

*Seattle Central College, Professional Photography Program, Instuctor*

I attempt to impart to others some nuggets of my struggles so that they may learn to separate their passion for their art from the business of making money at it.Or maybe I try to bring to the two together. In any case, the business of photography is a pretty straightforward discussion that I've led countless times.

A few years ago, I was invited to speak to the Professional Photographers of Washington (PPW) in Chelan, WA. I wanted to bring a deeper dimension to that presentation. By nature I’m a shy person. When I was in the 6thgrade, I asked to be the “manager” of my friend who was running for class president. It included standing on stage in front of the entire student body to introduce him. By the time I was called to the stage my palms were so sweaty I could barely stand, much less speak in front of hundreds of people. Taking the stage, I walked quickly to the mike, and garbled out:

“ThisisJohnhe’srunningforpresident.VOTEforhim.”

I then flew off the stage, knees trembling to take a breath of air. Since then, I have spent decades learning to feel comfortable in front of a crowd, of 3, 30, 300, or 3000. It hasn’t been an easy path albeit, for me, worth the effort.

*Chicago Art Institute, nude workshop, Instructor*

Since then, I’ve been impressed by the speakers who open up to share a very personal experience that has affected them, and by so doing, affected me. I also wanted to step from behind my shyness and challenge myself to share my journey through personal and professional experiences. They are, after all, intertwined. These revelations have often had a tremendous impact on my understanding of my world. I was hopeful that in some small way my experiences could help others to see their lives a tad more clearly. With sincere reflection, I looked at my 30+ years in the photography business and how that life informed many of my choices.

About every 10 years I feel the need to reinvent myself business-wise. The early part of my career was as a Medical Photography, followed by 12 years spent at the University of Washington as their chief staff photographer. Then another decade or so as a commercial/journalist photographer; followed by commissioned portraits. Running parallel to my business career was my exploration of photographic art as well as a devotion to community support, and a desire to be an effective educator and consultant.

At each of these junctures, something in my personal life informed the decision to change my business. I wanted my presentation to the PPW workshop in Chelan to incorporate these experiences and their perceived results.

With that in mind, I combined two previous presentations into one: the history of photography as seen through portraits, and my own personal journey through photography. More to follow...

And last but not least.

JVH Digital Printing Festival will have a day of LARGE FORMAT printing and LARGE FORMAT printers to peruse. Thursday 10/3 8:00am-4:30pm. If you're a professional interested in perusing the best large format printers, papers and software this is the place.

Here's the link: http://www.jvhtech.com/festival.php