Before you click the shutter, tell me what you see. I would be willing to bet big money that your description would mostly include details of the things you mentally isolate from the larger context. In essence, your description would be a list of objects you deem important enough to notice. Reread that last sentence and replace the word "description" with "photograph." To make a better photograph do we need a better description? Or, is what's missing emotional content and connection beyond mere description?
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HT2559 - A Catalog of Your Work
12/03/2026 | 2 mins.
HT2559 - A Catalog of Your Work
A friend of mine (who is a little older than I am) is involved in a massive project to create a digital catalog of his life's work. This consists of over 2500 finished images. He has inspired me to think about doing a similar project and catalog for my own work. But then, I had to ask myself, who would ever see it? Why would such a catalog be important to anyone other than me? Which is more important, doing new work or recording that past work has been done? Perhaps here is a compromise
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HT2558 - Losing History
11/03/2026 | 2 mins.
HT2558 - Losing History
When I started in photography some 50 years ago it was axiomatic and universally understood that it was important to learn the history of photography. There were, I'm guessing, a couple of hundred photographers who are still important to this day, who were the pioneers, whose work we needed to know at least briefly if not intensely. We built a library of their books, study their images, read their essays, and recognized intuitively that this was a prerequisite for our own photographic growth. Instagram and internet influencers have replaced the need to study the masters from the history of photography. I'm trying to imagine a novelist who doesn't read novels or a pianist who never listens to music.
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HT2557 - Key Tones
10/03/2026 | 2 mins.
HT2557 - Key Tones
There's a theory in fine art photography that every image needs to have key tones, some spot in the photograph that is absolute black and another that is absolute white. These tones supposedly calibrate our vision for everything else in the image. They become tonal reference points. Like all other rules in photography, I find this one contains a truth, but not a rigid one. Key tones are worth considering, but not with inflexible rigidity.
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LW1496 - When do you own a photograph?
09/03/2026 | 12 mins.
LW1496 - When do you own a photograph?
Do you own a piece of music because you purchased the CD, or do you own it when you have memorized the tune? Do you own a novel because you purchased the book or because you read it? Do you own a photograph when you've purchased the original print? Or do you own a photograph when it becomes so familiar that it's part of your mental gallery? Thought about another way, do you own a photograph because of the physicality of the print, or is it more important that the image is treasured in a corner of your soul?
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You might also be interested in. . .
Every Picture Is a Compromise, a series at www.brooksjensenarts.com.
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About LensWork - Photography and the Creative Process
Random Observations on Art, Photography, and the Creative Process. These talks focus on the creative process in fine art photography. LensWork editor Brooks Jensen side-steps techno-talk and artspeak to offer a stimulating mix of ideas, experience, and observations from his 50 years as a fine art photographer, writer, and publisher. Topics include a wide range of subjects from finding subject matter to presenting your work, and building an audience.
Included in this RSS Feed are the LensWork Podcasts — posted weekly, typically 10-20 minutes exploring a topic a bit more deeply — and our almost daily Here's a thought… audios (extracted from the videos.) Here's a thought… are snippets, fragments, morsels, and tidbits from Brooks' fertile (and sometimes swiss-cheesy) brain. Usually just a minute or two. Always about photography and the art life.
Brooks Jensen is the publisher of LensWork, one of the world's most respected and award-winning photography publications, known for its museum-book quality printing and luxurious design. LensWork has subscribers in over 73 countries. He is the author of 13 books on photography and the creative life -- the latest books are The Best of the LensWork Interviews (2016), Photography, Art, and Media (2016), and the four annual volumes of Seeing in SIXES (2016-2019).
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