I’m embarrassed. When I see a Blurb email land in my inbox and realize I am the primary focus, I feel embarrassed. When I upload a YouTube film and my finger hovers over the “public” button, I feel embarrassed. When I’m in the field and have a camera pointed at myself, I feel embarrassed. When I see someone else doing the same, I feel ashamed for them. This might sound melodramatic, but it’s true nonetheless.
I’m about to turn fifty-seven, so chalk this up to midlife crisis.
But if you do, you will be assigning blame where it does not belong. Let’s call it a generational thing. Me coming from a generation without the tools of modern convenience. I got my degree in photojournalism without ever touching a computer. (They arrived the semester after I graduated.) I had no mobile phone, no internet, and no digital audience to con. We had no algorithm to game. There was no like button. (Thank God.) I didn’t have a television. What we did have was a lack of distraction.
We had assignments, or the story in our head, and a handful of people we could show, always in person, without distraction. But to show the work, you had to print in the darkroom, a minefield laden with a hundred ways to go wrong. Just drying and mounting the prints took hours. Hours when you had to do something else, like think. One of my friends had two possessions, a guitar and a bong, and would pawn his camera once a week for food money, only to repurchase it on Friday. I remember his shoes had holes in them. He went on to have a thirty-five-year career in photojournalism and is still working today. Turn a camera on him, and he would be embarrassed, too. (He also went on to make a highly-touted film on the Drug War in Colombia.)
Call it shame. Call it the inability to feel empathy. Sociopathic behavior is rampant now. Just look at the US government. Sociopathic, not psychopathic. Born without the ability to feel shame or empathy. This runs parallel to the Attention Economy. Go back to the emergence of YouTube, around 2005. Look at the superstars who emerged. Shameless. And their impact is still being felt today. Their shamelessness spawned hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of new channels, including mine perhaps. (Many went on to have mental health issues.)
To my credit, I backed in, and only after being asked if I could do something I didn’t know how to do. Make films. People assume I’m a successful YouTuber, but that makes me embarrassed, too. “I’m NOT a YouTuber,” I always quickly respond, trying to extricate myself from that conversation. But I also realize that’s how I know many of you, and you tell me there is something there when it comes to what I’m putting out. Something different, something at an angle that others don’t seem to know. (Actual, real-world experience?)
When people ask about the future, I always respond that my goal is to disappear. It’s true. I think about it every single day. If I had the means, I’d go. I’d still answer my phone and email. Don’t think I’d leave my wife and friends and family and live in a cave. No, I’d still make things, just not share any of them. I’d still make one copy of a book and move on. Again, this dates back to not having any options. During my time at PJ school, none of us tried to have a show, and I don’t remember ever attending a photography show. There was no photo gallery near us. I do remember buying photography books at Half Price Books.
Maybe it’s because I know the quality level of most of the people promoting themselves. Average to below average. You can’t make high-quality work and spend two-thirds of your time with a camera pointed at yourself. Impossible. This is fodder for the distracted, the gear geeks, the move-the-goalpost crowd. I don’t want to be considered there. Never. One reason I love having my own site. It’s just me. No advertising, no begging, no shameless promotion of what will trigger the like button. What I post is unknown until I see the “new post” button and think, “What am I thinking?” No matter who sees it. Two people or two thousand. You aren’t the push. The push is internal, but man, do I wish I could turn it off, at least at times. Unlikely now, after decades of putting out.
I began blogging in 2002 while I was living in Los Angeles. I remember the condescension from fellow photographers who felt blogging was beneath them. Almost all of them are gone, and the ones who remain have certain, let’s just say, advantages that have little to do with the quality of their work. These same people have lame sites, if any, and are all in on things like Instagram, even as their industry implodes around them, due partly to Instagram. (What’s the definition of insanity?) I don’t find these folks interesting, and know they have a ruthlessness I do not possess.
The folks I find interesting have found a way to create their own world without the world being solely focused on them. They are bringing story-driven work, books, and articles to the masses as the main character, but equal in standing to all the supporting actors. This isn’t easy. This takes years. And it would be SO easy for them to pander, but they don’t, because they know the second they do, it’s all over. The work is no longer theirs. The work belongs to the oligarchs, the bots, the geeks, those who never leave the darkness and glow.
I just spent a day in the field. Never once did I think of you. Sorry, not sorry. I can’t. If I do, it might as well be you in the field and not me. I never once thought of a show or gaining something from making those pictures. The only thing I thought about was the human comedy before me, and the privilege of being there to witness it. I’m not a saint. Far from it. I know I’m part of the story, but not the part that should get the most attention. I keep thinking this will change. I keep thinking I’ll suddenly be okay with turning the camera on myself, but in truth, it feels like I’m getting further and further away. I just shot a forty-five-minute film, then promptly deleted it. I just filmed myself in the field, then promptly deleted all the footage. The second it spun up before me, I felt embarrassed. Someone sent me a film from a YouTube photographer, and as soon as it started, I clicked away because I knew they would do and say anything to feed the monkey. Walking the world with a tech shadow on your every move. Embarrassing. (Keep sending them, but know I rarely get through the first minute.)
Where this leads is anyone’s guess. I have ideas. Ideas for finding a balance. Ideas for weeding out those who refuse to visit a website, those who can no longer read, and those who are slaves to the feed. No offense, but there is too little time for this nonsense. We are on a clock. Mine, due to my age, might be ticking faster than yours. I know how fleeting, how fickle, this creative world is. Outside influence can be a much-needed spark or a poison pill. Go ahead, red or blue Neo. What’s it gonna be?
Comments 20
This was a great read for me just now. I want to assign myself a photo project for 2026, and have been thinking through various ideas. I recently read The Notebook, since you mentioned earlier this year and it finally bubbled to the top of the hold list. I’ve been writing in the photo notebook, trying to figure out what the project will be. Detailed enough so I know what to go look for, but not so detailed it’s a straightjacket, and not so loose as my usual photo life of wandering around taking photos of whatever catches my eye. I’d like to come out of it with a book, and like most of my other books, the print count is likely to be 2. I’ll never willingly turn the camera on myself, and can count on the fingers of one hand the good photos of me. There is no good video footage of me. None at all.
Author
Landing on a good project will change your life. Take your time. Find something close and something you can’t stop thinking about.
Asking for a friend… If you had the means to go, today, your wife by your side, where would you go?
I hear ya, man. I’ve seen some weird shit in my almost 55 years (b-day next month 🙂 ) but what I see today… I just don’t get it. Nor do I want to. There is so much unnecessary ugliness. I just want to make my stuff. I’d like the world to make sense again. It did, when I was a girl. I’d go out exploring, just to see what there was to see. Experience that giddy excitement over finding a spot hidden in plain site that felt outside of time. So, I make stuff… paintings, photos, weavings. Because they remind me of that feeling.
Author
I would go to the same places, and spend more time here in New Mexico. I’d still be doing stories, but taking my time and not sharing much along the way. Say Hi to your friend..
We only see the external side of digital outcome of all generations on “social” networks. I “hear”(I don’t participate on these things so I don’t see it) stories of the young generations as well as the old generations ( sometimes they are the worst fomo types) destroy their costly spare time and their potential creative lives. As a fatalist that I am, ( I hear you Dan) I only hope the quality which is still offered digitally (payed for of course, free is toxic shit) through the net – I read a lot – will stand the test of time and will hold it’s supporters. I’m not optimisic though, free rules the world, a trap for every newbe to be caught in. Easy.
Editing, self printing 4×6”, cutting and glueing an old school photobook right now and it makes me very relaxed and happy. Back to 1992. Life was more easy. Paper and glue. Perfect.
Author
Hey, I’m using paper and glue now too! The FOMO thing is so odd. I see adults in the birding community, people in their 70s and 80s, running back to their car to download and post. It’s a sickness.
I miss imperfections in photos, am I weird for saying that? Probably. I like the tiny blurriness..I love the imperfections. Woe is me.
Author
Yes, feel over anything considered “perfect.” Most of the “perfect” conversation is based around older men who obsess over things like pixel peeping, color management, neutral black and white, etc. They forget to make good images.
I just wanted to leave a note.
This was, and is a refreshing read, as too with your YouTuber-game.
Today I got myself a pair of headphones, plugged it in to my record player and listened to two albums front to back, just enjoying the music. Happiness!
Author
I still love shortwave radio…
Not having to produce for an audience other than myself is incredibly freeing. If you are doing any sort of creative work for money, you have to enjoy marketing yourself and your work, accounting, bill-collecting, keeping your website up-to-date, etc. I enjoy none of these things. Friends and family seem to think if you have an expensive camera, and have taken the odd decent photo, that you are now a photographer who is capable of sports photography, wedding photography, etc., for the big bucks. LOL. So, I do have to spend some time educating people about the skills, experience, and equipment those types of photographers have that I do not. I am still mucking around with my first book, but have been distracted by the arrival of my first grandchild, and making myself useful to his parents. I’m looking forward to finishing up the first book, and making books from my recent travel photos. My daughter gave me one of those little Canon Ivy printers, and I’ve been enjoying printing some of the travel photos, and putting them in my sketchbook. I got a little travel watercolour box for Christmas, and am looking forward to using that. The colours are glorious, so much different than the horrible watercolours we used in elementary school, and easier than watercolour from tubes. I even sketched in my sketchbook the other night, something I haven’t done in quite a while. I am reminded of the freedom I had as a child to entertain myself with creative pursuits, and making stuff. I was lucky to have adults in my life that were doing the same in their spare time, and provided the materials and the opportunities for me. Now it all comes down to time management, and prioritizing, avoiding the brain rot section of the internet. Thank you, Dan, for the validation about not needing to make a business out of an enjoyable passion. It has been important to me.
Author
Most who turn their photography into a business these days find themselves compromised beyond belief. They become slaves to metrics and will do and say anything to feed that beast. When someone sends me a YT photography film, the vast majority of the time, within the first minute I see someone speaking who isn’t the real version of that person. They are the algorithm version, and I just don’t have the patience. I watched an interview with one of the YT pioneers, and once he had his mental breakdown and left YT, he was COMPLETELY different than when he was running his channel. His demeanor, vocabulary, etc. That is a shame, no two ways about it.
Thanks for this Dan. I find myself facing this internal dialogue the whole time when I have a camera in my hand, conditioned by the algorythm to ask myself how this picture will play out in my substack feed. I’d really love to quiet the noise and be able to focus on what I want to take pictures of for what those images say to me about what I am witnessing, or how I want to express how I’m feeling about the world. Coming off of the platforms entirely (I’m not on Instagram) seems too scary but maybe this is the only way. And then, if the work is good enough, those who are meant to see it will do so somehow.
Author
One of the many reasons I don’t like Substack, nor do I read anything on Substack. It’s another popularity contest. Create a simple site that’s yours. Post when you feel like it. Stay real. Don’t expect much.
I’ve spent 2025 in, to quote a Black Flag EP, “the process of weeding out.” Some observations from this exercise.
Most YT photography influencers start with the claim “I’m XX and I’m a professional photographer,” yet their work is either absent from the content they create or is banal/ordinary. There is a seeming inverse relationship between YT prominence and the quality of the work.
Most also are sitting on at least $30K of gear, which for those of us who don’t have a professional corporation, would be between $40-60K of pretax earnings. All the buying and selling and showcasing of new stuff is just to generate gear lust. The marketing guys love this. This means that the content is only worthwhile if you’re looking to buy gear or you’re gear obsessed.
Finally, few of the photographers or artists I admire are on YT. There’s a reason for this.
So based on this, YT isn’t additive; it’s just entertainment
Author
You are spot on. YT is about following, not good photography. A huge difference. They KNOW how many people are gear obsessed. They know how many of these folks would rather watch YT than go shoot. And yes, most high-level folks don’t have time for a YT channel.
Like you I’m old school. Turing 54 this year. I’ve been doing photography for about 5 years. It’s been tough. Every year I tell myself, I’m stopping this cause it’s not ‘working out’. For 2026, I am off Instagram. I dont have a website cause i can’t afford one so i dont know how I’ll get my work seen. Why do I need it to be seen? That’s how I get work. Not sure how things will work out but it’s scary and exciting at the same time.
Author
Not easy these days. Takes time and concerted effort over a long period. Especially if you want to do it sans social.
Hey Senior Smogranch!
Long time Amigo. Life had me in another busy stretch but recently culminated in retirement, a move to a bigger property, more space around us, workshop with wood shavings on the floor, gardening, wildflower meadow in the works, and time to carry a camera again and remember how ‘to see’. Anyways, enjoying catching up on your site again and instantly resonating and connecting with all you have to say. So Happy Birthday, keep on keep’n on, and know I’m quietly in the background reading again and trying to contribute to your confidence, not your embarrassment. 😉
JT
Author
Timmis!!! Long time no see. Glad to see you back here, and glad to hear you are out doing your things. Bigger is better. More space is better. Wood shavings are good. I made a bookshelf in middle school shop class. Still have it.