B&h Photography Podcast

The art of photography offers boundless potential for altering and enhancing human perception—this is the focus of our conversation on this week's podcast. Listen in as we go down the rabbit hole of visual discovery with alchemist of photography Abelardo Morell. From his early desire to enlighten students by transforming his classroom into a camera obscura to his ever-expanding universe of ideas—and the subsequent tools he uses—to record moments in light, Morell is an undisputed master in conjuring magic from a cross section of art and science, time and space. Guest: Abelardo Morell Photographs © Abelardo Morell, Courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery For more information on our guests and the gear they use, see: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/podcasts/photography/the-camera-obscura-and-recording-time-and-space-in-images-with-abelardo-morell Episode Timeline 3:30: Abelardo Morell’s Street Photography Roots 4:29: The Power of a Visual Language 5:50: Creating a Camera Obscura in the Classroom 7:30: Making Pictur

A well-crafted portrait is a beautiful thing, and this week’s podcast takes a deep dive into creating individual, group, and family portraits, both on location and in the studio. Our guests are master portraitists Monica Sigmon and Michael Taylor, co-owners of SigmonTaylor Photography in Williamsburg, Virginia. Please join us for tips on everything from how to arrive at a signature style when working on location to the practicalities and pitfalls of establishing a dedicated portrait studio and turning client’s heads in today’s competitive marketplace.  After listening, if you’re still hungry for more portrait photography insights, look no further than Sigmon Taylor’s six-part series Portrait Studio Intensive, produced by the B&H Event Space in February 2022. Guests: Monica Sigmon and Michael Taylor Photograph © Sigmon Taylor For more information on our guests and the gear they use, see: www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/podcasts Episode Timeline 2:37: How does one arrive at a signature style when shooting por

Nature and wildlife photographers seeking to put their images to work for the good of the planet will love this week’s podcast. Our first guest, Jaymi Heimbuch, founded the Conservation Visual Storytellers Academy to teach photographers how to connect their pictures to a larger purpose. Listen in as Heimbuch discusses ways to harness the three A’s—Action, Audience, and Affect—and successfully target the people you want to reach with your work. After a break, we hear from Heimbuch’s star student, Anne Readel, who reveals how the viral spread of her story on No-Mow May enabled her to recast her message with different angles, increasing the story’s reach. Stay to the end for Readel’s offbeat story about living with your urban turkey neighbors. Please join us for this inspiring discussion about conservation storytelling, and learn how the aforementioned three A’s can be used to craft the focus of your nature and wildlife pictures and expand their impact. Guests: Jaymi Heimbuch and Anne Readel Episode Timeline 3:

There’s a special feeling to photographing sports action that hooks you from day one. Listen in as we talk sports with Sony Artisan of Imagery Jean Fruth, and longtime Sports Illustrated Director of Photography Steve Fine. In 2019, Fruth co-founded Grassroots Baseball to celebrate the amateur game at the youngest levels. In her latest book Grassroots Baseball: Route 66, Fruth photographs young players in the same heroic manner as the pros. When it comes to equipment, she recommends the best gear to fit your budget, while singing the praises of fast lenses, As Fruth’s longtime editor, Fine weighs in on the three pillars of sports photography and the vital importance of cropping. In Fine’s view, great pictures are a shared accomplishment between a photographer and an athlete in a moment that cannot be repeated. Please join us for this spirited discussion about Grassroots Baseball and learn how the aforementioned three pillars can be woven into Sports Photography gold. Episode Timeline: 4:30: Jean Fruth’s star

With a camera in his hand, Harvey Stein owns the streets, having spent the past 50 years capturing quintessential moments and making sensitive portraits of the people he meets there. In this two-part episode, he shares details about his photographic process while also conveying the wisdom he’s acquired in publishing 10 books of photographs. We first caught up with Stein at the 2022 B&H OPTIC Conference in June, where he spoke about his newest book Coney Island People: 50 Years. He describes his interactive approach to street photography by traveling near and far in search of the human animal. Although he packs a Canon 5D for foreign locales where vibrant colors can be an important element, Stein is most at home with his Leica M4, a 21 mm lens, and a finder that lets him maintain visual contact with his subjects. We also learn about his Manhattan darkroom, and all the money he’s saved by rolling his own film for all these years. In addition to his substantial photography chops, Stein is also an expert in p

Sapna Reddy and Matt Kloskowski have more in common than just colorful photos of birds in nature and soothing landscapes. In this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast, we investigate how their respective work lives have fueled the technical mastery that allows their creative vision to flourish. We spoke with them both as part of our continuing coverage of B&H’s 2022 OPTIC Conference. We begin the show with Dr. Sapna Reddy, who balances a rigorous medical career in radiology with the creative freedom of time spent outdoors, capturing scenic landscapes. Reddy’s medical work is limited to a strict analysis of grayscale image data, yet her colorful landscapes provide a healing influence from the world of hospitals. Listen in to learn how she follows the light based on what nature delivers—choosing extreme wide-angle lenses for scenes with powerful foregrounds that draw the viewer’s eye and using longer focal length lenses for compositions that isolate elements. Reddy also tells of mastering the t

This episode of the B&H Photography Podcast was originally published on July 29, 2021. We revisit it today to mark the passing of the podcast torch from creative producer John Harris to Jill Waterman, a creative content writer for the B&H Explora blog, who appears as a guest with Davies. Harris will continue to be an avid listener to the show, and we hope he’ll also grace us with his voice on occasion as a future guest.  Photographer Sally Davies embodies a remarkable creative spirit, and we think that spirit also resides in the homes of the 72 New Yorkers she photographed for her colorful book of environmental portraits, appropriately titled, New Yorkers. If this spirit does not exist and Davies is not in tune with it, how could she have captured the essence of her subjects and their abodes so efficiently, in some cases in just minutes? We answer that question and many others in this discussion about the making of her book. We are also joined by Jill Waterman who has been photographed by Davies, and

On this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast, we continue our coverage of the 2022 OPTIC Conference with two highly invigorating segments about exploring the world after dark. Our first guest is Susan Magnano, who specializes in luminescent night painted portraits. Our chat is revealing on many levels, from the balance of careful orchestration and randomness inherent in her portraits to a mention of the OM Systems OM1 as Magnano’s newest secret weapon. After delving into her playful yet powerful arsenal of lighting tools, we gain insight into her multifaceted career—from beginning at a local newspaper to her currently thriving wedding photography business, and her upcoming schedule of intensive photo workshops. After a break, we welcome Sigma Ambassador Jack Fusco to discuss his unique blend of astrophotography with idyllic nocturnal landscapes. During our conversation, Fusco distinguishes astro work from deep sky photography, weighs the differences between DSLRs, the latest in mirrorless camera

On this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast we return to the 2022 OPTIC Conference for two enjoyable and pragmatic segments about macro photography. While both photographers we speak with are well-rounded professionals, their not-so-secret joy is crawling around in gardens and woods, making beautiful close-up macro photographs of insects, plants, and the tiny wonders of nature.   Our first guest is Chris McGinnis, who specializes in spider and insect photography and is an OM System Ambassador. Our chat with McGinnis is incredibly elucidating, not only about OM System lenses and cameras, but also about computational photography and his macro techniques with flash.   After a break, we welcome Sigma Ambassador Heather Larkin to discuss her macro work with flowers and to learn a bit about her specialty portrait work. Primarily, we discuss the wealth of macro subjects available in your own backyard and garden, but we also learn of the latest Sigma macro lenses and a few very specific tips for approac

On this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast, we are pleased to welcome photographer and director Brandon Tauszik and journalist Pendarvis Harshaw to talk about their recently completed project, “Facing Life,” an effective blend of form and content, whose principal image format is the cinemagraph and whose content speaks to one of our society’s most pressing issues: prison reform.   Our discussion takes on both aspects as we learn how cinemagraphs are produced and how Tauszik uses this process to create resonating portraits that blur the line between still and motion photography.  We also come to understand the motivation for these two creators to address the changing landscape of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, and profile the joys and struggles of eight people recently released from life sentences. Our conversation brings together the technical and creative aspects of this imaging process, including Tauszik’s thoughts on portraiture and the specific gear and techni

On this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast, we are pleased to present a conversation with photographer Camille Seaman, and pleased to do so from the halls of the OPTIC 2022 Photo Conference, which we have certainly missed over the past two years.   Seaman was a keynote speaker at the 2022 OPTIC Outdoor, Wildlife & Travel Photo/Video Conference, which is hosted by B&H and held from June 12-15, 2022, in New York City. Please check the above link to find an archive of the conference’s presentations, but settle in now for an enjoyable and inspiring conversation with Seaman that we recorded in person after her keynote address.    Seaman’s photographs have been published in National Geographic, Italian Geo, TIME, The New York Times Sunday Magazine, Newsweek, Outside, and American Photo, among many others. She frequently leads photographic workshops and is a TED Senior Fellow, Stanford Knight Fellow, and a Cinereach Filmmaker in Residence. It is her work photographing Earth’s two poles that fi

The 2022 OPTIC Outdoor, Photo/Video, Travel Imaging Conference or just “OPTIC 2022” is live and in-person again and we are excited to welcome the event’s director, David Brommer, to the program. Brommer will give us a sense of the updated conference, which after two years online is now a fully hybrid in-person and online event. Of course, we at the B&H Photography Podcast look forward to being back at the live events and talking with the many photographers who speak and present their work.    This year’s OPTIC Conference runs from June 12–15, 2022, and includes presentations by Chester Higgins, Camille Seaman, Joe McNally, and many others. There are also opportunities to try the latest gear in specialized environments, expert-led panels, portfolio reviews, a sunset cruise, the OPTIC Challenge Print Competition, and OPTIC Signature Photo Walks sponsored by Lindblad Expeditions. Online participants can check the selection of available webinars.   After our brief chat with Brommer, we present a very import

It’s been a minute since we spoke about drones on the B&H Photography Podcast. The last time we did, it was about drones in news photography and before that, drone work in landscape photography. But today we welcome back to the show one of our earliest guests on the podcast, Randy Scott Slavin.   Slavin is an aerial photographer and drone operator, as well as a motion director and still photographer. He started his company Yeah Drones in 2013, at the dawn of drone use in film and commercial work, and his clients include Showtime, Netflix, ESPN, Saturday Night Live, and CNN, among many others.  Slavin’s work crosses all genres from advertising to film, working with small teams and big crews, and he understands drone use from the photographer’s perspective as well as a flyer, racer, and builder of drones.   With Slavin, we discuss his recent projects, his workflow, and how he decides which drone is best for each assignment. We also talk about drones and cameras for large professional shoots and those gea

Is artistic creativity passed down through generations of a family? How is style and wisdom garnered? How can a father and son collaborate to grow their work individually and as a team?  These are just a few of the questions we posed to Moshe and Eddie Brakha, otherwise known as Brakha x2, during this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast.   Moshe Brakha likes to say that he was “born in Israel and reborn in Hollywood,” and both his early music and celebrity portraiture, as well as his later advertising and editorial work, sure have the vibe of Tinseltown. The elder Brakha built a thriving photography practice that includes not only portrait work but also high-profile advertising campaigns such as those for SKYY Vodka, Martini & Rossi, and Motorola. Eddie Brakha began collaborating with his father after graduating from film school and has expanded their work with new ad campaigns and fine-art series. They have also directed music videos, public service announcements, and “motion” campaigns for

In 1966, a twenty-one-year-old French woman bought a one-way ticket to Vietnam, where the American military involvement was becoming a full-scale war. The young Catherine Leroy was an admirer of photographer Robert Capa and the “reportage” she grew up seeing in Paris MATCH magazine, but she had little photojournalism experience. Despite that, and despite her particularly small physical frame, Leroy began as a freelance “stringer,” photographing the growing conflict in Vietnam. For the two years that she was working there, she was the only female photojournalist covering the war.   Our guest on today’s B&H Photography Podcast is author Mary Cronk Farrell, who recently published “Close-up on War: The Story of Pioneering Photojournalist Catherine Leroy in Vietnam.” The book chronicles Leroy’s time covering the Vietnam War and her evolution from an ambitious newbie to a respected conflict photographer with images appearing in LIFE, The New York Times, and her beloved Paris MATCH.   With access to Leroy’s pers

This is a fun conversation, very informative, and gets the creative chemistries gellin’. Our guest on today’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast is Rhiannon Adam  and if there is anyone who knows more about instant film photography, I don’t want to meet them.  She brings a wealth of researched knowledge about the history of the Polaroid company and also simple but effective techniques to improve your instant film photography practice, whether via FUJIFILM, Mint Camera, or Polaroid.   Our conversation generally follows the framework of Adam’s 2017 book “Polaroid: The Complete Guide to Experimental Instant Photography,” which has been updated and republished in 2022 as a paperback version. The first part of the book (and our conversation) relates the story of the “Polaroid” camera and the inventions of its founder, Edwin H. Land, a.k.a. Dr. Land, which include polarizer sheeting. We learn of the race to market the various instant cameras and films until the SX-70 took the world by storm in the 1970s.

In September 2017, we dedicated an episode to a conversation about one photograph—an image made by photographer Richard Drew, on September 11, 2001, in New York, which has come to be called “The Falling Man.”  It was an insightful recollection and analysis of an incredibly painful image,  and on today’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast, we will again discuss one photograph to try to understand it better.   The photograph is titled, “The Drowning,” and it was taken in August of 2020 during another national crisis, albeit a very different one. Photographer Cornell Watson created the series “Behind the Mask,” “… for the times we pretend to be strong when we are dying from the weight of racism.”   Each image in the series is a carefully created and powerful allegory, but “The Drowning,” for reasons we will discuss in the episode, has a quiet power that has not waned since we first saw it. To learn more about this photograph, we are fortunate to have Cornell Watson join us, as well as photographer, auth

Our conversation on this week’s episode of the B&H Photography Podcast is about the challenges that the practice of photojournalism faced during, and in the wake of, the monumental year, 2020.  With the Coronavirus pandemic and the protests following the murder of George Floyd news photographers and editors were faced with situations few had ever experienced. To their credit, the institution as a whole, worked through it, adapted their workflows, and continued to produce honest journalism in the face of many dangers.   Our guests to discuss this topic are Lauren Walsh and Danese Kenon.  Author, Lauren Walsh is a past guest on our show and her recent book “Through the Lens: The Pandemic and Black Lives Matter” addresses the challenges for photojournalism brought by the Covid pandemic and the protests and politics of 2020. It is a wonderful collection of interviews with noted photojournalists and editors who worked through the events of that unprecedented year.   Danese Kenon is the Managing Editor of Visua

(This episode of the B&H Photography Podcast was originally published on January 20, 2017.)     We are living in a Golden Age of landscape photography. Digital cameras and improved software enable the kind of imaging that until recently was only possible via the budgets of large publications and the talents and ambitions of a few select photographers. Ambition and talent remain, and with enhanced dynamic range and color algorithms, higher sensitivity settings, simplified stitching and compositing software, and a network of websites to display work, impressive landscape photography is abundant; however, there are new masters and the skill set of current practitioners includes not only those of the photographer, but also of the savvy digital graphic artist.   With the ability to pull details from shadows, augment colors, and combine distinct files into a single image now easier than ever, we must ask—is it acceptable to represent nature without natural characteristics, to merge photos from different focal l

It has been a hope of ours for some time to speak with photographer Stanley Greenberg and, considering he’s made three books in the past three years, there is a lot to talk about. Greenberg is known for his large-scale series on subjects like the New York City reservoir and water systems, on giant particle accelerators, telescopes, and dams. His recent projects, however, are an interesting blend of urban exploration and 19th-Century history. We speak briefly about his 2019 book, CODEX New York,  and the typologies he identified walking the whole of Manhattan, but we concentrate our conversation on his work, Springs and Wells - Manhattan and the Bronx,  and after a break, we discuss his latest book Olmsted Trees.    Greenberg, who started his professional life working in city government, is a Guggenheim fellow and no stranger to prestigious grants and commissions. He’s also no stranger to libraries and the research that informs his work. It was during a research visit to the New York Historical Society that