Uber asks, “Know where you are going but need a ride?” Then they offer you options.

Every time you talk to a client or a potential customer, you need to know your intent and the obstacles in your way or their way.

You need to have an objective in mind. For example, knowing where you want to go is the same as telling the Uber driver where your destination is to be for your trip.

In Barrel Racing, the rider wants to complete the course in the least amount of time, and the system is around three obstacles, which are barrels laid out in a triangle shape on the course.

When I am teaching storytelling, we use the same parts of the story that Aristotle outlined in Poetics. He wrote this around 335 BC. It is the earliest surviving work of dramatic theory. But, again, the subject wants something, and there are obstacles to overcome to get it.

The tension is great for telling the core of any story, but the one missing thing companies and organizations must have for their storytelling is a “Call to Action.” So, now that you have heard this story, we want you to do something.

Traditional Advertising Call to Action

• No obligation: “TRY” is in all caps; the email offers a full refund.
• Usability: Directing Readers to click “Subscribe Now.”
• Immediacy: The copy includes the phrase “right away,” and the Call to Action button uses “Now.”

The key to an effective Call to Action is to provide people with compelling reasons to ACT NOW rather than defer that action.

Avoid using a passive voice. Use action verbs.

Get straight to the point and make it short and sweet. 

Here is a trick that will make all your Call to Action successful. Start with the audience and the call to action. Then, find the story that will best emotionally connect with them to achieve your “Call To Action.”

The title is quote from Helen Keller.

“I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” 

Michael Jordan

How does one learn? How do you grow? I believe the answers to these questions lie in our failures.

If you try and avoid all failures, you will take no risks. Without taking these risks, you cannot learn.

When watching a PGA golf tournament, you see the caddies and golfers referencing these notepads. They have the notes they have taken about the golf course. They are often called yardage books. Here is what they may look like.

PGA golfers cannot play it safe and win a tournament. They take risks. To take those risks, they assess the ball’s lie and pick where they want to hit it. Those that win the tournaments take risks.

We often picture Tiger Woods hitting the green and sinking the put.

However, we forget how often he misses.

The reason bull-riding is a popular sport isn’t that it is easy to do. It is popular because it is hard to stay on a bull for 8 seconds.

Rewards come after the risks have been taken.

“Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” 

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Originally posted this on the Facebook Group “Nikon Z6 Z7 Mirrorless Cameras”. This is a repost of it.

I am a little tired of seeing posts that oversell a camera. It comes off as a used car salesman. I think we need to be as transparent as possible on a camera’s merits.

Some people are looking to buy a camera and often are disappointed because they listened to some posts about selling a camera.

Nikon Z7/Z6 cameras are fantastic. I own the Nikon Z6.

We need to go back to the film cameras just before digital became prominent in 2002 to remember what I think we forgot.

We had several cameras back then.

• Viewfinder
  • 8×10
  • 5×7
  • 4×5
• Medium Format
  • 2-1/4″
  • 6×6
  • 645
  • 6×7
  • 6×9
• 35mm

When digital came along, we tried to buy one camera to do it all. The reason was simple those first digital cameras cost as much as $25,000.

Today I think we have slowly returned to where we should be. Many cameras, like the film days, work great for certain types of photography, but there isn’t one camera that does it all.

I must admit that the Nikon D850 comes close to doing it all.

After the Digital revolution in photography, we have the mirrorless revolution.

If you do this for a hobby, you will most likely buy a good digital camera that meets your needs.

If you are a pro or an amateur with the means to buy more than one camera, you will buy at least a backup camera. Then you add those unique cameras for the things that work best.

Many pros don’t buy every camera they will use. Many rent those high-end medium format cameras for those jobs that need that resolution.

Regarding Nikon Cameras for the advanced amateur or pro, here is how I break down the Nikon Line.

Nikon D5 – The ideal camera for a photojournalist. They are asked to shoot just about everything. They need a great sports camera, suitable for portraits, low light shooting, and video. A buffer of 200 RAW images is fantastic—also XQD Card Slots for speed.

Nikon D850 – This is one of the best cameras for almost anything. I believe the Nikon D5 is better for sports due to its low light and frame rates. The enormous resolution of this camera is a must for the landscape and commercial photographer who needs to make super large prints. Great for video

Nikon D750 is a great full-frame camera, but the buffer is small at 6.5 fps. It has many low-light capabilities like the D850, just not the resolution. It is the entry-level of the full frame.

Nikon D500 – While this is a smaller DX format is is pretty much the Nikon D5 in a smaller DX format

Nikon Z7 – This is the mirrorless version of the D850. Due to the DSLR’s focus, it isn’t the same, but close. The fact it has more focus points in some ways is better. Picking this camera over the D850 is for all the reasons mirrorless has advantages over DSLR.

Nikon Z6 – While very similar to the D750, the buffer is more significant than the Z6. This might be the best video camera as far as mirrorless on the market. It has a higher frame rate than the Z7 and ISO than the Z7. I bought it for those two reasons.

Why I like mirrorless

• Seeing what you are getting
  • White Balance
  • Depth-of-field
  • Exposure
• Quieter even with mechanical shutter
• Less need to Fine Tune Auto Focus
• Optional electronic shutter
• Lighter
• More focus points
• Face and Eye recognition
• No need for extra gear when doing video

Significantly, you are getting sports images with your camera. It is excellent that you can make huge prints from your smaller sensor.

When you start to compare your camera by saying, who said my ______ Camera couldn’t shoot __________ is the same as saying my Nikon ______ is as good as the Nikon __________.

That is what I have a problem with.

Show off your beautiful images. Talk about the love of your camera. Just don’t try and say your camera does everything that the entire Nikon line of cameras does because it doesn’t.

The closest camera to doing that was the Nikon D850, but even it has some limits.

In my opinion, no one camera does it all.

When I teach in college classrooms, many students are there to check a box. They need this course to meet the requirements for their degree.

So many people are going through life checking boxes. This is the time of year when many have just checked another box. They graduated from high school or college and now will look for a job.

I was raised in a different environment by my parents. My father had been checking boxes his life until one night in college, he found himself on his knees praying to God and felt God was asking him to change direction.

Vocation means a strong feeling of suitability for a particular career or occupation. Calling is a synonym for the word.

In some of the classes I have taught in college, I found students just trying to meet the minimums. I don’t mean minimum like passing, but rather what are the requirements for an “A” and then proceed to do just enough to get the “A.”

“Mastery is not a commitment to a goal but to a constant pursuit. What gets us to do this, what get us to forward thrust more is to value the near win. How many times have we designated something a classic, a masterpiece even, while its creator considers it hopelessly unfinished, riddled with difficulties and flaws, in other words, a near win?”

Sarah Lewis

Whether your goal is to work for National Geographic as a photojournalist or to get to the finish line of a marathon, write a book, find a partner, be a good parent or a good friend, the feeling of success and satisfaction can be found in the process, not the accomplishment.

This is key to being a successful storyteller focused on the process rather than the checkbox.

Process	Checkbox
Wants to know the subject	Wants to get the content
Arrives Early	Arrives on time
Leaves Late	Leaves Early
Extremely Curious	Indifferent, Uninterested, Average

95% of people who go to Yellowstone National park use only 5% of the park. It has been reported that 90% of the visitors never leave the road, and 95% never venture more than 100 feet off the pavement.

I consider those the box checkers. They have been to Yellowstone.

“Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.”

Greg Anderson

Know Your “Why?”

As some might say, having a vocation or calling is being mission-minded. You are pursuing something. I believe my calling is to get to know the people God has put in my life. To develop relationships with these people and get to know them.

When I get to know someone, I learn how I can serve them.

College

Too many people go to college to get a degree, and not enough go to college to learn a subject. I want an engineer who understands physics that builds the bridge I will drive on. I don’t like the engineer who checked off they took the class.

At Georgia Tech, I was in a Civil Engineering class where the students built a bridge out of balsa wood that the professor had given them. The bridge would be tested to see if it held a certain weight.

Little did they know, but the professor gave them faulty plans. They were to check the design and build it. The lesson wasn’t the building of the invention but rather the ability to think and go back to the professor telling him that the design was flawed. This is a real-world example.

Many of the students failed that assignment that day. They were box checkers. Those who loved learning and were there for the process found the mistake and passed.

I really love covering events. Why? You have to constantly problem solve.

The first problem was ensuring the faces in a group shot were visible. I used two Alienbees B1600 strobes powered by the Paul Buff Vagabond batteries. Now to fire them, I was using the Pocketwizard Plus II Transceivers.

The problem to be solved was the group was under a large carport with a background sun lit trees.

I took photos of the individual graduate with the founders of the school and the administrators. The diploma had to be in every shot; if I were not careful, it would have been not legible. The solution is the same setup as for the group photo. By using the two Alienbees B1600 lights at a 45º angle to each other, I was getting an excellent, consistent morning for each person.

To make my post editing go quickly, I also did a custom white balance using the ExpoDisc.

By the way, can you make some headshots while you are here? Yes, I can. Again the same setup, but I just moved closer to the trees and shot some headshots of the founders.

One part of the assignment was to get the first group shot to them before the 5 pm ending time of the event. So I had to carve out a few minutes to get those group photos for posting on social media.

To get all these photos promptly, I chose to work with the Nikon Z6 and the Sigma 24-105mm ƒ/4 Art lens. While I shot the group photo at 32mm, I could go wider. I loved shooting the headshots at 105mm.

Grandparents, parents, siblings, and friends came to celebrate the GAP Year program graduates in Pine Mountain, GA.

I used Bluetooth technology to help sync my camera with my phone using Snap Bridge. I was being sure the time was correct and set the GPS Coordinates.

When I ingested the photos into PhotoMechanic, it took those GPS Coordinates and turned them into a street address.

I click on the world, and then it will look for the GPS coordinates, and as long as I have an internet connection, it will search for the street address.

Now, since I was also shooting with my Nikon D5, which doesn’t have Bluetooth technology, I just selected all the images and applied those GPS coordinates to those images.

The students dressed up in all types of fashion statements. I love this guy’s tie.

This family is from Ecuador. I love his Panama hat.

As soon as I took this photo, they asked me in Spanish if they could get copies. Yes, they can.

I provide the client with an online gallery where they can download the images using a password.

I was getting candid photos as well as occasionally finding families altogether. I would take these as well. I just had to watch the light on the faces. Way too many of the guests were posing people with the windows behind them. I put the large glass windows to their side or on my back. Again it is about Lights, Cameras, and Action!

The room was quite large, and the best place to stand to get photos of the stage was in the back of the room. This way, I wasn’t upfront blocking the guest’s view.

I brought my Sigma 120-300mm ƒ/2.8 Sports lens and a 1.4X and 2X converters. I started with the 1.4X converter; this is the view it gave me and made the lens a 420mm ƒ/4.

I quickly changed the converter to the 2X, which gave me this view with the now 600mm ƒ/5.6. Once again, I am problem-solving. This time, the camera and lens combination allows me to get photos that no cell phone will get.

As you can see, this is what the guest was getting with their phone.

I moved around the room with the long lens and looked for different perspectives. I thought the microphone was too much with some speakers in front of their faces from the back of the room.

I didn’t need to move to get a different angle with every speaker.

I was shooting with three cameras and various lenses. My wife also shot some photos with a camera.

• 2 Nikon D5 cameras
• Nikon Z6
• Sigma 24-105mm ƒ/4 Art
• Sigma 35mm ƒ/1.4 Art
• Sigma 70-200mm ƒ/2.8
• Sigma 120-300mm ƒ/2.8 | Sport
• Fuji X-E3
• Fuji 18-55mm ƒ/2.8-3.5
• Fuji 10-24mm

The lenses I used for different reasons. First of all, I am not shooting one specific style. I do not shoot all prime lenses wide open, which many people do. I love the shallow depth-of-field shots.

I also realized when shooting that large group shot that I needed to be at a more significant depth of field. This is why I shot those photos at ƒ/8. The front row and back row are all in focus.

I love to isolate moments using the shallow depth-of-field and know that sometimes you need more.

Technical & Aesthetic

Just yesterday, on a forum, a photographer asked if the new camera would make you a better photographer. The old argument was that it wasn’t the camera but the operator. However, I wasn’t going to take this clickbait as it was set up.

“It will make you technically better–Aesthetically the same.”

Stanley Leary

These new cameras today let me take photos that were not possible without a flash just years ago.

So I pride myself on knowing my gear and how it can help me get photos I couldn’t do before. So, I try and keep my bag updated. I also know that you can have a technically perfect picture with no aesthetic qualities.

Social Work Training – Capturing Action!

All my training in reading body language and studying for a master’s in photojournalism has helped me concentrate my efforts to capture moments. I was trained in social work to read people. I was evaluated repeatedly on how well I listened with my eyes and not just my ears.

Adequate photographers are more technicians. They get the photos in focus and well exposed.

Great photographers are doing more than being a technician. They are using the camera to capture moments that help tell a story.

I like moments like this one. The students show how much respect they have for this teacher from this year. No words are necessary to communicate their care. You need words to know why they are giving him this type of respect.

Do you want to learn how to cover meeting better? Do you need me to cover your event? Give me a call, and let’s talk. I teach one-on-one sessions and love to use my gifts to help you capture those critical moments in life that happen only once.

While doing a story on coffee growers in Salvador Urbina, Chiapas, Mexico, the farmers taught me how they produce the Arabica Bean Coffee.

I learned that arabica coffee does best with shade. The tree requires some but not too much direct sunlight; two hours a day seems ideal. The lacy leaves of the upper levels of the rainforest initially shaded the coffee tree.

When they prune the banana trees, you can see the trunks, which look like corrugated cardboard to me. Those channels help the water get to the leaves and bananas.

Salvador Urbina, Chiapas, Mexico is in a rain forrest. Salvador Urbina has significant rainfall most months, with a short dry season. 

What can we learn from these coffee growers?

The production of coffee is a time and labor-intensive process. From the plantation of the first coffee seeds, it can take three to four years before a newly planted coffee tree will begin bearing fruits.

10 Steps from Seed to Cup

• Planting
• Harvesting the Cherries
• Processing the Cherries
• Drying the Beans
• Milling the Beans
• Exporting the Beans
• Tasting the Coffee
• Roasting the Coffee
• Grinding the Coffee
• Brewing the Coffee

Fairtrade

Fairtrade was started in response to the dire struggles of Mexican coffee farmers following the collapse of world coffee prices in the late 1980s.

Fairtrade coffee is certified as having been produced by fair trade standards. Fair trade organizations create trading partnerships based on dialogue, transparency, and respect that seek more significant equity in international trade. … Fairtrade practices prohibit child or forced labor.

Café Justo was the coffee cooperative I partnered with to help tell their story back in 2010. I had been producing videos for a short time, which was a turning point for me. We focused on telling the story focusing on the crisis the farmers were suffering and the difference the cooperative made in their families and communities.

Listen to what I captured back in 2010:

Maybe you are like those coffee farmers who had to leave their farms to find work to feed their families. By just learning to come together and tell their story, the consumer didn’t pay more for coffee. They changed where they bought their coffee. You can support these coffee growers by buying them here at Just Coffee.

While forming a cooperative and selling directly to the customer helped the coffee growers to prosper, it wasn’t the cooperative, the roaster, or their willingness to come together that made them successful.

It was when they told their stories that customers rallied behind them. People are waking up to the fundamental unfairness of world trade and demanding a better deal for the people who do our dirty work. Are you getting a bargain or exploiting people when you always shop for price alone.

Are you telling your story? Remember, what made a difference in the Fairtrade movement was the telling of the stories of people being exploited.

Once you have your customers, don’t stop telling stories. Now tell a different story. How about how bananas help produce great-tasting arabica coffee?

We all know that if you want to get someone’s attention, tell a story. We also know that not all stories are engaging.

I believe many companies are picking stories like people fish–toss a line in the water and see what bites.

Finding a good story in your organization is like looking for a great quote. That person’s story you tell will be handy because their story is a brief distillation of the larger pool of people you serve.

A good story also affirms what we already know about ourselves. The report helps you to reaffirm your beliefs and helps to define the category of the brand you are.

This past weekend I saw my daughter’s Spring Dance Concert. I photographed the event for the school to use for their recruiting and promotion.

While editing some 2,600 images, I was reminded that distilling the event down to a few photos was communicating what they hoped to become and what they were doing. They only have a dance minor at the time and are in the process of creating a dance major.

Biggest Mistake

One of the most prominent mistakes organizations make when picking a story to tell is to pick one based on politics rather than the story’s strength.

I have been consulting for many years with organizations, and over and over, the people they want to feature are often someone who has been around a long time or is very popular.

Here are the critical elements in a story that help you identify the best story for your organization to tell.

• There is a before state and an after radically different state. This is before your organization made a difference in their life and after they encountered the organization.
• This was a crisis of sorts. They had a real problem, and the organization helped to solve it. The key here is when comparing their crisis to other possible people for your story that their crisis was the worst.
• Their story represents your target audience’s crisis that you will problem solve as an organization.

Too Close

One of the problems for most companies and organizations is they are just like the dancers–they are too close. They cannot see what they look like from the audience’s perspective.

Even the directors of broadway go into the audience seats and give feedback to those on the stage; they lack the ability often to truly separate themselves from the production and see it with fresh eyes.

I was given a story to execute when I started as a photographer. My mentor Don Rutledge encouraged me to go and find stories and do them to get better. I did this for many years and syndicated those stories through Black Star and Camera Press.

If you want to be a better photographer, stand in front of more interesting stuff.

Jim Richardson

I learned very quickly the story you picked had more influence on the outcome than execution alone.

After shooting and writing many poor choice stories through the years, I slowly realized I was pitching more and more stories to editors. When I did those stories, they got much better engagement than those I was given.

The better I got to know my clients and what they were doing to help their customers I was pitching no longer just exciting stories but now strategic stories.

Another Mistake

Don’t pursue those stories that only entertain and do not move people to the “Call To Action” for your organization.

Be sure the stories you pick a point to what you do best and how you can help the audience with similar problems.

If you are a profit-oriented company, you solve problems for the audience. If you are a nonprofit, you ask the audience to join you in helping solve a problem. 

Secret

The key to your company’s success is picking the right story to tell. Once you have done this, your next step will be identifying another story. Your success is directly related to communicating what you do to solve a problem for a person. Then it would help if you consistently executed doing this for those who respond and ask you to fix their problem.

Tell people what you do through a story. Do what you tell people you do. Continue to improve in the execution of your service and repeat this process.

The purpose of doing an alignment for your car is to reduce tire wear and to ensure that vehicle travel is straight and true (without “pulling” to one side). Alignment angles can also be altered beyond the maker’s specifications to obtain a specific handling characteristic. Motorsport and off-road applications may call for angles to be adjusted well beyond “normal” for various reasons.

Being out of alignment with your car shows up as uneven tire wear.

Being out of alignment in your work causes your organization and you to not get the best performance. Like tires that get worn unevenly, you will become worn out prematurely.

When the tire isn’t aligned, it creates resistance, and that is what causes the uneven tire wear.

People are more excellent when you are in alignment at work. Like all the wheels on a car, when aligned to the vehicle, it goes straight and true. The key is at work; you should be aligned to the purpose of that organization. If you don’t like the organization’s purpose, find a different job.

Everything lines up for you when you’re in alignment, and everything seems effortless because you’ve already done “the work” energetically. You feel like your team has your back because you’ve surrendered. You are not pushing your agenda. You are finding ways to serve the mission statement.

When you align, you don’t have a strong sense of ‘need’ around what you want to manifest. You are open to your desire manifesting in different ways and are not attached to ‘how’ it has to happen.

For me, my faith has helped a great deal. I feel that God has got it under control. Now I have to remind myself of this every once in a while. When I do, it releases tension.

Show me your ways, LORD, teach me your paths.

Psalms 25:4

Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and he will establish your plans. The LORD works out everything to its proper end — even the wicked for a day of disaster.

Proverbs 16:3-4

If you report to anyone, ask questions that will help you align with the organization.

• What does success look like a year from now for the organization?
• What can I do to help this be achieved?
• Is there anything I am doing that I need to stop doing?
• Are there any books, workshops, or seminars I need to improve that you suggest?

In baseball, the batter must respond to what is pitched to them. They do not control the pitch. They only control their response to that pitch.

The best hitters are those who keep their eye on the ball and have spent a lot of time in a batting cage working on their swing.

Get in alignment to experience a life of less resistance. Learn to ‘Go With The Flow‘ – be relaxed and accept a situation, rather than trying to alter or control it.

We displayed the fruits of our labor at the county fair. What have you accomplished? Where is the fruit of your labors?

Anonymous

Like most, you also measure your self-worth from what you do. When you do this, comparing what you produce to others is the next most likely thing done.

How good is your game? That seems to be what drives many photographers. They compare their work to other photographers.

Once I started to do freelance full-time, I shifted my focus to observing successful photographers. I began to watch those busy and not basing that decision on how their photos looked.

About eleven years ago, I started to hire photographers for my clients. That is when I got to see really why certain photographers were busy.

Photo Skills

First, for a person to get hired to shoot for a client, their work must meet some bare minimums for that client. Let me explain that the skill level is much lower than many photographers think it should be, but that is reality.

To be considered, the photographer must produce photos that are well exposed and in focus. Now the fascinating thing about hiring photographers was all the other stuff that made me either want to hire them again or never use them again.

Negotiating Skills

When I would call, photographers asked them to do some work on how they handled that first phone call; negotiating our contract determined the rest of the relationship.

I need to know the price, the terms and when I will get the photos. It was a two-way street on this. The photographer also needed to know this from their perspective.

If a photographer wanted to negotiate more after we agreed on everything, this was a clear indication of someone who would take too much of my time. I need the photographer to shoot and deliver with as little problem as possible.

People Skills

I was shocked that many photographers can get some great photos of people’s expressions but have poor people skills.

However, I must say that those photographers with good expressions in their photos of people tended to have better people skills than most.

Most of my clients are concerned with how the photographer did with the people when they were shooting more than just how their photos were. You see, the photographers are representing them when they show up. This is why many clients will put a staff person on set to go between the photographers and the subjects because they don’t want problems later.

I hired many photographers once that I would not hire again because the word came back that they were challenging to work with. Then other photographers make the client look better than if they were there.

Final Product – The Photos

I am surprised how many photographers take way too long to get the photos to the client. When hiring photographers, I need them to rename the images with a particular file naming nomenclature so that the photos will work with the database they are put into for the client.

In addition to the file naming, I need the metadata filled out. This is all part of the negotiating I have done with the photographer when first hiring them for the job.

You would be surprised as to how many do not follow through. So, I get the photos numbered the way they came from the camera with no metadata. This creates a problem because I have to contact the photographer and ask them to fix the images and upload them again. This delays now the client from seeing the photos.

I have had a few photographers get the photos to me after the deadline, and we couldn’t use them for the initial purpose.

Final tips to increase the fruits of your labor

• Negotiating – Keep it simple. Don’t use industry jargon unless necessary. Be realistic and do not over-promise.
• People Skills – Listen, communicate & relate on a personal/professional level. Good people skills include problem-solving abilities, empathy for others, and a willingness to work together toward the common good. Reply to your emails promptly. Value your client’s point of view.
• Photos – Deliver to the client photos in the way you negotiated. WOW, clients by underpromising and over-delivering.
• Be clear and transparent –Customer loyalty increases based on how mistakes are handled. Studies show that up to 70 percent of unhappy customers transform into loyal customers if the error has been fixed, exceeding their expectations.

Jeff Justice is a standup comedian that in 1990, noticed many beginners in comedy could use some help. He gave a few tips for rewriting their material to improve the jokes. He also gave some tips on timing in the delivery of those lines.

Surprised that some of them listened and even more surprised with a group of them asked him to do a workshop.

Here is a quick overview I did for Jeff back in 2012.

My wife took both of Jeff’s classes. Now the hard part is after your graduation standup routine at the Punchline, the next step is no longer a class but a live and unforgiving audience.

Mark Evans took Jeff’s class back in 1993, which changed his life. He is a successful comedian today. His latest tour Southern Not Stupid is where you can see him perform.

He remembers that graduation night was such a fun event and wanted to recapture that time when the audience was a little more forgiving than jumping straight into the hecklers that can be in a typical audience.

Sunday night, April 29, 2019, was the first Jeff Justice Comedy Workshoppe Alumni show organized by Mark Evans at The Basement Theatre in the Buckhead section of Atlanta, Georgia.

While helping the students write better jokes is central to Jeff’s workshops, he is also helping them with timing. Delivery is everything. Jeff often says, “‘I’m a wild and crazy guy isn’t funny. But Steve Martin delivering it as he did was hilarious.”

I think Mark Evans knows that the one thing that everyone needs to get better is practice. It is only by doing this enough times that you help manage those butterflies so you can get that Comedic Timing down for delivering a joke that gets laughs.

While you put yourself out there by performing once, you don’t improve until you do it consistently.

No matter what you want to learn to do, taking a class is just the first step. It would help if you worked on your craft. Put yourself out there consistently, and you have a better chance of making it.

For photographers, you need to shoot lots of photos and share them. Then it would help if you embraced the honest critiques of your work. That is how you grow.

You have most likely heard the mantra, “The easiest way to make better photos: photograph your subjects against a clean background.”

They may even say, “99% of photos fail because the background is messy.”

I am here to tell you they are right and wrong. For the beginning photographer, it is much easier to simplify a background than to take a complex and cluttered background and make it work.

What my mentor Don Rutledge taught me was that backgrounds give context.

A clean background makes the subject pop out, but where are they? What are they doing?

Don taught me that it is a matter of composing to make sense of a scene and waiting for the “moment.”

Depth-of-field—is the distance between the nearest and farthest objects in a scene that appear acceptably sharp in an image. Most photographers use a shallow depth-of-field to clean up their background.

The closer you get to something and the wider the aperture, the shallower the depth-of-field. Also, you are removing context.

You see, it is seeing all those people’s faces behind this man that helps give more context to this photo.

Seeing all the people in the background and their expressions helps photos many times.

Don had the patience and ability to see everything inside the frame. He taught many photographers how to see the edges and everything in between.

I think the background helps make many of Don’s photos. Had he followed the advice you hear about simplifying the background, he would have never been the communicator he was.

The background and everything around a subject can give context to a moment.

Without the woman in the background with the nurse’s hat on, you might not get from the photo that this photo has something to do with healthcare.

Don’t go out and shoot everything to include background. Clean backgrounds have their place.