A constructive critique?

This video is brought to you by Squarespace. Welcome back everyone. We are going to do some more viewer mail today. I've got some really awesome stuff that I want to share with you guys. But first, I want to make a little announcement. If you watch my videos, you probably know that I teach an online Zen workshop and I haven't done one in a while. Well, today I have announced two Zen workshops for 2026. The first one is going to be in February and the second March. Now, this workshop is a project-based workshop. So, you will complete a project during the course of the month that we will meet. We do this online. So, you're going to come on Zoom and we're going to have a class every week lasts about two hours and then after every class, then you have an assignment to do to start putting your zen together. And this is really awesome because we get to go through all the elements of things like spreads, pacing, uh, sequencing. It is really fun to do and I've enjoyed doing this every time I've done it. If you are interested, I will put a link in the show description below. I strongly recommend you check it out and sign up fairly soon because these do fill up. But, I hope to see you guys there. But without further ado, let's get to some of your work today. Okay, so first up is this scene which comes to us from Chip Chipman. This is called Art of the Steel. Love the title. This is really awesome. I'll read you a little of his note. He writes, "Hi, Ted. I have been following and enjoying your videos for quite a while. I've enjoyed them for your observations, critiques, and reviews of gear. I've paid special attention to your reviews of the books and Zenes that you've received and the honest critiques given. As a matter of fact, your videos gave me the encouragement to create my own zen. Before I was a photographer, I was a metal sculptor, which required gaining an understanding of structural integrity. Consequently, I became intrigued by the construction of new buildings going up in Berkeley, California. I decided to photograph aspects of the construction process, hoping to engage an audience which may not necessarily be aware of what it takes to build these structures that they may inhabit in the near future. That said, if you have the time and interest, please take a look and possibly give me some feedback. Thanks, Chip. Chip, this is a fantastic project. I love the idea. In fact, I'm not really sure I see a whole lot of stuff like this and you've executed this extremely well. First of all, I love the fact that you've gone into what it takes to build a building. It's something that pretty much everybody is familiar with if you've ever passed a construction site when you've been driving along. But I love that you give us access into a deeper look on this. I love that it's a mix of kind of these landscape things with the steel. Uh there's a lot of still life aspects to this. I love the portraits that are in here, especially. This is really amazing. Only thing that I find a little strange in here is you have one spread and it breaks the rhythm of the entire book where you have eight images across two pages. And I get it, sometimes you're trying to get stuff in, but to make matters worse, not only do you have the pages numbered, but you also have these lettered. I know why you did that because there's an index in the back so people can refer to what it is. Um, the only thing I would have to say on that is it just feels awkward because the entire book is well paced. It goes from basically two images uh on a spread to sometimes one image across two spreads and then that which kind of just breaks the rhythm for me. Other than that, and like I said, that's super nitpicky, but uh it is important in the long bigger scheme of things. I would like to see you expand this into book territory. Actually, you've got a nice 40ish page zen here. And uh I would like to see you either pursue this more and get more kinds of images or if you feel like you've already had enough to say with this, find another subject that may be steel related that could dovetail into this a little bit. That might be interesting to see kind of two sides to something or two different subjects that are similar. But man, outstanding job. I will link up to Chip's Zen below. If you guys want to get a copy of this, you can hit Chip up. I think he's done an outstanding job on this. Chip. You should be very proud. Thank you for sharing. All right, so next up, we have this very large and beautiful book. This is called Global Village. This comes to us from Mark Eden. Mark also sent me a note, and I'll share a little this with you. It describes his intention of this project. He writes, "Like many people, I've been getting more and more concerned watching news headlines lately. So, this is my humble attempt to put something positive into the world and spark some curiosity to speak to and learn something from those with different backgrounds. As a photographer, I know I'm not going to change the world, but my hope is the book can reach just a few people and become one more building block in creating a kinder and more tolerant world. I hope you enjoy the stories and thank you for all you do for the photography community. Sincerely, Mark. And in the book, Mark writes, "The global village, the things we believe are made up of a simple formula. They are the sum of beliefs passed down to us by our elders and our experiences we collect along the way. The world has shrunk to the point where national borders and even oceans no longer separate us. Technology allows people to connect with almost anyone on Earth at any time. So the world has essentially become one big village with the effect that impact we will have is more pronounced. So Global Village is divided into 12 chapters. Each chapter representing a different place. Mark, I love your photography. Your sense of color is outstanding. You've done some really wonderful work in here and I love the diversity to everything. Not only in the types of photographs that you're shooting, the stuff that you're driving yourself to do. I love the portraits, the fact that you're probably having interactions with people, which is probably fulfilling the entire pursuit that you talked about in your opening letter for this and I hope that you're getting a lot out of this. Uh this is an extremely ambitious book. You've covered

places all over the world. I'm very impressed with it. Um, I love the fact that, you know, it's from Marrakesh to India to Japan is in here to, uh, even Seattle is in here to represent an American city. Um, the one thing that I would love to see you do next on this, and I love seeing it all in this form, uh, because it is so diverse and there's quite a lot of ground covered. It would be cool to see you kind of pick one place though and stick with it and see if you can take it to another level. Um, that's one thing that I found. Uh, I've been going to Japan for a number of years. Most of you who watch this channel know that. And the reason that I love it so much, I mean, it's just captivating. And every time I go, I learn something new. I see something new and I dig deeper into a culture. And over the years, it has affected how I shoot Japan and the types of things that I shoot when I'm over there. And I would love to see what you're able to do if you're able to focus in on some of these places. And so, I can envision you doing a whole series of books on here. Uh, this is very well done and I think you've done an outstanding job. It's well printed. I'll link up to Mark's work below and I highly recommend you guys check this out. It is a beautiful book. The text is very well written. He did an awesome job. And I also want to make a comment on something at the end of your letter that I think is important. And you kind of humbly said that, you know, you don't expect to change the world, but maybe a few people will see this. Well, this is how we do change the world. And this is the power of photography. And it's something that it's going to be very personal to you, but I love that your desire is to share that with other people. I think for instance, getting the book done, getting it finished, making it look awesome, sending it to me. I'll help promote it and continue that path. I think you're going to get more traction than you think you are. So Mark, this is really well done. Outstanding. Thank you for sharing. You should be very proud of this, man. Okay, so I got some more stuff that I want to share. I've got a very conceptual zen and some wonderful street photography. But real quick, I want to give a shout out to our sponsor this week with the awesome folks over at Squarespace. How easy is it to build an amazing website in a matter of minutes? Squarespace has you covered. It's dead simple. Head over to Squarespace, hit get started. You can start by selecting from an impressive collection of customizable templates, or you can do what I do, build your own. something unique because you know you're not like other websites. Give your site a name. Next, you can build your homepage. We'll start with a few preset layouts just to get us going. Want to sell products like books or prints? Well, you can feature those on your homepage. Create a few more sections if you want. Let's also give it a color palette. There's a whole bunch to choose from and just get us started. We can change this all later. Next, let's select the typography choices. Welcome to your website. Everything is set up and it's all ready for you to customize. Squarespace is built on Fluid Engine, the next generation of website design. Select edit and Fluid Engine allows you to drag, place, and resize any element on the page. You can snap these to a grid. You can make them float on top of one another. You can free form however you like. You can even preview and adjust how the site looks on either desktop or mobile. The layouts are independent. Of course, you'll want a portfolio for your work. Creating an image gallery is as easy as dropping a folder of images on your web browser. Once uploaded, you can drag to resort, customize the look, and Squarespace writes all of the code for you. Everything just works, and it looks fabulous. Want to sell your own prints, books, or zenes? Squarespace has the capabilities to not only set up your online store and collect payments, but they also give you all the tools that you're going to need to be successful managing shipping and payment options, manage your orders, and engage with your customers. They even give you the tax tools that you need to keep things organized and stay compliant. You should try Squarespace for yourself. It's absolutely free. No credit card required. Just go to squarespace. com/op. Sign up for that free trial. If you decide Squarespace is right for you, I can save you an additional 10% on your order by using offer code AOP on checkout. That's right, the code is AOP. So, stop procrastinating. Go build your website today. And I want to give a special shout out and thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring this video. All right, so next up, I've got a wonderful little zen that comes to us from Brian Blackman. This is called The Fall of the House of Brown. I'm going to read you some of his note. And before I do, I just want to show you this because my man gets extra bonus points for actually typing this on a typewriter. Very cool. But anyway, Brian writes, "Hi, Ted. I wanted to share my first photo zine with you since your channel has been an invaluable source of inspiration and education. Enclosed is a copy of the fall of the House of Brown. It is a documentation of the demolition of the historic Prior Brown building in Knoxville, Tennessee. I spent half a decade working in local government and was privy to much of the behind-the-scenes drama and gossip around the efforts to save the building. My primary audience has been the advocates, planners, and the downtown regulars who, like me, walk past this building daily. I didn't want to force too much of that narrative onto a general audience, but I wanted them to feel the weight of the loss. Throughout, I've tried to leave some room for hope and anticipation. That feels ambitious to pack all of that in, but I hope at

least I've made it entertaining. This has been part of an effort to put art out in my 40s that isn't limited to small screens and short attention spans. I feel like I've learned a lot through the process and I'm already thinking of other concepts. Thank you for your time and your content. Best, Brian. Brian, you've done an outstanding job with this. I really love the concept. I love the idea of the subject being the building, the fact that it's being torn out. Something that's very emotional and matters to you, which is going to put a lot of passion into it. And I think that, you know, it is ambitious to put all that stuff in here to show it in a certain light, to put the weight of loss in here, and also to provide hope. But I think you've done a good job with this. Uh, some of my favorite pictures that I want to point out. First of all, this one. I love it when you're using the facade of the old building that has not been destroyed yet, and you're using this to window in and frame in the deconstruction that's happening behind. It's really cool, and you do this in a series of images in here that kind of follow one another. Here's another one with the windows, and you've got the earth mover in there. Um, really, really well executed. Um, and I think that your style does convey all those things and I think you're doing a good job. And I love the fact that you're in your 40s and you're like putting stuff out there. You know, there is no limit on things. There's no age uh that like, you know, you're going to like burn out or something. I mean, I guess that's all in your head if that's the case. And I see people that uh, you know, we live in a culture where people celebrate either young prodigies or old legends. And you don't have to be one of those two things. In fact, I think our world has changed a lot in recent years. Um, anyway, really nicely done. I want to encourage you to do more of this and please send me more stuff as you do it. I think this is a really, really excellent start with this for a first scene. I will link up to Brian's work below. Check him out. Brian, thank you for sharing. All right, next up is this lovely little zen of street photography. This comes to us from Tobias Olsen. It is called a street memoir, and there's no note attached to this, but I will read you the introduction to the zen. And Tobias writes, "This collection of images is my first attempt to showcase my photography beyond the realm of social media. " The majority of the shots were captured during a 3-week trip to New York City with my wife in the summer of 2023. Each day of our stay, my wife and I made the 40-minute commute from our friend's home in New Cannon, Connecticut to Manhattan. Each day bringing something new and exciting. From the lively energy of the city to the vibrant colors of the Pride Festival. We even stumbled upon the set of the latest Ghostbusters movie. However, on that particular day, we were hit with a thick smog blowing from a wildfire in Canada, hence the yellow tent on some of the photos. to boil it down. That's what I hope this collection represents. The typical unexpected day in the city that never sleeps. Tobias. So, Tobias, this is very well done. I love your sense of color. I love the narrative of just having a 3-week trip to New York represented in here. And I also like the fact you shared the u the story about the fog blowing in. I remember that in 2023, and it happens occasionally, and it does have an interesting effect on some of these images where you sort of have this wildfire smog that's hit with this. Um, one note that I want to say and uh, something to keep in mind for future projects. Um, I would work on editing your work just a little bit more. And the reason I say that is when you slow down, you do some really nice compositional work. The two shots I just showed you. Uh, this is another one. This is one of the best spreads in here. Uh, the woman behind the window. And then you have a gentleman in this window up here. It's really well done. I think when you slow down and you give it that effort, I think you get some really good stuff. um when you get into the crowd shots and the pride festival and all that, I start to lose a lot of that uh intimacy that you're able to convey when you compose. And I'm not saying that you're not trying to compose these. I'm just saying that they're taken more from the hip. They're in the moment. Uh and they end up being stuff that I've seen a lot with other projects, but when you slow down, I think you've got something that's very interesting, very unique. This is another great one. This woman looking in the shop window, uh juxtaposed with this one in this doorway. They're very simple. Um but they don't Well, here's the other thing. New York has been photographed so many times, too. Shots like this give it more of a uniqueness to where I still feel like I'm in New York, but I'm seeing something new that's a little bit different and uh it draws me in a lot more. Cover is wonderful. This is the only criticisms I would give you on this. Uh and it's hard to do. Uh you know, when I teach the Zen course, this is one thing that I do with deal with students and I've done it myself is that you have a group of images that you want to put into the zen that make that up. And it is so hard to pull things out of there sometimes, but you have to remember that every image that's going into a book must support the theme of the book. And that's how you get something that's of a really good quality across the board. And it means that sometimes there's an image that you're attached to, but maybe it does not support the rest of the stuff in the book. And that's why it needs to come out. And sometimes there's groups of images like that. The other thing is this was an experience of you spending 3 weeks in New York City. And in your mind, you were there. It was your experience. And so I guess who am I to come along and tell you start cutting stuff out? But I'm just telling you what works for me. And I think that when you slow down, I think your image quality goes way up and I think you're doing some outstanding stuff. So keep it up, my man. And I want to see more from you. So um anyway, I appreciate everybody who sent stuff in. Check them out in the show description below. Zen courses coming up in February and March. Drop me a comment if you got any questions. I will see you guys in the next video. Until then