Photography Podcasts: Improving the Eye by Way of the Ear

By Chris Lombardi, 7-26-07

Last autumn I had the opportunity to attend my first field photography workshop with a professional instructor. I spent several days tromping about Glacier National Park with Tim Cooper, an amazing digital nature photographer and an instructor with the Rocky Mountain School of Photography.

The most instructive part of the workshop experience, by far, was the daily critique in which Cooper would gather a few photos taken by the students that day, project them onto a screen, and then, tactfully and kindly, rip the photography to shreds. As Cooper moved through each image responding to its best and worst qualities, tracing the lines of “movement” through the image and making suggestions for improvements, I gained my first glimpse into the workings of a talented and practiced photographic mind. Tim was teaching me how to think like a photographer. He expanded my conceptual vocabulary, giving me new tools with which I could critique my own work. I could have kept my camera in its bag the entire workshop and still come away a better photographer.

I was delighted to find two web sites this week that offer something like my experience with professional instruction. The Radiant Vista is a photographic community that offers all sorts of intellectual tools for improving one’s photography. My favorite of these tools is the Daily Critique, a daily audio broadcast in which photographer Craig Tanner critiques a photo submitted by a reader. Craig does a very nice job with these sessions, pointing out a photo’s strengths and weaknesses and offering useful in-field technical tips as well as PhotoShop adjustment techniques to improve the image. I find listening to one of Tanner’s critiques a great way to warm up for an evening of working with my own images.

My other new favorite podcast is The Candid Frame, a photography podcast created by Ibarionex Perello featuring interviews with successful working photographers. Perello and his guests help me think like a photographer at another level—the level of creative process, project development and professional development—as they discuss the way they work, make livings, and strive for new levels of creativity. Perello is a talented and insightful interviewer and his show is of the quality of something you’d hear on NPR. A great source of inspiration for photographers hoping to move from the realm of the dabbling hobbiest into a more serious artistic practice.

Enjoy!