The Beginner Photography Podcast

490: Jeff Larason: Seeking Purpose Through Photo Critiques: The Crit House

• Raymond Hatfield

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In this episode of the Beginner Photography Podcast, I chat with Street Photographer Jeff Larason, whos helping others find deeper meaning in their work through photo critique. Jeff dives into the joys and challenges of receiving feedback through his youtube series, The Crit House. Jeff talks about his journey of self-analysis, the importance of constructive critiques, and how to find a supportive photography community. 

The Big Ideas:

  1. Value of Constructive Feedback: Receiving specific and constructive critiques can significantly improve your photography skills and artistic vision.
  2. Emotional Impact: Striving to infuse your photographs with emotional depth can create more resonant and meaningful images.
  3. Community Engagement: Finding a supportive community for discussions and feedback enriches your learning and personal growth.
  4. Balanced Sharing: Carefully considering when and what to share on social media can help you focus on meaningful self-improvement rather than external validation.

Photography Action Plan

  • Seek Constructive Feedback: Join a local or online photography critique group to get diverse perspectives on your work. Ask for specific feedback, focusing on areas where you feel uncertain or want to improve.
  • Enhance Emotional Storytelling: Spend time pre-visualizing your shots to determine the emotions you want to convey. Practice incorporating elements like lighting, composition, and subject interaction to build stronger emotional narratives.
  • Engage with the Photography Community: Participate actively in photography forums or attend in-person meetups to discuss and learn from peers. Mentor or seek mentorship to gain insights and broaden your perspectives.
  • Curate and Monitor Your Sharing: Be selective about the photos you share on social media, focusing on quality over quantity. Set specific goals for what you hope to achieve with your shared images, such as feedback on a new technique or storytelling approach.
  • Utilize Multiple Feedback Channels: Share your work in different formats, like printed versions for in-person critiques and digital ones for online feedback. Combine the insights from virtual critiques and in-person interactions to gain a well-rounded understanding of your strengths and areas for improvement.

Resources

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Thanks for listening & keep shooting!

Jeff Larason:

One of the greatest things I've ever enjoyed about photography is when somebody looks at a photograph and sees something in it that I never saw. You've spent hours either in the dark room where you've spent time in light room and then Photoshop and, you know, this image, down to the pixel. And then somebody comes along and says something about it, and you go Yeah. that's fantastic. I hadn't seen that in my own image and it helps you and it helps you understand the context the way that the rest of the world looks at what you have taken. Because once you've taken the picture, and once you've put it out there in the world, it's no longer yours.

New Jeff In out:

Hey, welcome to the beginner photography podcast. I'm your host, Raymond Hatfield. And today we are chatting with street photographer Jeff Larson about the power of getting feedback on your work. But first, the beginner photography podcast is brought to you by CloudSpot. Impress your clients with a beautiful gallery that is easy to view, share and download on any device. You can control image size at a watermark and even download limits. So grab your free forever account today over at deliverphotos. com and only upgrade when you're ready. Now, Jeff Larson is a longtime photographer of the streets of Boston, and he's also the host of The Crit House, which is one of my favorite photography YouTube channels where he hosts these roundtables with photographers breaking down not only each other's images, but he also brings on photographers to talk about the images that inspire them. And I know what you're thinking, It's scary to share your work and I get that in fact, Jeff gets that as well. so he's going to share today how he kept his work to himself for years before learning the value of constructive feedback. Also, we talk about connecting with a trusted community and the profound growth that comes from in person feedback and some tips on how you can find that in your own community as well. But quick note. There was an issue with the audio, being a bit hot and somehow I didn't catch it while recording. So Jeff's audio does sound a bit fuzzy at times, I hope that you can look past that. I mean, obviously, as you heard in the intro there, but I hope that you can look past that for just all the great advice that Jeff has and shares with us today. So with that, let's go ahead and get on into today's interview with Jeff Larson.

Raymond Hatfield:

Jeff, why don't you tell me, when did you know that photography was first going to play an important role in your life?

Jeff Larason:

It was a process. I didn't really start, taking pictures until I was 20. I mean, except for snapping family stuff and not really thinking about it. But, somebody gave me a camera when I was heading to London for a trip for the summer, when I was in college. And, when I was there, there was a darkroom class that I took. And I had just been wandering around the streets of London and the guy who was running the darkroom looked at my images and said, Oh, you should, take a look at these photographers. And It was, Andre Cortes and, Robert Frank and Henri Cartier Bresson. So I went to the library and looked them up and, at that point it was just I was just knocked out by the, that there could be art. I was not aware of that photography could be artistic. I grew up on Sports Illustrated and National Geographic and that geo has some lovely images, but it was not what I had thought of as art. and I think that was the moment that sort of changed things for me, but it was a long progress before I started really taking it seriously as an art form.

Raymond Hatfield:

What were you going to school for at that time? I was

Jeff Larason:

in communications, radio and television, which is what most of my career has been, in radio and television. But, class that I was taking in London was unrelated to what I was actually studying in college.

Raymond Hatfield:

So why is that? I'm always excited to learn about that at that point. Was that just something that you thought this might be interesting? Let me get these credit hours or was there something a little bit deeper? I mean, you had photography kind of all of your life, but I'm assuming by this point, it hadn't meant anything to you until this

Jeff Larason:

well, quite frankly, I'm not that deep of a person, so it wasn't anything deeper. I think it was just that that looked like a fun class to take. And I had a camera, and I was enjoying walking around taking pictures in London, and it just seemed like a fun thing to do, so I took it, and it just sort of sparked something in in me that I didn't realize was going to be there.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. What were those earliest days like for you? Because I'm sure that you're shooting film at the time. Most cameras, did not have auto modes, all these program modes and whatnot. So you had to learn how to use a camera. Was that a relatively easy process for you?

Jeff Larason:

I did what I knew how to do with the camera and yeah, it was all manual. I had an old Ricoh. I couldn't even tell you what it was, but it was all manual and I still shoot manual to this day. All of my cameras have all the bells and whistles, but I shoot as much manual focus as I can as well. that's just the way I learned. it was a dark room class, so it was interesting to, learn sort of what I call the fundamentals of photography. it's a little bit like, with Photoshop and Lightroom these days, I had a background in dark room, which allowed me to at least understand dodging and burning and the things that, you did back in the dark room with your hands and wands, in the light, trying to make sure you were getting things right. So it was a good way to learn the fundamentals of photography by starting out with the basics and not having all the bells and whistles that we have these days.

Raymond Hatfield:

Of course, your first few photos that came out, did you just knock them out of the park or were there, so was quite a learning curve there for you. Where do you think you struggled most?

Jeff Larason:

I never really thought of it as struggling. I just enjoyed the process of taking pictures and, through the summertime, there was, I think, one picture that I took that lasts to this day. I have no idea how many rolls of film I took that summer, but it was, probably 100 or so. And, you just learn. You just kind of sort of grow and just assume that, you enjoy the process. I didn't know whether I was supposed to be good or bad. No one was judging my work. No one was seeing it. It was just me. And so, I didn't feel like I was struggling or trying to, rate myself against anybody else because I was taking pictures and enjoying them and seeing what came out of it and at the other end and then they went into a box and I didn't show them to anybody because they had already done the job for me, which is to give me pleasure with the print.

Raymond Hatfield:

Really? So you were taking these photos and you didn't show anybody? Nobody knew that you were rather taking photos?

Jeff Larason:

That's kind of the trajectory of my career. I spent 30 or 40 years photographing and not showing my pictures to anybody. My best friend in the world didn't even realize that I was, a photographer. and it wasn't, it wasn't until, another friend of mine who I talked to about photography a writer. She was an author and has editors and people look at her work and give her feedback on her, the novels that she writes. And she said to me, you should show this to somebody so that you can get some context to whether these are good or not. And so I did. I finally, went and I guy who was a professor of, I think at the New England School of Photography at the time. And, And we sat down to coffee and he looked at him and said, well, this is good and this is bad and this is, here are some things you want to think about and here are some things that might move you in the right direction. And I listened to him. That was really the moment that my eyes opened up to what you need to do to become a better photographer. And that's also the genesis of the YouTube program that I have, the Crit House. Because again, I think that there are a lot of people out there who are taking pictures, capturing images, creating, who don't have, an understanding of how important it is to show your work to others and to get constructive, healthy, thoughtful feedback. And that's not Instagram. Instagram, you show your work, people like it and maybe you get likes and maybe you don't, that's not constructive feedback. Feedback is sitting down, looking at a body of work and talking through what's there and what's not there and what it means and what it doesn't mean.

Raymond Hatfield:

I'm really excited to talk more about The Crit House because, I've watched number of videos on YouTube and really enjoy it, but I want to kind of go back to this idea of not showing any of your photos because there's a lot of listeners who there's the two camps, right? You either show every single photo that you've ever taken on Instagram because that's what everybody does. You don't show any of the photos because maybe it's self doubt. Maybe it's, whatever it is. Obviously there was no Instagram at the time for you, but what was it that kept you from showing photos to others?

Jeff Larason:

There was no one to show it to, It was me and I was married to somebody and then she looked at him and, she appreciated him. But it was a hobby. It was something that I did that I cared about. I spent a lot of time looking at other photographers. I went out and, read books and saw photography of the greats. I got an understanding of who, had meaning in the world of photography and in the art world. And, I tried to integrate that into my photography, but it just, it was never that, interesting to me to show it. And I mean back then I mean, this is the 80s, right? In the 90s through the process as well there weren't avenues to show it as much there were like photo clubs that were out there but they never really appealed to me for whatever reason. I went to maybe a couple of photo club meetings they were judging and sort of rating things in a way that just it didn't resonate with me, so I didn't show it. I didn't show the work until I had the opportunity for somebody to give me, good, constructive, thoughtful feedback.

Raymond Hatfield:

So if, living in today's world with the availability of sharing your photos literally everywhere, almost instantaneously, Would you change anything about your journey in photography? Would you continue to keep those photos like your own until you got to the point to where you did, or do you suggest to new photographers today to share your work as fast as possible?

Jeff Larason:

I don't know, it's hard to put yourself in a position that you aren't actually going to be in. I think I benefited from not showing everything that went out there, and I benefited from not trying to make every image something that is going to get likes. I just, I took pictures and I, the ones that I liked, I liked. So there was sort of that self analysis that you allow yourself. You're less concerned about the feedback from other people. Which is weird because I'm talking about how important it is to get feedback from other people. but it's just, it's, I love Instagram, I mean I'm all over Instagram, I kind of go back and forth about how much I post on it, but one of the problems with Instagram is that I don't spend a lot of time with the images that I see. Even my own, I post and I'm scrolling through and, spend a half a second on images, if it's a real banger, I might go, Oh, I like that and click and then move on to the next one. And that for me, isn't the best way to look at great photography and to think about it and to understand it. For me, it's looking at books and going to shows and talking to people. That's where you start to, understand photography at a higher level than you do on Instagram. And again, I'm an Instagram fan. I'm not trying to diminish Instagram, but I think it has its positives and its negatives and, that It's, a place where you quickly look at images is I think one of the problems

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, will agree with that as well. So then, if photography for you at the time hobby, and just something that you did for fun in your spare time, what was the reason for you to want to seek out specific feedback and get better? Because I know, as much as I like, cooking or lawn care, I'm going to get to a certain point and then that's all that I need, because if I spend more time on it, it's going to, consume everything. What was it about that moment in time or photography where you said, I need to go

Jeff Larason:

I think it's I think it had something to do with wanting to see where my photography stood in the greater world. and again, this is not instagram. This is sort of saying. Okay. Well the great photographers are out there and they are great for a reason Why is that? And how can I, come closer to being great? Now I know I'm not great. I'm an okay photographer, for an amateur. I've been doing it for 40 years. So a certain amount of time you start to develop some skill and you get better. But I'm, never going to be great, but I want to understand, I wanted to understand how to do things better and also, by the way, not just create better photographs, but create, meaning behind and not only an image, but a body of work and also to sort of understand what art is. what does it mean to create art? Because I, I didn't grow up in a world where art was an important part. You know, I watched sports, and I, worked and raised a family, but I never understood art. And so a lot of what I was trying to do was to understand art and meaning. I still struggle with that. I still struggle with trying to understand, how my photography can have more meaning and emotional impact on not only people, but on myself, you know, that has some meaning to myself. And that's, where I wrestle with it now. I don't wrestle with what the f stop should be, or depth of field, or how I process an image. I am wrestling at this point in my photographic life with trying to have it mean something, have it mean something to other people as well as myself.

Raymond Hatfield:

So when you look at your earliest days, let's say pre, sharing You had that body of work and then everything since then as well. How have your photos grown more meaning since then in what ways were they lacking before?

Jeff Larason:

Well, I think before, when you start out, or at least when I started out, and not having an understanding of art, I just took pictures. I just, you know, said, Oh, this is pretty. I like this, or I like the line, or there was something that, about the composition or the moment or whatever I just liked it. I did that and I did that a lot. I mean, got a lot of pictures that I liked, but then you sit down and say, Okay, well, I might want to create a book, or I might want to put a show on the wall, and do that is like the next step because now if you're gonna put a show on the wall I mean you can just put a bunch of 15 really good pictures on the wall or whatever the number is and they're 15 good pictures, but Is there a thread? of what those images say? Are they sequenced in a way that work together? Is there something that communicates to people the import? Or is there anything important in what you're saying in those images? And for the most part, for the first couple of decades that I was taking pictures, there was no meaning to it. I was just taking pictures. I was going around and I was documenting my life. I actually at some point thought of it as sort of my own personal visual journal. There was nothing important about it to anybody about myself. so unless if I'm gonna put something on the wall, the only person who's gonna come to look at it is me. And, my mom and my son no one else is gonna care. So I needed to try to understand, if I was going to, rise up to the next level, how do you decide what your photography means? And then how do you create more so that there's meaning to it? That's where I am. I'm still wrestling with that. I'm still trying to figure out Because that's where you become great, right? Those are the great photographers. They have meaning. They have, there's something that you look at them and you say, oh, that's not only a great photograph, but it hits me in my heart.

Raymond Hatfield:

What have you come up with? How have you gotten closer to there? Look, obviously we're not there, right? Photography is always a journey. But how have you got there today?

Jeff Larason:

I'm wrestling with it. I have Two or three projects that I'm sort of working on broadly. There's a street that runs through Boston. I live in the Boston area. The Mass Ave runs from, Dorchester through the south end, through Back Bay into Cambridge and out to the western suburbs. It runs through, some of the most run down, poor, decrepit parts of the city. And then also, just a mile away, go through some of the wealthiest neighborhoods in America, in the world. And that street is a fascinating street for me. And I have been spending time trying to show that street. It's not a documentary product. it's a sort of an artistic representation of it. But that's one of the things that I'm doing. And then I'm, doing another project that is now landscape, which is completely new for me. Cause I've never. I've never captured landscape before. I've always been a street guy. but now living in the western suburbs and I look out my window here there are trees and every once in a while a fox and a coyote will run through that's not street photography anymore. So, I've been working something that is, at least has some meaning to me on the landscape side and I haven't figured out how to do it tell a story with it beyond how it, that it makes me, gives me some pleasure. So for that particular project, I don't know. I like the pictures. I haven't figured out the meaning of it yet.

Raymond Hatfield:

Right. Well, hopefully you can figure that out soon. know, as you were saying that, I could only draw parallels to a similar situation that I'm in right now. and feeling a very similar way of like, but what does this mean? what does it, like, does this photo look nice? Yeah, but what's it for, and I feel like with landscape, it's very hard not having people in the photos. In fact, every time chat with a landscape photographer, I'm like, how do you add emotion when there's no smiling faces or eyes, you know, that we can just naturally as humans draw into and even they struggle like it's a hard thing. So I wouldn't beat yourself

Jeff Larason:

You know, I'm not, I'm very much enjoying the process. That's one of the nice things about being old, is you start to appreciate that things don't have to be done now. I mean, I don't have that much time left on this earth, if it doesn't get done, it won't get done, but I'm enjoying the process. I'm still enjoying the process of documenting the Mass Ave project when I can. So I've got, things that I do photographically that I, am enjoying. And I'm allowing myself the space to be able to figure it out, maybe I'll never figure it out. Maybe there's nothing there, but at the moment it's fun. And if nothing happens with it, I'll move on to the next thing.

Raymond Hatfield:

Hey, fun is, I think, more than half the battle in photography. Cause if you have a reason to get out, it's always fun, right?

Jeff Larason:

thing that I'm doing right now, it's a nighttime thing. And I only do it when there's a full moon. and it's, it documents the full moon, And so, I'm getting up at three or four in the morning and going out into, I was just out in Nevada last week. I was out in the desert in Nevada at three o'clock in the morning shooting the full moon. don't know if the photography is any good, but it was a fascinating, almost, this is going to sound strange, but it was almost a spiritual sort of occasion. I'm sitting in the desert. 30 miles outside of Reno, in the pitch dark, except for the incredible luminance of the moon shining down on this valley where I can see nothing but mountains around me. There's no lights of the city. There's nothing else except for the moon and the desert and me. And that was, pretty cool,

Raymond Hatfield:

Very different than Boston.

Jeff Larason:

Very different than Boston.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, of course. Let's talk a little bit about the Crit House here because, as I said, I've seen a number of the videos, there's a lot to love about it. I think one, for a lot of photographers, what I found just in the listeners is that a lot of people love to watch YouTube videos because, there's always the complaint of I don't have enough time, I don't have enough time to go out and shoot. I don't have enough time for this and that, but by being able to watch others go through it, there's almost this therapeutic element to it as if they can live vicariously through these people. Right? And as somebody who I don't really get my images critiqued, I've just always been like. I take the photo. I like the photo. The photo is done, but I hear what you're saying of how important it is to get other eyes on your photos. So watching, you talk to others about their work, watching others talk about other photographers, and the work and, the five images that they love as well. It's such an interesting conversation that like isn't typically. happening on YouTube and especially in the photography space and most critiques if they are on YouTube are like three hours long, you know, your videos are easy to consume, watch and get an understanding. Like for me, they get me excited to go out and shoot. see it, I get the inspiration, and now I want to go out and shoot and be a better photographer. and I think that people need more, of this. I'm excited, to have more people, obviously check out your work, put all the links in the show notes for sure. But tell me, somebody, again, who didn't share your work for so long, and now you're almost like this evangelist for, like, getting people to look at your work. what have you discovered about, the work of other photographers by hearing, or just by being a part of these conversations?

Jeff Larason:

I have started to understand more the language of photography that being able to communicate about what your images are and what they mean is important for viewers to understand the context. I have said this myself and I heard other, people say it, and it's wrong, that I just want my photographs to stand on their own. I don't want to have to communicate, which would be great, which would be great if you were that great, but the reality of it is when somebody comes in to see your pictures. They want to have context. They want to have an understanding of what are you showing and that doesn't mean you have to write a book about it, but you need to be able to communicate and to let people know Here's Here's what you're seeing so that you give them a push in the right direction, and the ability to be able to communicate that is very important to being able to make a good photograph and a good body of work. I've also learned that editing is critical to success. A lot of people put just, they put photographs out, they put photographs out, I don't mean editing in terms of like processing and Photoshop, I mean editing in terms of not showing images and deciding that this one is not one that fits within this body of work. if you're creating a book or you're creating a zine or you're putting a show on the wall or whatever it is, that process of editing deciding what's in and what's out teaches you so much about your own, not only your own photography but you as a person and as a photographer as well. And again, so it's not, so much, you know, what I've learned about taking a picture. It's what I've learned about, that those decisions and actively making those decisions about your own work, is really what makes you a good photographer. And that's part of the process of getting feedback from other people because people tell you, well, this one works for me and doesn't work for me. And why? And that helps you to understand your own photography. One of the greatest things I've ever enjoyed about photography is when somebody looks at a photograph and sees something in it that I never saw in my own photograph. You look at it and you're, Oh, you've spent hours either in the dark room where you've spent time in light room and then Photoshop and, you know, this image, down to the pixel. And then somebody comes along and says something about it, and you go Yeah. that's fantastic I hadn't seen that in my own image and it helps you and it helps you understand the context the way that the rest of the world looks at what you have taken. Because once you've taken the picture, and once you've put it out there in the world, it's no longer yours. Other people are going to interpret it and make decisions about it. And so that's part of that process of getting feedback is preparing to show it out to the rest of the world.

Raymond Hatfield:

This is an area of photography that I've never explored before, and clearly need to, I love that idea though, that once you put a photograph out into the world, that's no longer yours. And it reminds me of, I think it's that Ansel Adams quote of, there's two people in every photo, the photographer and the viewer. And it's interesting to think about, cause It changes at some point, right? Cause photography is very much a solo thing. I came from the world of like cinematography where it's like a team effort and then you get into photography. It's very solo. But the aspect of the sharing, the work of getting work out there, once again, it becomes collaborative. And that, can be difficult because there's a lot of insecurities that we have because it's such a solo thing to create this image that, Oh, once somebody says a work is garbage. Are they saying that I'm garbage? Or are they saying that the work is garbage and it's hard to separate that? So one, did you struggle with that at all? And if so, what advice do you

Jeff Larason:

know, I, I didn't because, I mean, if somebody tells me my work is garbage, I'm probably not going to listen to that person.

Raymond Hatfield:

That might have been a bit harsh, but you know, like how we internalize things.

Jeff Larason:

I think people's concern with critique is that there's this impression that somebody's just going to come in and be mean to you. I haven't shown this landscape project to anybody but, my closest people, who I trust. But I don't know if I were going to show it to, a gallery that they would go, Oh, this is fantastic. it's very possible that they would not be very nice about it. But I have gotten to the point where I understand that if I'm asking for feedback, I should ask for, specific things like here's what I'm trying to understand about this, not only this image, but this body of work, can you help me? understand it, to improve upon it, what can you tell me that would make it better? When you go into the critique process, I don't think that the healthiest thing to do is say, is this good or bad? Cause that's not going to give you any good feedback to take you to the next step. So no, I guess, I mean, I know I went away from your question, but I think I never had problem with, getting feedback because I thought it was, it's always been important to me to try to understand what it is that I'm taking, and what I'm capturing and how to get better with it. Listen, I know feedback is very hard for some people. I know you create these things that are your, they're your babies and you love them so much. But I think, at some point just came to place where I realized, that other people have opinions and those opinions are, just as valuable for me to hear as my own. So I needed to hear it.

Raymond Hatfield:

So, how do we balance the difference between, cause I can ask my mom what she thinks about my photos and she'd be like, these are the best things I've ever seen in my life, right? Every single time. and that's like a false, sense of, accomplishment. So what advice do you have on maybe finding a community or finding people, who we can start to trust

Jeff Larason:

and that's a really good question because, I mean, first of all, showing it to your mom and her opinion. Incredibly valuable, I love it when my mom says it's a great picture, but she didn't understand what I'm trying to do, but she likes it and it makes me happy. So show it to your friends finding a group of people who you trust and feel comfortable with is admittedly hard, Like I said, I spent a long time not doing that and not knowing how to do that but we're in a time right now in an age when we have the internet and we have Instagram, I mean if there are people that you interact with on the internet that are people whose work you like reach out and say, Hey, listen, I'm trying to learn. would you like to look at my work? I'd love to hear your opinion and do a call like we're doing right now. there's nothing more valuable than like sitting across the table and having prints, so if you were not in Indianapolis and I were not in Boston and we could sit together and just look at these things and talk about these things and you can, you could say, well, I don't like this one. This one really works for me. These are the ones that I really like. But you can do that. You can do that here, you can do a share screen and I can show you images and you can show me images and we can talk about them. And if you can expand that, so you have three or four or five people who can get together once a month and do the same thing for a few hours where you show, here's what I've taken this month and this is what I've been working on. And, Hey, I'm thinking about doing this. I want to put together a book or a zine. What do you guys think if I do this? Talk to me about the concept and does that work for you? When I talked about, understanding the language of photography, that's part of what I mean is, just to be able to have that conversation and to understand how to communicate not only what you're trying to do, but also what you feel about the other people's work as well in a way that's healthy and helpful to them. Cause there's a big difference between criticism. And And critique, right? Critique is a healthy, thoughtful process. Criticism is, I don't know, for me, it just, it sounds mean. It's just, I'm going to be critical. it sounds negative, but critique is something where you, look at the pros and the cons and the positives and negatives and the meaning, and you think about it in a bigger way than just being mean and saying the negatives about it.

Raymond Hatfield:

I love that. I think that's what we all want. At our core, everybody just wants to win. To have some sort of validation to feel seen right? and being able to create work from ourselves and then be able to share with others. It's almost our way of, non verbally speaking to others, how we view the world. So, that desire to feel seen through that, I think is, real deep. Not being very familiar with the whole process of this, is there a question maybe that I'm missing or looking over? Is there anything that I'm not, asking that you think is really important about the process of critique? or finding people to critique? Is there anything like that?

Jeff Larason:

don't know if it's a question, but me the most important thing is try to figure out a community that you feel comfortable with. Just a group of people that you like and respect and admire and hopefully will do the same to you so that you can talk about about your photography and sort of say here's what I want to do and have those conversations and then to go out and take a walk Right if the other people of you like and respect their street photographers go take a walk You know go stroll around and see how they shoot, see what they do and work next to them. So you're taking a picture of with one person here and another person there, and all three of you are in the same spot, and you all get different pictures. How did that happen? And then you think about, oh, that's how that person sees, and that's how that person sees, and now you start Talking about that together and well, I looked at this and I looked at this and this is why this is meaningful to me. And this is why I saw this composition. It's just conversation, right? I mean, and this is exactly what you do. And that's what this is. This is why what you do is so great as part of your podcast here is you are giving people, something to listen to, to understand it. And what I'm saying is that, people hopefully we'll go to that next level, right? And then to get together amongst themselves and say, Oh, we've got, you know, here are five people in Indianapolis. Let's go take a walk. And hey, next month, why don't we get together at Bobby's house and sit down and show some prints, right? And now you've got a community. Now you've got people who just want to talk about photography. And, sometimes people come and go because their interest wanes and they do get, you know, involved in other things. But, you bring new blood in and have that energetic group that all cares about and understands each other.

Raymond Hatfield:

Is it possible? I know that you said, sharing your screen and stuff. We can do that online and obviously that's what you do as well on the crit house when you meet people on zoom there. but tell me the difference between, doing this virtually and doing it in

Jeff Larason:

Um, So that's a really good question because, interact with prints on a table. And moving them around and saying, Oh, look at how these work together, right? Here you've got four images that all look how these are just great together. And they may not be the greatest photographs individually, but as a unit, they're fantastic. And you get somebody else come along and say, Oh, well look at these, you kind of put those together and you start to see that process of different people interacting with your photographs in a way that you never would have. You never would have done it before. I mean, you might have if you really care, but now you've got this other from other people and you yourself get to do that with other people as well I mean there's value to looking at other people's photographs who are your peers and saying Oh, this is what works for me and what doesn't work for me because then you Start to understand yourself a little bit more and what you like and don't like in your own photography this group went for four years From the start of kovat until just last month when we got together for the first time together again it was so nice just to be able to do that same thing again. Now, on the other hand, the difference is online. You have the ability to share images beforehand and you can see things and you interact with them in different ways. So there is great positivity to be able to do that in a share screen as well. It's just a different environment. And the other thing is that, on Zoom, it's harder to, like, one person wants to talk and everybody's interrupting people. And so you can do that in person because you can have one conversation over here and another conversation over here between two people. And, so the in person thing for me, I think is, the best way of doing it. But, there's great value to doing it remotely as well.

Raymond Hatfield:

love that. Thank you for sharing that. That sounds like a blast. That sounds like something fun and something that I'm going to start looking into. Try to find a group of people around here who might want to get together every once in a while and start looking at our photos.

Jeff Larason:

Sorry to interrupt but one of the things is that the people in that group that I have worked with have grown. I Mean, they came into it as good photographers. We brought them in because everybody was sort of, we liked the work that everybody brought to the table, literally, and to see them over the years grow from the feedback that we're giving each other, cause they'll hear something to say, Oh, I should try that. And then the next month they come back with what somebody had said, try that. And you go, Oh, that's fantastic. so the growth that you see from people is just, it's beautiful. it's so nice to have a community where you're seeing people, become better because of what you're doing for each other.

Raymond Hatfield:

And that's so hard like we miss that so much online because people come and go because there's just so many people online. People are hiding behind screen names, you don't necessarily recognize when somebody's not there, or when somebody new is there so absolutely get that. it comes to, giving critiques. Is it easy to give critiques, accurate feedback on other's work. If it's a style of photography, that's not of your own.

Jeff Larason:

It's harder because you don't, understand it as well. Yeah, so that's, a challenge, but, your thoughts are still valid. So I spent 40 years doing street photography and, I didn't know anything about portraits portraits or landscapes or fine art photography or, any of that. But when I see photography in those genres that I have never done before. still can have thoughts about it and so trying to sort of put together what your thoughts are about something you don't necessarily fully understand still has value, right? Because, if you have a landscape photographer, right, who is looking for feedback and you're a street photography person, That photographer still needs to have input from people who don't necessarily fully understand landscape. Because if they put it on the wall, or in a book, not everybody looking at that image is going to know anything about landscape photography. those images need to communicate to people who don't understand it. And so when you ask before, about Your mother is gonna look at that picture in a book and she still needs to be moved by it and she still needs to Be impressed by it. And so if you're only looking to impress landscape photographers Then only show it to landscape photographers. But if you want Everybody to like your work and to appreciate it and know what you're doing Then you need to show it to people who may not necessarily Understand it

Raymond Hatfield:

Ooh. N

Jeff Larason:

I feel like I've gone so all philosophical here and I'm not that smart so

Raymond Hatfield:

ha ha ha No, I think it just goes back to Again, it's so hard, I think, as a human to like share something that so vulnerable, be vulnerable and share photos. and what I'm trying to do here is squash almost any objection that somebody might have about joining a group, right? Oh, I'm not a landscape photographer, I shoot street, I don't belong with these people, the opposite. And you perfectly encapsulated, like, we should be getting together even if we have a difference in genre of photography.

Jeff Larason:

I'll go a step further that there is value to having a critique group Where it's not even just photographers you can have bring in a painter somebody who does, etchings or drawings and I haven't done this before, so this is all theoretical, I think, I know that there are groups that do this. They bring in people who are just artists, you know, sculptors and from different areas of art. And now you're having discussions about, as opposed to just about photography. And that becomes a different conversation as well. And then I'm not saying that we should all do that, but that's the kind of thing that illustrates what you were asking about is, the input is a value from all sorts of different viewpoints. and by the way, think about that for yourself, your input is valuable to them as well. So it's not only their input to you Because it's a two way street when you're in these groups. It's a community, you have a relationship And what you give to it? is a big part of the process as well. It's not just gimme gimme gimme You're there to be able to help other people as well

Raymond Hatfield:

Well, Jeff, I don't know how to end it any better than that. I think that is both inspiring, motivational and obviously, very informative as well. So, unfortunately we are at the end of our time. I know people listening are thinking to themselves, I gotta learn more about this. I gotta get involved. So where can we learn more about you and obviously the Crit House online?

Jeff Larason:

My website is just my name. It's jefflerrison. com. and then the Crit House is on YouTube. if you just search for the Crit House, you'll find it. And we have, over the last, six months or so, we've been doing a new series that's not critique, that we bring in photographers to talk about the images that, influence their creative growth. so we call it my five, and, it's photographers that show five images that, when they were starting out and learning photography had some meaning to them. and we talk about why and, for me, that's been a fascinating conversation to hear, how people saw photography and grew from it and the images that had some meaning to them. So The Crypt House on YouTube and my website, Jeff Larrison, then on Instagram, it's Jeff underscore Larrison, L A R A S O N.

New Jeff In out:

All right, let's go ahead and recap what we have learned today. But first, if you haven't heard, the Beginner Photography Podcast community is back on Facebook. Come on in, join. You can, join the group for free over at beginner photo pod. com forward slash group. And let me know what your biggest takeaway was from this interview with Jeff. Now, my biggest takeaways here were one to seek genuinely constructive criticism. Jeff. emphasizes the importance of this, specifically receiving specific and constructive feedback rather than just simple, good or bad judgments. So for you try to find that trusted community or group that respects your work and can provide in depth critiques. And as I mentioned earlier, the beginner photography podcast, Facebook group community is a great place to start if you got nowhere else. Second, engage with in person interactions. Again, while these like virtual feedbacks, can be beneficial, in person interaction will always offer just more of a unique opportunity to physically not only interact with Prince, but also just to gain a different perspective. So start looking, or start your own local, critique group yourself to foster this, not only personal growth, but also the meaningful conversations around photography. And lastly, explore various avenues for sharing and learning. Platforms like Instagram can really be limiting for truly understanding photography. So consider engaging with books, art shows, and These face to face discussions. It's when we expand into these in person events that can really help your photography gain just greater meaning and emotional impact. Again, those are my biggest takeaways from today's interview with Jeff Larson. I'd love to hear yours in the beginner photography podcast community, which again, you can join over at beginnerphotopod. com forward slash group. And that is it today until next week. Remember the more that you shoot today, the better of a photographer you will be. Tomorrow. Talk soon.