#1 On Google

In this day of technology, you know when you have arrived in at least once sense when you've reached the top of the Google Search - and I have!

When you look up Steven M. Johnson in either Google Web Search or Google Images, you will either see my photography Web site, or you will see two of my photographs on http://www.jpgmag.com/.

I was actually #3 on Google for a while, but I guess somehow I moved up to the #1 position. Perhaps it's from all my activity on LinkedIN?

Whatever the reason, it's nice that if anyone looks up Steven M. Johnson, I will be the first person they find.

It's Been a While...

I know I know...I haven't blogged since last year. Well I haven't done a lot lately in terms of photography that was worth mentioning until recently.

I lost my inspiration for a while. I wasn't photographing people, and I didn't travel anywhere after Ensenada that I felt I could get any good pictures. Things were pretty stagnant for a while. However, I went to a networking event for people living in Orange County through the social networking site LinkedIN. Unlike Facebook and MySpace, LinkedIn specializes in people who want to network for their career, not to meet friends and date. I've found it to be a really good site and highly recommend it.

So I went to a live event to meet with other business people in Orange County and do some networking regarding my daytime job which is e-Learning design and development. The other reason why I really wanted to go to this event is because it was being hosted at the studio of Steve Anderson Photography. You should check out his site, he's got some great stuff, and I wanted to pick his brain.

So I went to the event and mingled with a few people for a while until I was introduced to Mr. Anderson himself. He is a very nice guy, and he was more than happy to give advice to a few of us up-and-coming photographers who showed up to this LinkedIn event. He also told us all a bit of advice that I had heard before, but needed to hear again - find yourself a niche. Specialize. Those that specialize in a particular type of photography are more successful than those who don't.

I had heard this before, and that's one of the reasons why I decided to try and make my brand more people-based. I don't think I have the patience for weddings, but people photography tends to be popular, so I thought doing portraits would be more lucrative than just landscapes. The problem is, there are a lot of photographers out there (like Steve Anderson) who do portrait work, AND they have nice studios with lights and fancy equipment that I can't afford as a part-time photographer. They also take some great pictures. That's some tough competition in an already ultra-competitive field.

So I pondered...and I thought. I love photography, and I didn't want to give it up, but I didn't think doing portraits was the right path for me. But if not portraits - what was my brand? What would my niche be? What could I do to set myself apart from others? Then I had an epiphany, although the answer had been in front of me the whole time.

From the very beginning when I studied with Robert Hansen, he thought my pier pictures at sunset should be my emphasis because they were my strongest work. I had resisted because I didn't want to be a one-trick pony just taking shots of piers all the time. But as I looked back at my work, particularly my most popular ones - including many of my pier pictures, I noticed they all had one look in common - they were all long exposures. My most popular photos purchased on http://www.istockphoto.com/ were long exposures. My most viewed pictures of Flickr were long exposures. My most creative work in New York were long exposures. The kind of photography that excited me the most almost always involved long exposures.

So that's it. That's my niche. That's my emphasis. That's my strength. I am a long exposure photographer.

With this in mind, I've already thought of lots of other images I can't wait to create. Of course, I always have in the back of my mind, "What if this leads nowhere? Should I have stuck with just doing portraits?" Well another thing I learned from Steve Anderson is to go with your passion, and my passion involves taking long exposures. It's what I love to do, and it's what I'm doing, and hopefully one day it will be noticed and bring me success as a photographer.

And if it doesn't - I'm going to have a lot of fun doing it anyway.

Cruising Ensenada

Just got back from a short cruise to Ensenada for my sister-in-law's birthday. The food was good and we had calm seas. I got a few shots from town that I thought helped capture a feel for the area. Enjoy!

A Weekend in Big Bear

So this weekend my wife and I escaped off to Big Bear. I did some research and found a cute little Bed & Breakfast called the Knickerbocker Mansion. Not only is it a B&B, but it also has its own bistro that serves quite the wonderful upscale dinners on Saturday nights (Friday nights is casual dining). You can read more about it at their website, but I highly recommend it. Two cute little details - they had two home-made mint truffles for us waiting on our bed when we arrived (which were delicious), and there was a cute rubber ducky waiting on the edge of our shower/tub.

While we were there, we went on an off-roading tour which made any ride at a theme park feel like childs play. We were told it was an "educational tour" and not an "e-ticket ride." Well it was more like a Z-ticket ride, but we spoke with the owner of the company and he made things right, so we will try them again, albeit with a different driver.

We also went to our first Ocktober Fest. While we did not ourselves participate in the Chicken Dance, or any of the other traditional dances the event is known for, both my wife and I did have one German beer a piece and that was plenty. It was actually a lot of fun and everybody was having a good time even before they got intoxicated.

Two other places we ate that I highly recommend if you want good food in Big Bear are Get the Burger and The Mandoline. Fantastic! If you are a fan of In & Out, you will LOVE Get the Burger. Just be sure to order it "Raccoon Style," which means they put a special spicy sauce in the beef patty and they carmelize the onions. The other place we went - where we actually had dinner one day and lunch a couple days later was The Mandoline. Fantastic food. Fantastic desserts. I wish this place was in Orange County and not all the way in Big Bear. You can see the menu for both Get the Burger and The Mandoline here.

All-in-all, a wonderful trip. Now we need to go back after the snow has fallen and we can do some serious snowboarding and skiing!

Walker Mashup

I found a cool new way to mashup photographs and put them together to music. I've been experimenting with it and created one based on photographs I did of Walker, who you can see on my website. Take a look for yourself:

Success with iStockphoto.com

Well it's been a few months since I uploaded some photos of mine to iStockphoto.com. So far the results have been good overall. I have two images that are somewhat popular. The one you see above has had 40 downloads already, and has been consistently downloaded since I first uploaded it.

While I don't think I'll be able to quit my day job based on royalties from iStockphoto, it's a nice affirmation that I've taken pictures that people find value in.

Samy's Photo Seminar - Sept. 29th

On Saturday, September 29th, I went to an event at the Orange County Fairgrounds hosted by Samy's Camera. Naturally they had vendors of all sorts there, but that was not the main attraction for me. What I was interested in was listening to professional wedding photographer Mike Colon talk about how he does photography.

I'd seen Mike's name in all sorts of photography magazines at the back where they have all the seminars and workshops and list the photographers who will be speaking. Seeing as Samy's put this seminar on for free (although technically I think Mike was sponsored by Apple for their product Aperature), I thought I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see him.

As I had hoped, the seminar was great! I was thrilled to learn that Mr. Colon has the same philosophy regarding philosophy that I do. The most important component of a photograph is that the "moment" is caught. The photo doesn't have to be technically perfect. What makes it a great picture is the moment it captures. That doesn't mean you don't do due dilligence to get a sound photo, but I think if you were to ask him, a technically wonderful picture with no emotion or feeling within it is soulless. Better a picture of a magic moment that isn't technically perfect than a perfectly technical photo with no magic in it.

Mr. Colon is also a big fan of using natural light whenever possible. He will even crank up the ISO to get the shot because he likes the grainy photo-journalistic look. I've always been taught that noise is not your friend, but he reminded us all that it used to be that film used to have that grainy look that was once considered "classic." If he does use flash, he tries to set it up so the light looks like it is naturally coming from somewhere, rather than an obvious use of flash. Hey - the guy makes a great living taking photos of celebrity weddings and shooting for major magazines and advertisers, clearly he's doing something right.

It was a great seminar, and I picked up yet more nuggets of knowledge I can apply to my own photography. In my opinion you can never learn enough...