Iterations

I think one of the things that made Father Bill Moore so important to me was the fact that he was one of a small group of non-family members and non-friends to say that I had talent as a painter and that I had something to say with my work and he was one of an even smaller group of people who I would consider a mentor in my life. This is probably something for another time, but I don’t think you can seek out a mentor — not intentionally and not with any real specificity in terms of who that person will be. That’s the way I feel about all of the mentors in my life. I never sought them out, but somehow our paths crossed and my life was made better for it. And hopefully theirs were too.

LINKS

Father Bill Moore – https://frbillmoore.com/

The Father Bill Moore Foundation – https://fatherbill.art

The dA Center for the Arts – https://www.dacenter.org

Pomona Arts Colony – https://www.pomonaartscolony.com

Music in this episode:

Reconciled by Sean Williams

The Wrong Way by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers.

I think Ben Horne and I first talked about recording together in 2018, not long after I was introduced to his work. But as John Lennon famously said, “Life is what happens when you’re making other plans” and for one reason or another, we just couldn’t get our schedules in sync, but I am so grateful that we were able to circle back around and make this happen. I am a huge fan of Ben’s work. I think one of his superpowers as a photographer is capturing the quiet drama of big places — subjects and scenes that most of us would simply ignore if we even noticed them at all. It’s beautiful work and I’m happy to finally connect with Ben to talk about it.

LINKS
Zion National Park
Yosemite National Park
Death Valley National Park
Colorado Plateau Film Reveal
Ben’s Portfolio Box Set

CONNECT WITH BEN
Website: https://www.benhorne.com
Twitter: @BenHorne
Instagram: @benhornephoto

CONNECT WITH ME
Website: https://jefferysaddoris.com
Twitter: @jefferysaddoris
Instagram: @jefferysaddoris

MUSIC
Normalize by Stanley Gurvich
What Have We Lost by David James Terry
Please Listen Carefully by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

This post may contain affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I may earn a commission. Thanks.

While I’ve never really done one myself — not intentionally anyway — I am fascinated by long-term creative projects. I find the whole idea of intentionally and purposefully immersing yourself in something you know is going to take years to realize both inspiring and a little terrifying. But I guess if you find the right project, the challenges, obstacles and accidents both happy and unhappy make the journey of bringing whatever it is to life that much more rewarding.
Marc Wilson is a photographer in the UK who has completed two such projects back to back. From 2010 to 2014, he produced a body of work called 
The Last Stand
 which, in his words “aims to reflect the histories and stories military conflict and the memories held in the landscape itself.” In 2015, after releasing the body of work as a book, he began work on his next project, 
A Wounded Landscape – bearing witness to the Holocaust
, which is based around 22 Holocaust survivor stories. The six-year project, culminating in a 750-page book, was made at more than 160 locations and is told through more than 350 photographs, as well as transcripts of conversations, research and sound. I am so grateful for the opportunity to talk about this powerful and important body of work.

LINKS
Kickstarter for A Wounded Landscape – bearing witness to the Holocaust

CONNECT WITH MARC
Website: https://www.marcwilson.co.uk/
Twitter: @marcwilsonphoto
Instagram: @marcwilsonphoto

CONNECT WITH ME
Website: https://jefferysaddoris.com
Twitter: @jefferysaddoris
Instagram: @jefferysaddoris

MUSIC
Normalize by Stanley Gurvich
Mysa by Laurel Violet
Please Listen Carefully by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

This post may contain affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I may earn a commission. Thanks.

In the middle of 2019, Netflix launched a show called Blown Away, which is a competition show for glass artists. The promos looked terrific and I think Adrianne and I were hooked from pretty much the first episode. We binged the whole season and it became sort of our go to recommendation for our Netflix-watching friends. I even reached out to Alex Rosenberg, one of the contestants on the show, who I sat down with for an episode of Process Driven.
Fast forward to the beginning of this year when Netflix finally released season two of Blown Away and for the next ten episodes, Adrianne and I were right back in the hot shop with a new group of artists. And just like with season one, I knew I wanted to talk to one of the contestants and I knew exactly who I wanted it to be. Both Adrianne and I were fans of Elliot Walker straight away. There was just something about his demeanor in the shop, not to mention that we absolutely loved what he made on the show. I really resonated with his approach to the materials, and the sense of humor he brought to the pieces he was making. I also really connected with how he spoke about his partner Bethany, who is not only his girlfriend, but also his assistant, his muse, and the curator of their gallery, Blowfish Glass.

And just so you know, this conversation does contain spoilers. So if you haven’t seen season two, consider yourself warned.

LINKS
Blown Away on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/80215147
Blown Away on IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9908860/?ref_=ttep_ep_tt
Alexander Rosenberg on Process Driven: https://podcast.jefferysaddoris.com/1966802/10382137-process-driven-28-alexander-rosenberg

CONNECT WITH ELLIOT AND BETHANY
Gallery: https://www.blowfishglassart.com
Website: http://ewalkerglassart.co.uk
Instagram (Elliot): @ewalkerglassart
Instagram (Bethany): @bethjadewood

CONNECT WITH ME
Website: https://jefferysaddoris.com
Instagram: @jefferysaddoris

MUSIC
Reconciled by Sean Williams
Normalize by Stanley Gurvich
Please Listen Carefully by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. 

As many of you know, I currently produce three different podcasts, each with a different format and purpose. Process Driven is a deep dive conversation with a single artist to talk about what they do and why they do it. In Between is a conversation with a recurring group of co-hosts around a single topic or theme. Iterations is my audio journal — it’s shorter than the other two shows and it’s just me offering up thoughts or reflections around what I’ve recently been thinking about or trying to work through. As I said, each of these shows offers a different listening experience, but in many ways I see them as part of the same larger, ongoing conversation. As you might expect, each of the three shows has its own feed and if you want all of them, until last year you had to subscribe to all three individually. But early in 2020 I looked a little deeper at how people were listening to podcasts, and what I found was that most people don’t listen to every episode of every podcast they subscribe to. I know I don’t. Instead, they create playlists — cherry picking episodes from within a given show or even across multiple shows, which is exactly why I created my “Everything” feed. Listeners could now get all three shows, along with any one-off conversations or any future shows in one feed instead of multiples and they could just add episodes of my shows into the playlists they were already making.

My plan from the beginning was to ultimately deprecate the individual show feeds and JUST have Everything. I even confirmed it again in an episode I put out in January called “Setting the Intention for 2021.” But the more I think about it and the more Adrianne and I talk about it, the more I’m questioning whether killing off the individual feeds is the best way forward.

On the one hand, I can see where if you were unfamiliar with my shows — both past and present — and you went to my website for the first time, you might be a little confused seeing three different shows that, at least on the surface, all seem to deal with creativity and the creative process in one form or another.

On the other, maybe you are familiar with the me and my back catalog but you just aren’t interested in my monologues or random conversations and you only want to hear my conversations with other creatives deep diving their process.

Either way, having only a single feed for all that I do — despite my intentions behind it — might not be what you want as a listener. And one thing that I have learned from Adrianne is to meet people where they are, which means that if you are really only into one show, I don’t want to risk losing you as a listener because I’m forcing you to subscribe to shows that don’t really interest you. That doesn’t serve either of us.

Look, I would love it if everyone listened to everything I released – and maybe that’s a goal I can shoot for – but I need to earn it. So, for now, I’m going to keep all of the individual feeds active and keep trying to meet you where you are.

CONNECT WITH ME
If you've got questions or feedback, you can connect with me on Twitter and Instagram @jefferysaddoris. If you’d prefer something more direct, you can email me at [email protected].

Music in this episode
Funk It Up by Steve Poloni
In the Clouds by Be Still the Earth

Music in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music and sound effects licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

WANT TO SUPPORT THE WORK I'M DOING?

Subscribe to Everything:

In Process Driven 37, I had part one of this two part conversation with Documentarist, Jack Lowe. And while you don’t need to have listened to part one to enjoy this conversation, I invite you to go back and listen to it if you haven’t. Among other things, we talked about the origins of Jack’s Lifeboat Station Project, which has him traveling to all 238 lifeboat stations around the UK in his mobile darkroom Neena to make photographs with his 12×10 inch wet plate camera. In this conversation, we talk about some of the motivations for the project and the supportive community that has grown around it, as well as what Jack hopes people will take away from the body of work as a whole. And just as we did in part one, we go down a few rabbit holes and, of course, talk a bit more about 
The Life Aquatic
.

LINKS

The Life Aquatic

Part One of this conversation

CONNECT WITH JACK
Website: https://lifeboatstationproject.com
Twitter: @ProjectLifeboat

MUSIC
Reconciled by Sean Williams
Normalize by Stanley Gurvich
Please Listen Carefully by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

This post may contain affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I may earn a commission. Thanks.

At the beginning of the year, I released an episode called
Setting the Intention for 2021, and one of the things I talked about was how I wanted to make some changes to my shows, both in who I approach to record with and in how I actually produce and edit the episodes, for example using music and sound effects to enhance the ambience or atmosphere of an episode when it’s appropriate and serves the story.

The first person I met on the back of all of this was Jack Lowe and I can’t really even tell you where I first heard his name or saw photos from his Lifeboat Station Project – most likely it was something that popped up on Twitter which over the past several months has become a terrific way for me to discover new work and connect with interesting people. Regardless, once I dove into a bit of Jack’s work, I knew I wanted to talk to him.

LINKS
Ambient Isolation: https://www.ambientisolation.com
Matthew George Tuckey: @MGTuckey
Jack’s Dawn Chorus: https://m.soundcloud.com/mrjacklowe/sets/dawn-chorus
Daniel Meadows: https://www.photobus.co.uk
Anthony Hopkins’ “Be bold…”: https://twitter.com/AnthonyHopkins/status/1344008299490861056

JACK'S FIELD RECORDING KIT
MixPre-3 II: https://www.sounddevices.com/mixpre/
DPA 6060 Spaced Stereo Pair: https://www.dpamicrophones.com
Audio-Technica M40X: https://www.audio-technica.com/en-us/ath-m40x

CONNECT WITH JACK
Website: https://lifeboatstationproject.com
Twitter: @ProjectLifeboat

MUSIC
Reconciled by Sean Williams
Normalize by Stanley Gurvich
Please Listen Carefully by Jahzzar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

This post may contain affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something, I may earn a commission. Thanks.

One of the hardest things about being an artist — beyond the actual making of the art — is deciding how to value the work we make. For many of us — and I’m putting myself squarely in the middle on this — the art I make is very personal, even though visually it may not seem like it. And, if I’m being honest, it’s not just the art, but the design, the podcasts, the books, basically anything that I’m applying any sort of purposeful effort into is personal. And isn’t that the way it should be? I know this might be a corny reference but saying that just now reminded me of a movie with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan called you’ve got mail. Meg plays Kathleen, the owner of this little book shop in New York and Tom plays Joe, the owner of a big box book chain that ends up forcing Kathleen to close her shop, which coincidentally belonged to her mother. Anyway, at one point in the movie Joe apologizes to Kathleen for driving her out of business, saying that it was nothing personal. Kathleen, says something like “What is that supposed to mean? All that means is that it wasn't personal to you. But it was personal to me. And what's so wrong with being personal, anyway? Whatever else anything is, it oughta begin by being personal.” And that’s pretty much how I feel about the things that I make. The things I make are personal, they’re not just products. And all of this is part of a recent conversation with Jon Wilkening that began with a deceptively simple question.

CONNECT

You can find me on Twitter and Instagram @jefferysaddoris. Or you can email me at [email protected]. You can find Jon on Twitter and Instagram @jonwilkening or on his website at jonwilkening.com.

Music in this episode:
Reconciled by Sean Williams
Faster featuring Helios Armor by Skygaze

All of the music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

WANT TO SUPPORT THE WORK I'M DOING?

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Pocket Casts | Overcast | RSS | Spotify

Tell Your Friends & Share on Social Media: You can even share a favorite show clip using the terrific Recast feature. I’ve made a video showing you how: Create Custom Audiograms with Recast by Simplecast - YouTube

Buy a copy of my book: Photography by the Letter

Like many of you, I could not be happier to finally be rid of the raging dumpster fire that was 2020. I know the next year will be anything but easy, but I am cautiously optimistic that 2021 will be filled with new possibilities and chances to do things a little differently than last year.

I started doing yoga about a month ago and Adrianne reminded me that there’s a concept in yoga about setting an intention at the beginning of a practice and while I’m not a fan of resolutions per se, I wanted to share a few things today that I’ve been thinking about for a while as a way of setting my intentions for the year ahead.

To that end, I want to let you know about some of the changes that I’m making both personally and professionally moving forward.

Let’s start with my shows. Early in 2020 I created a new feed called “Jeffery Saddoris: Everything” as a way for you to get everything I release, including Process Driven, In Between, Iterations, and any sort of one-off conversation, like the recent chat with Bill Wadman, all in one place. The response to that feed has been terrific – in fact subscriptions to the individual feeds have dropped off considerably as subscriptions to Everything have increased. It’s not one to one, but it’s enough that I’m going to deprecate the individual show feeds so that moving forward, I will only be publishing new episodes to Jeffery Saddoris: Everything. If you’re already subscribed to Everything, great. You will continue to get all of the episodes that I release, which should be not only easier to manage under just one feed but also more frequent since I don’t have to try to figure out where a particular conversation fits. If you are subscribed to one or more of the individual show feeds, please subscribe to Everything so you don’t miss anything moving forward.

And I want you to know that I’ve thought about this quite a bit. I know there are some of you who might only want to listen to Process Driven and this move might initially feel like kind of a bummer. But, I think the way we listen to podcasts has changed, partially because there are so many. I know it’s definitely changed for me over the last few years. I subscribe to dozens of shows and only a very few do I listen to every episode. Instead, I simply create playlists of the episodes that look interesting to me, and the trends show that I’m not in the minority here.

One of the things I’ve struggled with for quite a while is monetizing the work I do – and that goes for all of the work I do, from design work for clients to selling my paintings to whether or not to run ads on my podcasts. And without getting too deep into it here, it all revolves around self-worth and how I assign or ascribe value to the work I do. But I think I’ve come up with a solution that Adrianne and I have been talking about for a while now. A few days ago I tweeted a Venn Diagram with creativity on one side and philanthropy on the other and that place in the middle of those two things is where I want to be. So the solution we’ve come up with is that we’re going to donate the majority of any revenue that my creative endeavors generate into arts education and related non-profits. We’ll have details on the actual organizations soon, but the big picture is that this allows me to value the work I do in a way other than what it can do for me. It actually becomes more valuable in that the worth of it directly helps more than just me. I’m incredibly excited about it and again more details are forthcoming but that’s the big picture.

I think that’s enough for the moment. As I said, I’ll have more details around all of this in the coming weeks. If you have questions or comments, you can find me on Twitter or Instagram @jefferysaddoris or you can email me at [email protected]. As always, thank you for your time and your attention and for coming along with

If you were an On Taking Pictures listener, you know how all over the place some of the conversations with Bill Wadman and me tended to get and this one is no exception. We talk a little about gear, a little about process and a little about whatever tangent we happen to feel like following. In other words, just a normal chat between friends who have literally hundreds of hours of recorded conversations behind them.

SHOW NOTES

Sound Devices MixPre - https://www.sounddevices.com/mixpre/
RØDECaster Pro - https://www.rode.com/rodecasterpro/
Apple Big Sur - https://www.apple.com/macos/big-sur/
Gary Yost - http://www.garyyost.com
Oculus - https://www.oculus.com/

CONNECT

Connect with Bill: Website | Instagram | Twitter

Connect with me on Instagram and Twitter @jefferysaddoris or on my website at jefferysaddoris.com. If you’ve got questions or feedback, email me at [email protected].

Music in this episode:
Five to One by Steve Poloni

All of the music featured in this episode is licensed from Artlist.io, which is a terrific music licensing platform for YouTubers and filmmakers. Use the following link to get two additional months of Artlist.io free when you sign up: https://bit.ly/JS_Artlist

WANT TO SUPPORT THE WORK I'M DOING?

Subscribe & Review: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Overcast | Google Podcasts

Tell Your Friends & Share Episodes Online: You can even share a favorite show clip using the terrific Recast feature. I’ve made a video showing you how: Create Custom Audiograms with Recast by Simplecast - YouTube

Buy a copy of my book: Photography by the Letter

Affiliate Link Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links for which I earn a small commission if you make a purchase (at no additional cost to you). If I’m including an affiliate link, it’s for something I actually believe in.