Every photographer needs permission to suck. And I mean that literally. In this episode, I explore the difference between accidental failure and strategic failure, and why that difference will determine whether you spend your career playing it safe or actually growing into the photographer you're meant to become.

From my own lighting disaster at a corporate shoot to Jerry Seinfeld's brutal honesty about audience judgment, we dive into how the greatest creatives use failure as a laboratory for growth. Learn why test shoots are your creative lifeline, how Roger Deakins broke convention to create cinematic magic in Skyfall, and why Ira Glass's famous "gap" between taste and ability is actually a feature, not a bug.

Key Topics Covered

• The Anatomy of Avoidable Failure: Why I overcomplicated a simple lighting setup and what it taught me about scouting, team structure, and the control illusion
• The Comedy Club Method: How comedians like Jerry Seinfeld test material in low-stakes environments and what photographers can learn from their approach
• Strategic vs. Random Failure: The four pillars of testing that turn mistakes into data
• Roger Deakins' Skyfall Innovation: How the master cinematographer used LED panels as primary lighting to create one of Bond's most iconic scenes
• The Ira Glass Creative Gap: Why the distance between your taste and ability never fully closes—and why that's exactly what keeps you growing
• Reframing Failure as Data: How to approach creative setbacks with scientific curiosity instead of personal inadequacy

Featured Audio Clips

• Jerry Seinfeld - "The Best of Jerry Seinfeld" (Netflix Is A Joke): On the relationship between comedians and their audience
• Ira Glass - On the creative gap between taste and ability (original clip source unknown)

Music Credits

• Max Richter - "On The Nature of Daylight" (transitional music)
• Additional music provided by The Blue Dot Sessions (used under The Blanket License)
• Additional music provided by Epidemic Sound

Referenced Works & People

• Roger Deakins - Cinematographer (Blade Runner 2049, No Country for Old Men, The Shawshank Redemption, Fargo, 1917, Skyfall)
• Jerry Seinfeld - Comedian and creator of Seinfeld
• Ira Glass - Host and creator of This American Life
• Chris Rock - Comedian referenced for his methodical approach to material testing

Your Assignment

Schedule a test shoot this month. Not someday when you have more time or better gear, in the next 30 days. Pick one specific thing you want to explore:

• One lighting technique you're curious about
• One narrative approach you're afraid to try with clients
• One stylistic choice that feels risky but intriguing

Write it down. Put it on your calendar. Treat it like the professional development it actually is. Give yourself permission to suck spectacularly—because bombing in private is how you learn to shine in public.

Connect With The Show

Leave a Voicemail: Share your own creative failures, test shoot discoveries, or questions about strategic experimentation at terriblephotographer.com/voicemail

Get Field Notes Newsletter: Weekly insights on creativity, identity, and finding your voice as a photographer. Sign up at terriblephotographer.com

Resources Mentioned

• Test shoot planning and execution strategies
• The four pillars of strategic failure framework
• Environmental lighting philosophy and practical application
• Creative audit questions for identifying growth opportunities

One phone call. One late invoice. One moment of controlled but very real rage. In this episode, I unpack a recent client conflict that left me feeling powerful, anxious, vindicated—and deeply uncomfortable. It’s not about being right. It’s about what happens when your nervous system hijacks your ethics, and you end up blowing up the wrong bridge.

Social psychologist Jamie Hughes joins to help me understand what the hell happened inside my brain—and how anger, justice, trauma, dopamine, and freelance stress all get tangled up when money’s tight and respect feels scarce.

It’s about accountability. It’s about empathy. It’s about not turning into the thing you’re fighting.

Listen if you’ve ever:

• Been ghosted by a client after delivering your best work.
• Sent an email you were 90% sure you’d regret—but hit send anyway.
• Felt the righteous, electric satisfaction of finally standing up for yourself… and then the quiet shame that followed.
• Wondered why you get excited when you’re angry, even though your whole body is on fire.

Featuring:

• The HPA axis and why your shoulders hurt when you’re mad
• ADHD and justice sensitivity (why fairness feels life-or-death)
• How financial pressure rewires your empathy
• Why anger feels good… and why that should scare you
• What empathy actually looks like when the system sucks
• The guilt that follows a justified overreaction

Special Guest:

Jamie Hughes

Social Psychologist, Trauma Specialist, and Certified Life Coach

📲 @managing.mental.health

🔗 Website + Resources: beacons.ai/managing_mental_health

📩 Got a story?

If you’ve ever burned a bridge and still think about it in the shower five years later, I’d love to hear it.

Not to fix it. Not to absolve you. Just to witness it.

👉 Email: [email protected]

💬 Help Me Be Terrible, Together:

If this episode hit you, leave a review on Apple Podcasts. I’ll probably read it on air in the most awkward, self-deprecating way possible.

Music Licensed via Epidemic Sound and Artlist.io

There are shoots where everything clicks.

The light is magic. The client is chill. The work feels effortless.

This episode isn’t about those.

Instead, we’re going into the plumbing.

Literally.

From overflowing toilets in luxury villas to Fortune 500 invoice purgatory, from last-minute gear fails to moments that remind you why you ever picked up a camera in the first place — this one’s for every photographer (and creative) who’s quietly asked themselves:

Turns out? It is.

But maybe that’s not a bad thing.

Because hidden under the chaos, the duct tape, and the missed payments…

there’s still something worth fighting for. And sometimes, the most honest thing you can say is:

And maybe that’s the most romantic thing you’ll ever say about your career.

🧰 Mentioned in this episode:

• Client disasters (featuring two Kyles, mushroom water, and sewage)
• Scope creep and hostage negotiation skills
• Invoice limbo with billion-dollar brands
• A failed choir shoot and a thousand-dollar mistake
• The shoot that broke your heart in the best way possible
• Why the photos are just the receipt

📬 Stay connected

If this episode made you feel seen, stolen from, or slightly less alone—

subscribe to The Terrible Newsletter:

👉 terriblephotographer.com

You’ll get Field Notes, updates, and the occasional nudge to keep going.

🙏 Support the show

If you’re enjoying the podcast, please rate and review it on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

It helps more misfit creatives find their way here.

And honestly, it just feels good to know someone’s listening.

Credits

Music in this episode is licensed through Epidemic Sound and Artlist.io.
Episode Photo by Gryffyn

What happens when the thing you made in the dark suddenly ends up in the spotlight? This week, Patrick gets personal about the strange pressure of being “featured,” and why attention might be the most creatively dangerous drug of all.

From a viral photo in the dunes to the slow collapse of chasing relevance, this episode dives into the algorithm’s indifference to honesty, the myth of momentum, and what Johnny Cash’s American Recordings can still teach us about making art that matters.

This is for the ones who still believe in disappearing. In pausing. In letting the light hit you… without immediately bottling it.

Includes a clip from “The Beast in Me” by Johnny Cash (used with reverence, not profit).

All other music licensed via Artist.io.

Episode photograph by Casey Horner — Instagram: @mischievous_penguins.

"I thought the work would save me. I was grossly mistaken."

What happens when a stranger on Clubhouse calls you a technician instead of an artist? Patrick breaks down the brutal midnight conversation that cracked open everything he thought he knew about his photography career. From the golden handcuffs of corporate work to the humbling reality of freelancing for $650, this episode is about dismantling the fantasy of what creative success looks like.

No metaphors. No inspiration porn. Just the uncomfortable truth about technical skill versus authentic voice, and why sometimes the thing you think defines you is actually limiting you.

Part one of a two-part series on creative deconstruction and what comes after.

In this episode:

• A photo campaign that felt more like forgery
• The invisible shift from artist to technician
• Why being trusted isn’t the same as being seen
• The quiet way burnout creeps in
• What I learned after walking away

Light Leak: A Creative Check-In

Are you being hired for your vision, or just your ability to mimic someone else’s?

Grab The Darkroom – a free guide to creative clarity and finding your artistic voice

 terriblephotographer.com/darkroom-download

Music licensed via Artlist.io

Audio excerpt from Conan O’Brien’s farewell message on The Tonight Show (2010). Used under fair use for commentary and inspiration. All rights belong to NBC/Universal.

Subscribe, support, or scream into the void at: terriblephotographer.com

Email me: [email protected] – I’m always interested to hear your thoughts, ideas, and read hate mail. I respond to every message.

Follow: @patrickfore & @terriblephotographer

Everyone loves a comeback story. But what about the part where you’re just… sitting in a garage at 2 a.m., surrounded by half-charged batteries, broken gear, and a growing sense that something inside you might be cracking?

This episode isn’t about triumph. It’s about that strange, quiet middle, the one nobody posts about, where you’re not broken, not healed… just angry. Angry at the industry. Angry at yourself. Angry at the space between who you are and who you thought you’d be by now.

But that anger? Maybe it’s not a problem to solve. Maybe it’s fuel.

Topics Include:

• The weird middle space between burnout and breakthrough
• How anger can be creative fuel—if you let it
• Why “healing” and “finding joy” aren’t the point
• The choice to keep working, even when the work feels pointless
• Depression, resistance, and what it means to show up anyway

Opening Song:

“Demons” by The National
Used under license. All rights to 4AD Records and the artists.

Support the band at: americanmary.com

All other music provided by:

🎧 Artlist.io

Mentioned in the Episode:

• A broken laptop stand
• The hum of depression
• That 2 a.m. garage air
• The space where the butterfly might land

Subscribe to the Newsletter + Get the Free Download:

Want more of this kind of honest, no-BS creative conversation?

Subscribe to The Terrible Newsletter and get The Darkroom — a free digital download about making real work in dark seasons.

 terriblephotographer.com/thedarkroom

What happens when you still love photography but start to wonder if there’s any place left for you in the industry?

In this raw, vulnerable episode, Patrick Fore gets brutally honest about what it means to be a working photographer in 2025. From a moment of personal crisis in a cluttered garage to the soul-draining grind of cold outreach and algorithm-chasing, this episode pulls back the curtain on the emotional and existential cost of staying in the game.

You’ll hear:

• Why radical honesty might be the only antidote to creative burnout
• The tension between art and commerce, and why it matters more than ever
• A reflection on the dark side of the photography education economy
• A personal story about hitting the wall, and choosing not to walk away
• A deeper dive into the concept of Flow vs. Resistance, and how to find your way back to meaning in the chaos

Whether you’re a full-time freelancer, a weekend warrior, or someone questioning the whole damn thing, this episode isn’t about pretending. It’s about naming the mess, wrestling with it, and finding a way to keep going.

📬 Subscribe to Field Notes, the weekly companion to the podcast:

https://www.terriblephotographer.com

💬 Let’s connect:

Instagram @TerriblePhotographer

Newsletter: Field Notes (via Substack)

Book: Lessons From a Terrible Photographer (coming soon)
Email me - [email protected]

Credits:

This episode contains a referenced clip from “How to enter ‘flow state’ on command” by Steven Kotler for Big Think (Watch here) and a short excerpt (under 30 seconds) from Pixar’s Soul, used to illustrate the concept of creative flow.

Music provided by and licensed through Artlist.io.

Episode Title:

Why Shapes How

On Intention, Execution, and the Lie of Objectivity

Description:

You can nail the lighting. Get the shot. Hit all the settings.

But if you don’t know why you’re making the image, it’s just visual noise.

In this episode of The Terrible Photographer Podcast, we dig into the lie at the heart of modern photography — that technical mastery is the pinnacle of the craft. It’s not. Intent is. And most people are scared of it.

We talk motorcycle maintenance, emotionally hollow images, and what happens when a “family photo session” turns into something that actually means something.

Whether you shoot portraits, weddings, branding, or weird experimental self-portraits at 2am with a desk lamp, this episode is a reminder: your camera doesn’t make meaning. You do.

Inside this episode:

• Why so many photographers stop learning once they hit “base camp”
• The family shoot example that reveals what intentional work really looks like
• The myth of photographic objectivity — and why your perspective always leaks in
• Why TikTok’s rough, real content hits harder than a polished campaign
• What separates technically perfect images from the ones that actually stick

Want to go deeper?

Sign up for Field Notes — a free weekly email for photographers who want something more honest than gear reviews and Instagram hacks.

When you sign up, you’ll get the first chapter of my book Lessons From a Terrible Photographer — in PDF andaudio, delivered straight to your inbox.

👉 Get it at www.terriblephotographer.com

Credits:

• Music licensed and used by permission through Artlist.io
• Episode Art Photography by Earl Wilcox – shot in Santa Barbara.

This episode wasn’t planned.

But with federal troops deployed in Los Angeles, students arrested, immigrants targeted, and journalists silenced — it felt dishonest to pretend everything was normal.

In this special essay-style episode, I explore the role of photography in moments of protest and power:

• Why the frame is never neutral
• How truth is shaped, and sometimes distorted, by the camera
• The difference between documenting and performing
• What it means to be a witness, not a tourist

I also share a powerful on-the-ground reflection from LA-based photographer @chelsealaurenla, whose words remind us that not everything makes the news, but it still matters.

If you’ve ever questioned whether photography can change anything… this one’s for you.

Mentions & Resources:

• Follow Chelsea Lauren: instagram.com/chelsealaurenla
• Music licensed by Artlist.io

Stay Connected:

Subscribe to Field Notes

The podcast is the campfire, Field Notes is what you take home. Field Notes is the weekly email companion to this podcast, one part creative letter, one part behind-the-scenes mess, all bullshit-free.

→ Sign up here

Learn more about the project at:

terriblephotographer.com

If this episode meant something to you, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

It helps more than you know.

At some point, every artist has to choose:

Keep making work that gets likes.

Or make work that actually says something.

This is an episode about the quiet uprising.

The moment you stop painting for the academy.

The moment you realize you’re not burned out from doing too much,  you’re burned out from doing too much that means nothing.

We start with a true (and strange) story from 1863, when fourteen painters staged a creative rebellion and changed the art world forever.

And then we bring it back to you. To now.

To that feeling you get when you scroll your own grid and wonder if any of it matters.

If any of it’s even yours.

This is The Revolt.

Not with swords. With silence.

With risk.

With art that doesn’t beg for applause.

Subscribe to Field Notes

The podcast is the campfire, Field Notes is what you take home. Field Notes is the weekly email companion to this podcast, one part creative letter, one part behind-the-scenes mess, all bullshit-free.

→ Sign up here

📬 Join the conversation on Substack

We’re building a community of artists who are tired of the hustle and hungry for something real.

→ terriblephotographer.substack.com

🎧 Music licensed via Art List

Header photo stolen lovingly from Wikipedia. Don’t tell the Louvre.

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