Photographically Seeing

Are you ready to learn and understand how you eyes work—and how to make your visual perception sharper and better fit for the task of finding potential photographs? My new eBook “Photographically Seeing—Seeing Better, Seeing Deeper” will take your seeing—and thus your photography—to the next level.

For a photographer, seeing is where it all really starts. If you don’t see anything that interests you, you won’t be able to take any interesting photos. Obviously. However, there is a big difference between seeing in general and seeing with the intention of taking photographs.

“Photographically Seeing—Seeing Better, Seeing Deeper” will take you on a journey into how our eyes and brain work and teach you how you can develop and train your perceptive skills.

By training your perceptiveness, you not only improve your ability to discover and see potential subjects better and thus are able to create stronger and better photographs, but the opposite is also true. In the process of photographing, you train yourself to see more deliberately and clearer. The camera can consequently help liberate your awareness to see clearly and keenly, to know something about who you really are, and open your being to an unfading swell of empathy and compassion for those you meet along the way.

Maybe it’s time to discover how to see again? By taking the time to truly focus on what it is you see you’ll be able to create more engaging photos. Rediscover what it is you really see, and you will probably find that your photos will change dramatically. Good seeing doesn’t ensure good photography by itself, though, but a captivating photographic expression is impossible without it.

“Photographically Seeing—Seeing Better, Seeing Deeper” is 106 pages packed with useful information and practical exercises to make to see what is rather than what you believe is there.

Order the book “Photographically Seeing—Seeing Better, Seeing Deeper”

Back in Business

As some of you may have noticed, I am slowly getting myself back into the blog sphere after a longer summer break. Slowly meaning I posted my first “Last Week’s Instagram” here on my blog earlier this week. And from now on I will be back fully and once again committed to writing about photography and creativity.

The break was necessary to gather strength and momentum and inspiration, not only for blogging, but for life in general. I needed some air under my wings, get free from the daily chores—as we all do from time to time.

However, it’s not been anything close to a normal summer break. I have actually worked, but with tasks I have long wanted to do and not found time for. The worldwide corona outbreak certainly limited the usual summer activities I would normally embark on, such as travelling, visiting friends and just get away, anywhere. Instead I have, yes, worked.

That doesn’t sound much like a break, you may object. For me it was. Just changing the daily routine makes a big difference. But work? Yes, that too, when it’s fun. This summer I have built a new online program. Unfortunately, it won’t be something for most of you, since it’s targeting a Norwegian audience and a very specific such. More interesting I hope, is the new eBook about seeing photographically, that I finally have finished this summer.

It’s been years in coming, the text long been ready, but I just haven’t found time to put it all together and layout the pages. Well, this break changed that. I still have a few tweaks to do before I will release the book, but the photo following this post is the front page and a little teaser for what to come.

The eBook goes into details about what it takes a photographer to be able to see and understand what can become a photo. Seeing is where it all starts. If you don’t see anything worth photographing, you won’t be able take captivating photos. Naturally. So “Photographically Seeing—See Better, See Deeper” will teach you how to open up your eyes.

That’s all I will say for now. Of course, I will be back with an announcement soon, when I am ready to launch the book.

On different note: I hope you all have been able to enjoy the summer here on the northern and the winter on the southern hemisphere, even with the limitation imposed by the corona outbreak.

It’s good to be back.

When Time Is in Shortage

After I launched of my eBook 10 Great Tips to Take Better Photos last week, the reception has been above all expectations. Thanks to all of you, who gave me encouraging comments or kind-hearted feedback—and not the least, thank you to all who bought the book. It’s been a ride on high winds, taken me to a place of pure joy and making me want to start writing new books almost right away.

It has also reminded me of my intention I mentioned on this blog earlier this year, all the way back in January. Back then, I wrote that I had great plans for this blog of mine; I wanted to redesign the site and add more values in various ways to my readership. As such, this eBook is for me the first step in this direction. However, the reminder is in the fact that I had actually expected to also have redesigned my blog by now, as well as having launched more ideas and added new features.

The thing is—and I am sure you have experienced the same—sometimes we want to do so much, while time is holding us back or limiting how much we are actually capable of doing. There is just not enough time to go around. At least that’s our perception. It’s easy to get discouraged and stressed out by this apparent time lack. I have had to tell myself to lay such thoughts aside, not to discourage myself. I simply need to give myself some slack—we all need to do so, I would assume. Sometimes we push so hard, that nothing will ever get close to create a feeling of satisfaction no matter how much we actually are capable of doing.

In the end, I believe it’s better to be ambitious, have many plans, maybe more than is realistically pursuable, than sitting back and not push for much or anything at all. Some ideas may not be able to fly at all, some may need time to be transformed into reality, and maybe, in the end, only a few will reach realisation. It’s still so much better than doing nothing. In my opinion at least.

Another factor adds to this time balance. We have all heard and have probably experienced that time is relative. Isn’t it so that when we feel time is running short, we don’t manage to get much done—no matter how much or little we set out to do. The opposite is true, too, isn’t it? When we feel we are in no shortage of time there is no limit to how much we can get done.

Time is a mental state. We can actually control time. Of course, time never stops, but our experience of time is very much a result of our mental state. If we can relax our mind and not worry about time, there will suddenly be plenty of time. When you feel stressed out for time, try to impose a thought inside of you that there is plenty of time, and suddenly you will start to relax, stress down and time doesn’t feel like a shortage any more.

The last many months—or probably years—I have been flying around feeling the shortage of time. Never being satisfied with myself, never feeling I could get enough done. Launching the eBook actually provided me with a break. First of all because I had finished one of my projects that I had long been working on and wanted to finish, but never really had time for. However and even more importantly, the positive response on the book made me rethink my approach to time and gave me space to relax. This last week, I have allowed myself to think there is plenty of time for all I want to accomplish. It may sound strange, but suddenly it feels as if there is no shortage of time. It is really a mental state.

As a reaction to all this newfound time, I have decided to push on even harder. A couple of weeks ago I met up with Mary Shoobridge, a blogger that I have only had contact with in cyberspace. In mid-August she and her husband visited Bergen, my hometown, and we met face to face for the first—but hopefully not the last—time. One of the things that I brought back from that meeting, besides a very pleasant couple of hours with the two of them, was a question from Mary. She was inquiring about my Picture Critique I have in earlier years offered on this blog. When would I do it again? When I checked, the fact is that last time was back in spring 2015. Since then I have not had time to open up for another around of picture critique again. Well, with my newfound time and not the least because of Mary’s request, I will start a new round later this month. It will be duly announced here. However if you think it could be worthwhile to receive feedback on a photo of yours, you now have some time to either capture a new photo or search your archive for one you would like to have a second opinion about.

Furthermore, I want to flow with this positive response that the eBook has created. I am ready to start working on new books about photography as well as creativity. The question is where to start? I have far to many ideas for new books. So I have decided to ask you blogger-friends. Do you have any thoughts, any desires, any photo eBook you may feel the need for? Is there any theme I might be able to help you with through such an eBook? Please let me know. I will be delighted if you would like to give me some feedback.

By the way, if you haven’t gotten my new eBook 10 Great Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Point-and-Shoot Camera, you will find more information and may buy it on my website www.munchow.no.

Facts about the photo: The photo was taken a Canon EOS 1D with 28-135 mm lens set to 28 mm. Shutter speed: 1/125 s. Aperture: f/11. The photo was processed in Lightroom and Photoshop.

10 Great Tips to Take Better Photos

I am very proud to announce that my first eBook about photograph is out today. It’s a book I have been working on over the last year—on and off, of course. Now it’s finally available. For me this is a natural extension of my desire to teach and help anyone interested in taking better picture. The eBook (and the next to come) will be an addition to the workshops I teach all over the world as well as my online workshops.

10 Great Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Point-and-Shoot Camera addresses a handful of challenges that most photographers struggle with. Over 45 pages this eBook will give you a handful of great tips (and some more background to better understand the camera) to improve you photos and make your photos connect with the viewers. The intention is to help you make better pictures without getting too technical or talk too much about visual language or composition.

My intention has also been to make it affordable to most people, which means that for only 5 dollars you get access to download the eBook (as a PDF-document) .

10 Great Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Point-and-Shoot Camera is packed with useful information, tips and great photography. The language is down to earth and not technical at all. It aims for photographers not quite confident with the photographic process yet, but who want to learn more and improve their photography. If you are struggling with getting your photos look good or too often find that your photos don’t quite capture what you had in mind then 10 Great Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Point-and-Shoot Camera is a book for you.

To get this book published is for me very exciting. I have for a long time wanted to publish my own series of photo books. And this is the first one. In other words; in the future more books will come, both for beginners and advanced photographers. More than anything I want to put together a book about the creative process, which is something I have already started working on.

So stay in tune for more. However, for now, maybe 10 Great Tips to Get the Most Out of Your Point-and-Shoot Camera is worth looking up. You can get it by clicking the button below. It will take you to the web site where you can order the book.