Zen Camera is an unprecedented photography practice that guides you to the creativity at your fingertips, calling for nothing more than your vision and any camera, even the one embedded in your phone. David Ulrich draws on the principles of Zen practice as well as forty years of teaching photography to offer six profound lessons for developing your self-expression. Doing for photography what The Artist’s Way and Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain did for their respective crafts, Zen Camera encourages you to build a visual journaling practice called your Daily Record in which photography can become a path of self-discovery. Beautifully illustrated with 83 photographs, its insights into the nature of seeing, art, and personal growth allow you to create photographs that are beautiful, meaningful, and uniquely your own. You’ll ultimately learn to change the way you interact with technology—transforming it into a way to uncover your innate power of attention and mindfulness, to see creatively, and to live authentically.
For many of us, the return of Zen conjures up images of rock gardens and gently flowing waterfalls. We think of mindfulness and meditation, immersion in a state of being where meaning is found through simplicity. Zen lore has been absorbed by Western practitioners and pop culture alike, yet there is a specific area of this ancient tradition that hasn’t been fully explored in the West. Now, in The Zen of Creativity, American Zen master John Daido Loori presents a book that taps the principles of the Zen arts and aesthetic as a means to unlock creativity and find freedom in the various dimensions of our existence. Loori dissolves the barriers between art and spirituality, opening up the possibility of meeting life with spontaneity, grace, and peace. Zen Buddhism is steeped in the arts. In spiritual ways, calligraphy, poetry, painting, the tea ceremony, and flower arranging can point us toward our essential, boundless nature. Brilliantly interpreting the teachings of the artless arts, Loori illuminates various elements that awaken our creativity, among them still point, the center of each moment that focuses on the tranquility within; simplicity, in which the creative process is uncluttered and unlimited, like a cloudless sky; spontaneity, a way to navigate through life without preconceptions, with a freshness in which everything becomes new; mystery, a sense of trust in the unknown; creative feedback, the systematic use of an audience to receive noncritical input about our art; art koans, exercises based on paradoxical questions that can be resolved only through artistic expression. Loori shows how these elements interpenetrate and function not only in art, but in all our endeavors. Beautifully illustrated and punctuated with poems and reflections from Loori’s own spiritual journey, The Zen of Creativity presents a multilayered, bottomless source of insight into our creativity. Appealing equally to spiritual seekers, artists, and veteran Buddhist practitioners, this book is perfect for those wishing to discover new means of self-awareness and expression—and to restore equanimity and freedom amid the vicissitudes of our lives.
"When a Zen master puts brush to paper, the resulting image is an expression of the quality of his or her mind. It is thus a teaching, intended to compassionately stop us in our tracks and to compel us to consider ultimate truth. Here, forty masterpieces of painting and calligraphy by renowned masters such as Hakuin Ekaku (1685–1768) and Gibon Sengai (1750–1837) are reproduced along with commentary that illuminates both the art and its teaching. The authors’ essays provide an excellent introduction to both the aesthetic and didactic aspects of this art that can be profound, perplexing, serious, humorous, and breathtakingly beautiful—often all within the same simple piece."--Publisher description.
Restorative justice pioneer Howard Zehr is also an accomplished photographer. He begins his latest book with a confession—"I have written this book in part to encourage myself to slow down, to heighten my imagination, to renew myself while I gain a new view of the creation and the creator." With this book, Zehr makes a gift to anyone who would like to couple photography with seeing and thinking more deeply. In each chapter he offers a Purpose, a Problem, and an Activity with a camera in order to "practice mindfulness." You'll not need a fancy camera, but if you have one it won't hurt. Zehr's chapter-by-chapter exercises are aimed at heightening visual awareness and imagination—all while doing good and working for justice. A title in The Little Books of Justice and Peacebuilding Series.
Zen of Photography Introducing Light presents the fundamentals of creative photography as an unfoldment, a revelation. Each section considers a unique facet of the creative photographic process and gives you an opportunity to develop your own unique photography expression. Offering a blend of poetry, philosophy, and technique, Ross shares how the art of photography is created by the refinement of the photographer’s eye. The photographer’s eye processes and contemplates a variety of creative lenses of mind, focusing on subtle details in microseconds, being in the zone, and having a single-mindedness meditation. He shows how each element of the creative photographic process must be considered to enlighten and refine your photographic sensibilities: the artist, the camera, the light, the time, the place, the dynamics of visual grammar and composition, the photograph as a visual communication, and the viewers’ experience of the image. Presenting an inspiring, informative, and beautiful collection of thoughts, images, and techniques of photography, integrating poetry, Zen philosophy, insights, and instruction, Zen of Photography Introducing Light inspires you to refine your photographer’s eye and develop your creative photography process to create great images.
Discover your voice, cultivate mindful awareness, and inspire creative growth with photography
In The Mindful Photographer, teacher, author, and photographer David Ulrich follows up on the success of his previous book, Zen Camera, by offering photographers, smartphone camera users, and other cultural creatives 55 short (1-5 pages) essays on topics related to photography, mindfulness, personal growth, creativity, and cultivating personal and social awareness. Whether you’re seeking to become a better photographer, find your voice, enhance your ability to “see” the world around you, realize your full potential, or refine your personal expression, The Mindful Photographer can help you. You will learn to:
• Awaken your creative spirit
• Find joy and fulfillment with a camera
• Improve your photography
• Express your deepest vision of the world
• Learn to be more present in the moment
• Deepen your capacity for observation
• Gain insight into your self and others
• Cultivate mindful seeing
• Use your camera as a tool for change
• Enhance your visual literacy
• And much more
You can read this beautiful, richly illustrated book in order, following its inherent structure, or you can dive into the book anywhere that appeals to you, following your own stream of interest. No matter how you read and work through the book—many of the essays contain exercises, working practices, and quotes from well-known photographers—you will learn to deepen your engagement with the world and discover a rich source of creativity within you through the act of taking pictures.
TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction Seek Resonance Camera Practice Avoid the Merely Pictorial Pictures are Not About Pictures Visual Learning First Sight; Beginner’s Eye The Camera in Your Hand Seeing from the Body It’s All About Hormones Attention and Distraction Keep the French Fries Becoming Good Audience Fitting into the Flow of Time Catch the Wave, Not the Ripple Of Time and Light In Space Finding Your Mojo River of Consciousness Why Selfies? When to Put the Camera Down Mindful Sight Creative Time Minding the Darkness Potency of Metaphor Mapping the Internal Terrain What Helps? Analyzing Your Images Sift, Edit, and Refine Sequencing Experiment Become the Camera Music of the Spheres InSeeing Fifty/Fifty Creative Mind and Not Knowing Trust Your Process Digital Life Steal Like an Artist Art is a Lie that Tells the Truth Use Irony Sparingly Embrace Paradox When to be Tender, When to Snarl, When to Shout, and When to Whisper Sharpness is a Bourgeois Concept Learn to Love the Questions The Wisdom of Chance Awake in the World The Cruel Radiance of What Is Hope and Despair Companions on the Way Coherence and Presence Wholeness and Order Creative Intensity Sea of Images The Power of Art
The Zen of Photography: How to Take Pictures with your Mind's Camera is a collection of 100 sayings that the author has written over a 25 year period. By merging the study of photography and the study of Zen philosophy, one learns to use a camera a way of connecting more fully with the world. Consequently, a camera is not used as a wall between what is seen and what is experienced, but is a tool that serves to unite the photographer with what is experienced through the photographic process. This book teaches that photography is much more than f-stops, shutter speed and aperture settings, film choices, and camera purchases. If photography were merely a technical operation, robots could take great pictures. Learning is about readiness. Because you are a loving, thinking person who found this book, you want to be inspired to elevate your picture taking to a level in which you learn from the moments you observe and teach others to be moved by those moments. This book is ready for you. AUTHOR BIO: Paul Martin Lester is a Professor of Communications at California State University, Fullerton. After an undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of Texas at Austin and employment as a photojournalist for The Times-Picayune in New Orleans. Lester received a Master's from the University of Minnesota and a Ph.D. from Indiana University in mass communications. He is the author or editor of seven books.
Within the Frame is a book about finding and expressing your photographic vision, specifically where people, places, and cultures are concerned. A personal book full of real-world wisdom and incredible images, author David duChemin (of pixelatedimage.com) shows you both the how and the why of finding, chasing, and expressing your vision with a camera to your eye. Vision leads to passion, and passion is a cornerstone of great photography. With it, photographs draw the eye in and create an emotional experience. Without it, a photograph is often not worth—and can’t capture—a viewer’s attention. Both instructional and inspirational, Within the Frame helps you on your photographic journey to make better images of the places and people you love, whether they are around the world or in your own backyard. duChemin covers how to tell stories, and the technology and tools we have at our disposal in order to tell those narratives. Most importantly, he stresses the crucial theme of vision when it comes to photographing people, places, and cultures—and he helps you cultivate and find your own vision, and then fit it within the frame.
