I need a photo editor

[Robert Kalman]

I am just back from a master class workshop in Berlin with photographer Jeff Cowen. It was sponsored by Lens Culture, and it was, without a doubt, the most intense and useful 5-days I've spent in a long time.

One thing I learned: while I am a reasonably competent large format portraitist, I am inept when it comes to properly editing my own work. I'm much too emotionally tied to my subjects to make objective judgments, and, as I'm looking to break into showing my work to galleries, I need a good editor to help me show only my strongest images.

Does anyone have a lead on possibilities?

Many thanks.

[David R Munson]

How are you at editing other people's work? You may be able to work out a simple arrangement with another photographer and be editors for one another. When I'm having trouble editing a body of work, my photographer fiends are indispensable.

[Asher Kelman]

I am just back from a master class workshop in Berlin with photographer Jeff Cowen. It was sponsored by Lens Culture, and it was, without a doubt, the most intense and useful 5-days I've spent in a long time.

Robert,

It must have been a fabulous and unique experience. Congratulations! I'd caution you to beware of such a highly articulate and disciplined artist who's work often has layers of planning and thought in their construction. After going to such a strong influence, one might need a mental separation, maybe a vacation in a desolate beach or Iowa farmlands, (the same thing), and try to shed the implanted scaffolding of self-doubts that such an intense experience can do to anyone of us! After all you are not him!

One thing I learned: while I am a reasonably competent large format portraitist, I am inept when it comes to properly editing my own work. I'm much too emotionally tied to my subjects to make objective judgments, and, as I'm looking to break into showing my work to galleries, I need a good editor to help me show only my strongest images.

Really, now! Cowen makes objects of his people and deconstructs them according to his whim. You are not "too emotional", rather the emotive connections you have with your subjects is a quality his work seems, at least on the surface, to lack in all but a few cases. For you, relating to your subjects is your "ace in the hole"!

I've gone through your website and books on a number of occasions and enjoy your work. Kudos! Only in the book on Kansas water storage, "Hold Your Water", would I have really liked to have been a fly on the wall to see what else you had to choose from! When I saw the black Kansas Gas picture, I was relieved that you had gotten out of repetition of similar images. Still, that's only one of your many wonderful books where I harbored that reservation. Interesting that this one book is not about people, but cold metal welded objects. So it's hardly surprising that your gifted leverage of emotion, your strong card, can't be played!

Your work represents you well. I am not sure that you are so limited in editing as you imply, unless you also mean presentation of an image from your negative after the devious ways of the remarkable Jeff Cowan. Then, "editing" could mean cropping, overlaying several images, ripping prints, a layering and so on. Or you could mean "photoshop work". I do think you simply want to better select pictures for a unified collection.

Is that's the case, I think the first thing to do is pick several candidates for what should become the master, "iconic" thematic image of the series. Ask what are the ideas and motifs you need to see. Then everything else will fall into place.

I already love the way you have made collections of your work. You celebrate the people you meet, in a way like the World War II German photographer August Sandler. Maybe he prepared them more obsessionally, or given the custom of the times, they dressed up for him in their best! By contrast, Jeff Cowan's models mostly serve him and individuals can be cut, blocked, segmented or have their faces masked out as they, themselves, do not seem to matter. What counts is the contribution of the subject to the deceivingly simple, (but actually complexly layered), "physicality" that Jeff builds into his images.

So, his work can hardly inform yours which has its own honesty and truth. Neither can his methods of editing! To claim that would be like saying there's not enough Uranium in Gold! Trust your own heart before you shortchange your record of pretty damn good editing!

Asher

[jonreid]

I've just spent eight months editing 230 odd pictures down to the 72 that are going on my book. I had several friends help on a few occasions and my advice is that you must respect whomever it is that you are seeking guidance from. I had one freelance editor/curator go over the work and while she was very supportive I felt that had I taken it to the next level, of paying her for her time to help curate the selection, that it was going to become more about her ideas.
It's hard to explain but my gut feeling was that she would stamp her signature on it, rather than help me with mine.

It's also a really good opportunity to challenge yourself. I spent months, literally, one day per week laying all my little prints out then staring at them in overwhelm. Then one day I knew I had to be ruthless, that the project overall would benefit from my losing attachments and sentimental connections to images and I killed 10 pages from the book (about 18 images) in that one day. I then didn't look at it for a few days and was pleasantly surprised when I finally did. Holy cow, was I actually pleased with that edit? More or less I was, although the final edit changed again from there.

Jon

[Frank Petronio]

I've done a few editing sessions with "real" photo editors and some of them made just as dumb decisions as I did. At one of those reviews, only one out of five had anything new to show me, the rest were just burnt out photographers themselves. Of course the asshole from Getty wants to buy your images and give you that whopping 18% commission - do you think he really cares about you?!

In the end, after you stare at your stuff for so long, you just have to grow very detached and look at it as a story to tell in sequence. Start with a beginning, middle, and end - then fill in between.

Be brave enough to remove your best, most favorite images, then only reinsert them if they enhance.

Remember a lot of working photo editors are frustrated photographers. They usually want to be your advocate. But sometimes they can be passive-aggresive pricks, so don't blindly bank on what some random dude from NYC tells you just because they work in the "industry".

In the end, the best editor is always yourself, right or wrong, so man up and learn how to do it. Nobody else really cares... and if you trade with another lazy photographer, they'll just be two hippie-lame edits out of it.

Haha no offense to anyone except the hippies but face it head on and grow a pair!

[Ari]

Editing is a ruthless business, and it's a skill that every artist (for lack of a better word) must learn; too few realize the importance of editing one's work.
Be honest, be hard on yourself, sit with your photos for hours at a time, then leave them for days at a time.
Pin them to your wall, make a "book" in InDesign, think about them, etc; basically work with the photos with the same intensity with which you created them.
The best advice I ever got was exactly what Frank just said: be prepared to leave your best photos behind.

[Greg Miller]

You might find the photographers' salon at the Center for Photography at Woodstock helpful. You can show your work and get feedback from other serious photographers.

One thing I have personally found helpful in dealing with my emotional connection with my own photos is to save my editing for a couple months after shooting. Much of the emotion wears off over that time. And I often find that I edit out, or edit in, photos because of this.

[Robert Kalman]

I sincerely appreciate all of you taking the time to offer your insights. Beyond stepping into my big boy's pants, as Frank and Jon suggest, I will look into the CPW forum since I live within driving distance.

I do understand, as several of you have advised, that editing needs to be a ruthless enterprise. And, finding the right person to supply useful feedback to augment one's own perspective can be tricky.

Again, thanks for responding.

[Bill_1856]

"I need a photo editor"

Don't we all?

[bdkphoto]

I sincerely appreciate all of you taking the time to offer your insights. Beyond stepping into my big boy's pants, as Frank and Jon suggest, I will look into the CPW forum since I live within driving distance.

I do understand, as several of you have advised, that editing needs to be a ruthless enterprise. And, finding the right person to supply useful feedback to augment one's own perspective can be tricky.

Again, thanks for responding.

Your proximity to NYC is also full of possibilities - ICP (have to plug where I teach) lots of courses and workshops that would apply,- ASMPNY.org --Fine art portfolio reviews and lectures, commercial portfolio reviews etc, great place to network and find those resources to move you forward as well.