Getting Lucky

Imagery seems to be less of a commodity these days. It's some kind of weird decline of the photographer and equally proportionate rise of the "appropriator". Even more advantaged are people who have photography skills AND composition/layout/production skills. Hard to compete with people who have the total package. I see myself getting there someday, however.

College photography instruction and Black & White darkroom skills, not to mention screen-printing and illustration instruction, ..really helped me get a firm hold on the concepts behind digital photography and editing. Simply understanding and appreciating the old-school vocabulary and concepts that carried through to Photoshop gives you an interesting vantage point.

Kids coming up today without any knowledge of those old techniques will probably have a tougher time grasping even the language of design that your industry veterans still speak. Things changed so quickly. I wasn't really cognizant of it at the time, but while I was in school, everything was changing, or had just changed. And the design job market was shifting too. If it weren't for my interest in technology, I would've just been another drifting Bachelor of Arts graduate, out there waiting tables or going back home to learn a traditional construction trade.

Numerous talented people I went to college with that I can think of offhand - people who could draw, paint, create, ..but just didn't have any interest at all in new design technologies. Those guys still don't have jobs. I'm sure they applied for them. And I'm sure the employers looked over the resumes and remarked, .."Talented kid, but can he use Quark? Is she proficient on a MAC? Moving on.."