Dear friend; I want to give you some basic photography composition tips:
Month: March 2017
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How to Start Your Own Cindy Project
Photo of Cindy in her bedroom in Garden Grove. Photo of her parents in the top-left. Shot on a smartphone. Dear friend; I want to write you a letter on the importance of photographing your loved ones.
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37 Lessons Mark Cuban Can Teach You About Business
Practical life and business lessons from Mark Cuban, the serial entrepreneur and owner of the Mavericks:
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5 Diagonal Photography Composition Tips
The easiest way to make more dynamic, better compositions: integrate more diagonals into your photos.
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How to Overcome Paralysis by Analysis: The 80% Principle in Life
I often suffer from “paralysis by analysis†— I think too much when making decisions, and aim for perfection.
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How to Stay in the Game
One of the biggest mistakes I think individuals make in life is to think that “success†is making a ton of money, becoming famous, and having tons of influence.
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How to Become Enlightened
No, becoming enlightened is not becoming some Buddhist monk, and meditating on a rock in the middle of the ocean.
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How to Find Your Purpose in Photography
Dear friend; I want to write you a letter on finding your purpose in photography — and giving you a chance to reflect on why you make photos.
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15 Lessons Jay-Z Has Taught Me About Hustling
To me, Jay-Z is the epitome of the American dream: started off in the projects, and now is a self-made (almost) billionaire.
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24 Life Lessons From Thucydides
Life lessons from the Greek Historian, Thucydides — who actually fought in the Peloponesian war (between the Athenians and Spartans) then wrote a history on it.
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10 Tips How to Create Juxtaposition in Your Photography
Dear friend,
Today I want to teach you about ‘Juxtaposition’ — a fancy word that a lot of art school kids like to throw around.
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Rule Circumstances; Don’t Let Your Circumstances Rule You
Dear friend,
You might live in a shitty state of circumstances; but I want to encourage you — you can control your future and your fate.
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10 Lessons Socrates Has Taught Me About Photography
Dear friend; here are some lessons that Socrates has taught me about photography — and can hopefully inspire you:
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How to Be More Courageous in Life
“To be happy means to be free. To be free means to be brave.†– Thucydides
The lesson is this:
- If we are courageous, we gain freedom
- If we gain freedom, we gain happiness
So if you want to be happier, become more courageous.
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How to Shoot Personal Street Photography
Tokyo, 2016 Dear friend,
Recently I’ve been trying to combine two of my biggest passions in photography — street photography and personal photography.
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Shoot Different.
Why shoot like everyone else, when you are a unique, idiosyncratic individual, with unique life experiences, different from everyone else?
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How to Prevent Your Own Decline and Fall in Life
I just finished skimming some of Edward Gibbon’s “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire†(through some quotes), and have some valuable lessons I want to share with you:
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How to Believe in Yourself
Hanoi, 2017 #cindyproject Dear friend,
All of us lack confidence in ourselves— how can we learn to have more confidence, and belief in ourselves?
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You’re Infinite
The mind is like the universe. It constantly expands, infinitely.
So be like the universe; keep creating. Keep opening the minds of others.
Keep expanding your mind. Your mind, creativity, and abilities are infinite.
Have the ambition to live 300 years, even though you won’t. This will keep you hungry for the rest of your life, until your dying day.
Always,
Eric -
11 Lessons I’ve Learned From Dr. Dre on Hustling
Dr. Dre — the pioneer of ‘gangsta rap’, and currently worth close to $700 million dollars, after his sale of ‘Beats’ to Apple, certainly knows a thing or two about hustling.
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How to Make Good Photos on a Shitty Camera
Dear friend; if you have a shitty camera (or what you perceive a shitty camera) — yet want to make better photos, this is for you:
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Living a Good Life is More Important Than Photography
My Mom / Hanoi, 2017 I was reading Horace’s advice to his friend on poetry, and he said that we should focus on knowing how to order our lives correctly, instead of being overly-obsessed with how to order our verses.
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5 Lessons From Hesiod on Hustling
I just read Hesiod’s Work and Days; and found lots of great practical wisdom on working hard and hustling.
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Make Photos to Delight Your Soul
‘Poetry, created and invented for the delight of our souls, if it comes ever so little of the summit, sinks to the bottom.’ – Horace
Do your photos delight your own soul?
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18 Things I Would Tell Myself if I Started Street Photography All Over Again
Dear friend,
If I started street photography all over again; this is the advice I would give myself:
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Leica Manual
Dear friends,
I just made a new free PDF ebook: “Leica Manual” — a culmination of everything I’ve learned shooting with a Leica/rangefinder.
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The Pomodoro Photography Technique
If you have photographer’s block, or lacking inspiration to shoot— set a timer for 25 minutes, and do nothing but photograph for those 25 minutes.
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7 Steps: How to Make a Living From Your Passion
Dear friend,
If your dream is to make a living from your passion; I will try to give you the tools necessary to accomplish it.
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What if You Didn’t Get Any “Likes†or Comments on Your Photos?
Garden Grove, 2015 #cindyproject What if we lived a life where the only affirmation or criticism we got was from ourselves?
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Why You Should Be a General Photographer
I’ve been thinking a lot about the difference between a ‘generalist’ photographer, versus being a ‘specialist’ photographer.
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Why is Composition Important in Photography?
Tokyo, 2012 Dear friend,
I’ve been thinking a lot about composition— what it is for, and why it is important in photography:
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Think Small
Marseille, 2015 I was walking on the streets, and I saw an advertisement for the new Samsung Galaxy Note smartphone that said: “Think big.†What if we embraced the opposite— and “think small�
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Labor to Make Your Photos Concise
Hanoi, 2017 ‘I labor to be concise.’ – Horace
Let us work hard to make our photos short, and to the point:
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Make, Don’t Take Photos
Dear friend,
One of the lessons I’ve learned is that in order to make more beautiful photos, we should seek to “make” (not “take”) photos.
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Say “No” 1,000 Times
Tokyo, 2016 “People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.†– Steve Jobs
Life is short— why do we keep saying “yes†to “opportunities†we don’t really want?
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Immortality
Cindy trying on her wedding dress for the first time. Garden Grove, 2015 Would you want to be immortal?
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What is the Best Shoe For Photography?
Dear friend,
I think that photographers often over-obsess with cameras, gear, and lenses — but we never think about the most important tool when it comes to our photography; our shoes.
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How Not to Lack Self-Esteem
Dear friend,
How do we overcome our fears, and build self-confidence, and build up our self-esteem?