ERIC KIM ₿

The problem with technology now:

Technology is too focused on data, ‘efficiency’, ‘optimization’, and all these nerdy things.

What should technology be doing for us? Making us MORE ARTISTIC, more curious, and more child-like.

After mucking around with the new macOS Catalina beta on my laptop [and corrupting my hard-drive upon installing a new Beta Update], I did a fresh new install of the OS.

It is great. I feel lighter, more free, and more pumped to create new things. There was great joy in re-installing files and applications I needed. Also, I only re-installed the essential apps, files, and folders. Thus a lot of my old ‘legacy’ apps [that I no longer used]. are no longer on my hard-drive. This means more hard drive space, and my laptop runs faster, and more lean.

Which made me wonder–

Perhaps in life, we should regularly do a fresh new ‘reformatting’ of our mind, possessions, and life in general.

Instead of mindlessly scrolling through Facebook or Instagram, or flipping through stories, why not scroll through our own photos? Scroll through our own “Media Library” on WordPress, to scroll through our “Camera Roll” on iPhone/iPad, or scroll through our Google Photos app to reinspire ourselves.

It is easy for us to forget our old photos. By constantly re-examining our old photos, we can discover old “hidden gems”, but also edit down our work.

Nature: going outdoors, on hikes, fresh air; good for the soul.

Even though we are mostly city folk, I think the hybrid of extreme city and extreme nature is a good one.

So us as street photographers, let us also venture more forth into nature and use our photographic skills there as well.

What is a good direction to take your life?

Direct your own personal evolution.

A simple way to think about and approach life:

Only dedicate your energies on things you care for.

As a photographer you got a trillion things to shoot.

Question — what should I photograph? Meaning — Are there certain subject matter which is more interesting or less interesting to photograph? Are there certain things you shouldn’t photograph?

An idea I got from my buddy Ryan from Backyard Brew in Palo Alto:

Perhaps the best way to live life is directly. To think about your personal ‘end game’, and attack it directly.

A simple way to approach blogging, sharing, or publishing online:

Just share your own life experiences and journey with others.

It ain’t a matter whether your life is ‘interesting’ or ‘boring’. Just keep it direct, unfiltered, uncensored, and true:

When analyzing your photos or the photos of others, integrate ‘Bounding Boxes’ [in red] to think about the spacing/composition of your photo:

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A thought:

Perhaps we should focus on tiny (incremental), 1% improvements everyday (no breaking the chain).

Currently reading the ‘What happened to the future?’ essay on Founders Fund, and trying to think:

What is the future of photography?

I don’t know about you, but I hate banner-based advertising on blogs and websites.

The practical question is:

How do you monetize a blog WITHOUT using advertising?

Thoughts:

My epic vision [and the vision of all of us at ARS: Cindy, Kevin, Jun, Annette] is this:

ARS is social media ‘done right’ for photographers.

A social media platform for photographers that isn’t based on advertising, that isn’t a popularity contest, and isn’t based on toying with your emotions. A social media platform which actually EMPOWERS us as photographers and visual artists.

Anti-perfection in art. Just because someone else did it before doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attempt doing it as well (you will always do it differently).

Anti self-criticism. Making art as a creative process, of playing. No finality in your artworks.

ERIC

It seems we are are obsessed with growth. But my questions:

What is “growth”? Why is it so desirable? And how does one actually “grow”?

Don’t worry about it being a “good” or “bad” photo in the eyes of others. Instead, select your photos based on whether YOU like the photo or not.

If you’re not sure whether the photo is good or not, upload it to arsbeta.com

To feel guilt in photography is nonsense, and improper of us.

To feel guilt is to let external societal pressures guide our own instincts and intuition.

We should not prioritize the needs of society and others over ourselves. In praise of following our own gut, our own instincts, and obeying our own needs.

When we blame ourselves, essentially we are signaling to ourselves that we’re too weak to change things. “Blame” is essentially signaling of who has power.

When you blame others for certain conditions of your life, you’re saying that they have more power than you, and that they have power over you.

By putting 100% responsibility on yourself, this is quite liberating. It means we have 100% power and aren’t dependent on anyone or anything else.

A photo idea: document 24 hours of your own day!

What I think we desire to do as artists:

Create [more] beautiful things!

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Hey streettogs,

Happy Friday! I wanted to start sending you some more email newsletters to hopefully keep your mind full of ‘turbo thoughts’, and also to keep you more inspired in your photography. I’m currently loving the new RICOH GR III [I highly encourage you to order one], and want to share some of this new-spring of photographic inspiration with you.

Photography is fascinating because it is supposed to be a ‘factual’ depiction of reality. Thus, to somehow ‘fuck’ with a photograph seems to be immoral. Why? It loses its ‘authenticity’.

The RICOH GR III is easily easily easily the best camera ever made [thus far] for street photography.

All photography is good photography, but I still think street photography is the best:

Photography and nothing but photography!

Reduce friction in your life in order to maximize what you truly desire to do.

Simple ideas:

1. Wear the same outfit everyday: All black everything. All merino wool everything. Same pair of shoes everyday. One less thing to worry about. (Steve Jobs same turtleneck, and Mark Z with same grey shirt).
2. One camera, one lens: RICOH GR III, ERIC KIM NECK STRAP MARK II and call it a day.
3. Simpler is better. Use the absolute simples tool for the task possible. For blogging, just use your phone or iPad. For writing, just use IA WRITER and Markdown to keep your ideas and words flowing.
4. JPEG: Simplify your photographic workflow. Just shoot JPEG, to speed up and expedite your photographic workflow. JPEG > RAW.
5. At the gym, stick to simple workouts. Deadlift, squat, dumbbell press, chin-ups.
6. For cooking, keep it simple. I find that eggs are the ultimate food. Super cheap to buy, easy to store, and cook super fast. I usually will eat 10-12 whole eggs (yes, with the yolks too), everyday at around 8pm.

A life without photography or art isn’t a life worth living.

When I don’t walk around all day, leave the house all day, or have the opportunity to engage in any physical activity– my brain, mind, and soul gets strange. But the second I leave the house, walk around the block a few times, go lift weights at the gym, commute and hang out somewhere, my mental issues dissipate.

Which makes me wonder:

What if much of our “mental” issues were rooted in the physiological (pertaining to our physical body)?

Composition and boxes are really interesting to me.

Is there an “ideal” way to compose a box, series of boxes, or a rectangle?

Practical ideas:

What does it mean to become a ‘full stack visual artist’?

1. You own the means of production
2. You own the means of distribution/sharing/business
3. You know how to manage the marketing, technical aspects, and all the art aspects.

Essentially you become a fully-integrated pillar in which you can do everything yourself, without being dependent on anyone else!

A good incentive to giving constructive critiques on arsbeta.com

The more critiques you give to others, the better you understand your own photos, and gain better understanding how you can improve in YOUR OWN photography.

Mode — type, style.

We got airplane mode. Why not photo mode?

Currently participating in Y Combinator’s “Startup School” for ARSBETA.COM and enjoying this idea:

With your startup, what kind of really big problem are you trying to solve?

As kids we are told ‘sharing is caring, it can be fun!’

But as adults– what is the pragmatic upside of sharing? Why share at all? How do we benefit from sharing?

My basic idea is this:

Share from your overflowing bounty of epicness. Don’t “self-sacrifice” in order to share.

I think what we desire is this:

Optimal simplicity in order to maximize what is important to us.

Simplify our photo equipment (RICOH GR III in JPEG x iPad x Apple Photos) to quickly and effectively look through our photos, to quickly select the photos we consider meaningful to us, and to quickly share the photos with others (on your own website/blog).

Simplify our lifestyle and daily schedule. Less time commuting, more time creating.

Simpler foods— less indigestion, more strengthening for our bodies (simple meats and eggs). Simple coffee (all black), and just water. Maximal strength, extreme frugality in sustaining ourselves.

Lightness is the closest thing to godliness.

The lighter, simpler, and more intuitive your camera, the better. In praise of RICOH GR III and iPhone.

I think some of us artists strive to make artworks which are ‘eternal’, and ‘timeless’.

But it is my belief that nothing should last forever. If our artworks were eternal and never decayed and were never forgotten– future generations probably wouldn’t have the opportunity to create new things.

Wouldn’t it be horrible if there was a future in which no photographer was allowed to create art-works better than Henri Cartier-Bresson? Or better than Picasso? Or better than the great artists of the past?

Kind of sounds like a silly question, but I think very relevant in today’s world:

Why think?

What is ‘thinking’? What is the value of ‘thinking’?

Do we like to think? Do you like to think? Do you want to think more or less in your life?

I just gave a talk at Google on the topic of becoming ‘Creative Everyday’ [pdf download link to Slides], and wanted to change the definition of “creativity” from the notion of “artistic innovation” to the propensity to create lots of things.

Therefore as a photographer, you are more ‘creative’ if you create more (new) photos!

Some ideas:

As a photographer, make fun compositions for the sake of it!

With muscles to make your muscles bigger/stronger, they call it ‘hypertrophy‘:

Ancient Greek ὑπέρ (hupér, “over, excessive”) + τροφή (trophḗ, “nourishment”).

• Hyper (over, excessive) = hupeir (beyond)
• trophe: nourishment, food.

Applied to photography and art–

How do we become bigger/stronger/more as artists?

A thought:

There is no ultimate ‘truth’.

Furthermore, to strive to search for ‘truth’ seems to be a waste of time.

Another issue:

We can strive to discover deeper self-knowledge about ourselves, and perhaps more ‘truthiness’ about the world. But all of this “truth” is subjective.

Then what are we to do with our lives?

A simpler goal: strive to make beautiful artworks. To determine whether something is beautiful in our eyes is far superior than to search for “truth”.

This is the problem —

When we think of “creative photography”, we typically mean to say “artistically innovative”.

But who is the judge whether a certain photograph is “artistically innovative”? And is artistic innovation in photography what we desire? Or is it better to just make good, deep, and meaningful photos and disregard “artistic innovation” in our photography?

RICOH GR III is sharp as a mofo:

No anti aliasing filter, JPEG— super epic. As my friend Jun says, “physics don’t lie” (bigger sensor generally = better image quality/aesthetics for photos).

Personal photography: shooting photos to spark more joy in your own life.

How to become a hyper-human?

We want hyper-cars. Why not become a hyper-human?

What I think we are striving towards as photographers and visual artists is this:

Create images [art works] which are beautiful.

Now, how do we do this?

My goal —

More people to become self-employed, in order to allow more individuals to do great things. Best way to move humanity forward?

Use ‘Gaussian Blur’ to better determine your compositions in photography:

Shoot and create art works with visual clay, beautiful people around you all day.

Street photography as a way of life. As a way of seeing the world, interacting with the world, and making art works out of people!

HAPTIC: Creative tools to empower you >

Simple street photography assignments to get you going:

21mm is one of the focal lengths which have been over-looked by photographers [for a very long time].

I will make the case that perhaps there is still a lot of unpaved photographic/composition grounds for 21mm [as a focal length].

The simple formula for photography, art, and more:

Make stuff and share it.

Don’t have anywhere to share it? Upload your photos to arsbeta.com

Simple idea:

You must shoot A LOT [quantity] in order to make GOOD PHOTOS [quality].

We must assert ourselves as artists, not just ‘photographers’. To simply think of yourself as only a photographer is quite demeaning towards yourself.

A thought:

What if the best thing you could do for yourself and humanity is to create the most epic art-works you are capable of?

For example, don’t think of yourself as a photographer. Think of yourself as an artist. As an artist, it seems that our only duty in life is to create the most epic art-works we are capable of.

When I first started working my first 9-5 job, I desired deeply to become self-employed.

Why? I desired freedom! To show up everyday at an office at an arbitrary time, to leave everyday at an arbitrary time, and to do this from Monday-Friday seemed hyper-bizarre to me.

I thought to myself: We are living in the most modern and technological society. Why do we still need to show up to an office and put in a 40+ hour work-week?

I desired to become self-employed to escape this technological slavery. But what happens once you are self-employed, no longer need to wake up by a certain time, no longer need to attend meetings, no longer need to sleep at a certain time, no longer need to “work” during the day if you don’t want to?

This is my grand thought:

To become self-employed as a necessary step or a pre-requisite to attempt to do and create really great things.

Originally sent on ERIC KIM NEWSLETTER:

Monochrome tips:

The best learning is self-learning. Some practical ideas for you:

The deepest black. Jet black. Phantom black.

Perhaps this is my ideal aesthetic.

Shoot More Randomly!

Why shooting randomly will help improve your photography:

Photography as the ultimate hybrid and synthesis between art and technology.

My ideals of composition in street photography:

How to make more ambitious images which are more elegant, stronger, yet simpler?