Dear friend,

A very simple idea:

In our photography, let us seek ‘optimal simplicity’.

Study geometry to train your eyes to see better compositions (in the real world, when you’re taking pictures). From some hyperbolic geometry pdf textbooks I found on Google:

To make better photos, separate your subjects from the background (negative space between your subject and the background), in order for your eyes to detect the edges!

Continuation of Part 2 and Part 1 on CITIZEN KANE:

Our lives are improved by subtraction, rather than addition:

Look for similar pictures, to put them together.

Dear friend,

Ever since I was a kid– I was always seeking the truth of ‘happiness’. I tried to first of all define ‘happiness’, then figuring out how to achieve it.

Citizen Kane continuation (from Part 1):

Study vectors (arrows) to make better compositions:

CITIZEN KANE: one of my favorite movies of all-time — super inspired by the work and philosophy of Orson Welles:

Photography is fun when you treat it like visual experimentation!

My friend and student Becky Logan did this very inspirational project– photographing her 80 foot by 80 foot backyard for an entire year. It is a beautiful zen photo project– it reveals to us: You can discover beauty anywhere– as long as you look closely enough. Enter Becky:

To make better photos, play between clear and obscure:

Dear friend,

The reason I love ARS: we can harness the wisdom of individuals to “crowd source” feedback for our fellow photographers.

Dear friend,

One of the greatest blessings we are endowed with is freedom of Will; we have the freedom to direct our own human will however we choose!

Dear friend,

In starting ARS, the first photography feedback platform, a lot of photographers are unaccustomed to receiving anonymous critiques. I honestly do believe the best way to improve your pictures to get honest critique on your photos from others. But how should we integrate critique to our work?

Dear friend,

I’m thinking a lot about creative constraints. I am starting to really recognize the truth:

Constraints are the mother of creativity.

Dear friend,

It is difficult to say what is worth pursuing in life. It is easier to say what is worth avoiding in life!

Dear friend,

In-case you forgot, photographers are artists.

I’m a huge huge fan of Peter Thiel– in terms of his optimism, his view on the future, and his personal courage to stand up for unpopular ideas (but ideas he truly believes in):

Fun sketches of random Quantum Physics visualizations, made with iPad and Procreate app:

Randomly came across this Computational Geometry and Algorithms book, and wow— the geometry and aesthetics are sublime. Lesson: Study more math for composition and geometry inspiration.

Uplift
You have a gift; a wonderful gift to share with others
There is no other like you, so ignore what others do.

On my flight from California to NY, I watched ‘Won’t You Be My Neighbor?‘ — a life of the timeless Mr. (Fred) Rogers — and I am speechless.

Currently watching SOLO (film), and came across an interesting idea:

The droids (bots) in the STAR WARS universe are all slaves.

Which is interesting, because there is a lot of philosophy which confirms this idea:

Modern civilization is built on the back of slaves.

But what kind of modern slaves do we have? Unfortunately– almost all of us.

To make better pictures, add more motion:

Use Money to Buy Your Freedom

Dear friend,

I’m currently building a pitch deck for ARS, and wanted to use this opportunity to reflect on what ARS is, why ARS is different, and why we need ARS.

Why did I create and why do I believe in ARS? Simple: I want to harness the ‘cognitive surplus‘ of all of us in society, for the following:

1. Provide new jobs to people (earning money in a ‘location independent’ way) who are either under-employed or unemployed.
2. Create a platform in which people with ‘cognitive surplus’ (under-utilized brainpower) to do something meaningful with their free time, that can help augment their own intelligence, and also help others!
3. Change society for the better: (If everyone was able to contribute 30 minutes of their free time (a day) to provide constructive critique to others– wouldn’t society advance as a whole?)

Something super powerful I’ve come across in visual science– the notion of a ‘hypercomplex cell‘:

Dear friend,

This is a call to arms. Let us break free from the shackles of consumerism; let us embolden ourselves with the new ethos of ‘producerism’.

Dear friend,

I am a huge Aldous Huxley fan, and one of the most influential novels I’ve read is BRAVE NEW WORLD — a future dystopia which is very very accurate in terms of how we’re living our lives today.

ARS is so fun. I’m on a comment and critiquing spree, and wanted to share some tips on how to give a constructive critique in photography:

Dear friends,

We just launched ARS BETA VERSION II yesterday, with insane growth and feedback. We introduced the ‘constructive critique’ function; and I can truly tell you– this is a revolution.

I wanted to share with you what my personal vision for ARS is, and why I am so passionate about ARS.

Dear friend,

If you are sick of social media– say hello to ARS; the first productive online learning community for photographers and visual artists.

Give us what we need, dear fearfeeds.

How can we shoot better monochrome pictures?

Dear friend,

What is the solution to a lot of our problems in life? Simple — art (art).

Hi friends,

I want to share the greatest personal breakthrough I reached today and how you can apply this to reach your full potential past your wildest dreams.

Dear friend,

I wanted to write you an essay about social media. Is social media a wall that is dividing us, or bringing us closer together? It is a curious question that has gnawed at the back of my mind from age 21 until now (age 30).

Dear friend,

A thought–

Think of yourself like hydra. You cut off one neck; and three will sprout out from that stump!

HAPTIC hand makes limited edition creative tools. Here is an inventory update of our most popular HAPTIC tools soon to be sold out (ships worldwide from California). Pick one up before it’s too late! Thank you for the love over the years! <3 Cindy & Eric

• SUITS by Eric Kim Limited First Edition Hardcover Photobook [8 left] Invest in Eric Kim’s first photobook creation. Almost sold out!
• SAIGON SATCHEL [7 left] Your artistic on the go camera bag.
• MY FIRST PHOTOGRAPHY BOOK Children’s Hardcover Book  [10 left] Inspire your kids and next generation to take photos! Perfect gift for all ages
• HENRI SHOULDER STRAP  [18 left] The perfect cross-b0dy camera leather strap.
• ERIC KIM CASE [13 left] Carry your Ricoh, film, SD cards, and all your camera accessories
• HAPTIC NOTEBOOK x ERIC KIM [2 left] Your handmade paper and photography poetry notebook.
• ERIC KIM PORTFOLIO BAG [4 left] For the photographer artist, fits the iPad and  exclusively available in HAPTIC shop.

Dear friend,

We are currently undergoing a phenomenally exciting time in photography– the marriage of (human) photographers and AI (artificial intelligence):

Some simple photo composition tips:

Dear friend,

A very simple yet powerful idea:

Dictate your own purpose in life.

There ain’t a “right” or “wrong” purpose in life. It is your duty in life to dictate your own purpose in life.

Dear friend,

Simple idea:

If you want to be a better photographer, be a happier person!

In simple words:

First seek to be happier in your life (via studying philosophy and taking more real-life risks), and secondly — just going out more to take pictures!

Dear friend,

I wanted to pen a quick essay on some personal thoughts on freedom, free will, and how you have (more) power than you think!

Dear friend,

I remember when I was a kid– really into modding computers. There was this concept of ‘over-clocking’– you would push your computer processor to run faster than the ‘stable’ specifications. For example, if I bought an AMD processor that ran 2ghz, I could go into the BIOS and push it to 2.2 ghz, or if you got better cooling equipment in your computer (additional fans, better heatsink, cooling, etc) — you could actually push this processor even further to 2.5ghz or more!

Dear friend,

A simple question:

Who do you desire to become in life?

With photography, we become super-human with our vision.

A fun idea for your photography:

For a month, experiment just shooting only JPEG (no post-processing) — and see if this helps librate you in photography!

Dear friend,

A simple idea: Whenever you click the shutter, you’re just taking an attempt.

You are great
Dont seek to placate the masses or the herd
Seek your own personal apotheosis; give yourself your own self-hyping hypnosis

We have all heard the saying, ‘Fortune favors the brave.’ I like the saying, but it ain’t accurate or specific enough for me:

I’m pretty excited for the new VENOM movie, and started to do a little philosophical musings on the concepts of:

• Symbiotic relationships
• Parasitic relationships

Dear friend,

I have been studying a lot of algorithms, AI, etc — and came across this concept of ‘naive’. For example in machine learning, there is a concept of ‘naive bayes‘. Now how can a concept in machine learning be ‘naive’ (like a un-wise and silly human being)?

I’m an Elon Musk fanboy until I die. Here are some practical lessons I learned from him, from his recent interview with Joe Rogan:

Disrupt normal, be unique
Be you and smile, cheek to cheek

Dear friend,

A simple and funny idea:

Why have a brain?

In simple words: why have humans evolved to have a brain? And what is the best way we can use our brain?

Dear friend,

A practical idea: In order to become the most epic you, play against yourself!

Steve Jobs: one of my heroes. He has taught me the importance of staying true (and stubborn) on your creative vision, the importance of combining the liberal arts and engineering, and the importance of following your own gut and intuition.

To live a better life, embrace the extremes. Avoid the boring middle– either relax 100%, or go hard 100%. “Sleep hard, or work hard”. In this essay, I will try to combine personal thoughts on living, photography, working out, health, and diet (with this embracing the extremes strategy):

Continue reading Avoid the Middle; Embrace the Extremes

Dear friend,

A practical idea I have for you:

Treat your photography like a blank slate (tabula rasa). When you start off in photography, be totally ignorant of the outside world, and learn on your own (don’t enroll into photography or art school). Then use this chance to build your own unique vision, and as you get more experienced, THEN learn some theory and outside concepts and ideas to challenge your pre-existing ideas, then decide through dialectics (testing two contrary opinions) what best works for you.

My buddy Nassim Taleb posited a question in his book, ‘Antifragile’ that regarded ‘post-traumatic growth’. I think I’m one of the lucky few who was actually made stronger because of trauma– not weakened. I want to use this essay as a chance to share why I think I was able to grow from trauma, and some practical ideas on how we can help our future children thrive from stress and trauma.

Wipe the slate clean
What new ideas can you glean?

Dear friend,

A basic idea: the future of photography is going to be editing (the art of selecting your best work, and not showing your weak work).

Set the bar higher, high-flyer
Don’t mind if you don’t reach the top— just keep hustling hard, and don’t you stop

Check out the Stanford ‘Image Painting‘ demo to see how AI and deep learning can re-construct your photos; helping you better judge your own picture compositions!

Dear friend,

I’m studying a lot of AI, and have been philosophizing (my entire life) about technology-human integration.

A realization today:

We are seeking to ‘augment our intelligence’ with technology, yet what I think we really want to do is to augment our wisdom!

Authentic
Whatever life has given you, you’ve been blessed with