Johnny Photographer by Zack Arias

This is a snippet from the Creativelive Workshop that Zack Arias did a couple weeks ago. I watched some of the workshop, but missed this part.

Wow, he so nailed it. Pins down a lot of what annoys me about certain "big name" photographers out there.

http://www.youtube.com​/watch?v=9ncSMNxwVVU

Your thoughts?

This guy is more annoying than the people he's wittering on about....

Spacemunkie wrote in post #12451081
This guy is more annoying than the people he's wittering on about....

By at least a factor of 5...

Spacemunkie wrote in post #12451081
This guy is more annoying than the people he's wittering on about....

+1 I am sure he is a great guy, but he comes off as an a-hole.

Without making a statement about Zack's personality (which to my knowledge is far from an a-hole), I've been watching with interest how the strobist-kind of guys are going through evolution lately.

So there was Zack with his OneLight DVD, Joe McNally and the guys at Lightenupandshoot aka. Andy and Mikey. There are a bunch of others, but these guys have been on my radar the most and the ones who have promoted the use of speedlights as their main light source.

In all fairness though, Zack used an AlienBee in the OneLight DVD, so maybe he wasn't that hard-core speedlighter in the first place and the point was to use just one light what ever that light may be. But still, I don't know how much he's using strobes anymore and not even one light for that matter.

Joe promotes using small flashes and he has got a point. Only problem is that normal people can't afford dozens of SB-900s to utilize the system the way Joe does it.

And finally Andy and Mikey who just started using portable studio flashes in the field instead of speedlights. I do think they use both though, but the evolution and progress here is interesting.

It seems that when a photographer gets a bit of name in the industry (excluding Joe from this), they no longer want to use speedlights and go with something bigger and better.

I do know at least few of the reasons behind this, output power being one of them, but still, I'd like to see a professional photographer to make it with speedlights. And with a few of them, not a bunch like Joe uses

A little off-topic for sure, but I thought this might be a good thread to share my recent thoughts.

Janne

Zack is such a humble guy. I've been to his workshop and he's shared his story and how he's so privileged to have a second chance at being a photographer. His lighting stuff is good. He's technically sound and he's not about being a big named photographer and making a name for himself. His goal in life is to do a shoot for Rolling Stone and have a photo on the cover of it.

This was an interesting rant on his part. But that's him. He's pretty sarcastic and he likes to make fun himself as well.

Just my thoughts as well.

Cmon guys

Your watching a 1;09 minute snip from a video... Puleeese. How can you make any judgement about anyone from a 1 minute snip of a video. You guys are starting to sound and act like polititions

Zack puts out good information and helps with a non BS approach to Photography. I love the guy and would much rather learn from someone a little out there v/s all the other stuffed shirt people putting out their krap from thier orginizations they belong to. Hes as good as any, probably better than most, and lets you know that what you see is what you get.

So whats wrong with that ??

I wish there were more to that video because what shim said is about all I got out of it. I've never heard of the guy. I spend my time looking at what other people like myself are doing. Not so much famous people but just your average Joe (like most of us here). I used to look at famous peoples work and found that I was way out of their league but that was back when I was looking at landscape photography. Now that I'm doing portraits and weddings I need to find good photographers doing that type of work. I've gotten a lot of great ideas just from POTN for wedding shots. There are also some local photographer web sites that I look through every so often before I go to a wedding just so I can have some fresh ideas.

Zack's a great guy. I've attended his workshops, and he is incredibly humble, but brutally honest too. He is one of those photographers that came up through the struggling artist route. Went bankrupt, barely able to feed his kids.

Over Twitter he's very candid and has got in some heated arguments with some other photographers.. The ones who have been doing the craft for 2 years and are charging $16,000 for a 2 day mentoring session (Jesh DeRox). I think that burns him up, and preciptated his rant..

That would burn me up as well. $16,000...

I found out about him not to long ago and after watching his workshops I've grown to love the guy. He's so honest and I love that.

I'm a fan of Zack too. I've learned good stuff from him. However, after the third seminar I watched, it seems that I'm not getting a lot of new information and I will probably not watch the next one with the same intensity...

Is Zack's name real? It sounds and looks an awful lot like Zacharias. I'll change my name to Hugh G. Rection maybe.

That's his real name. Zack Arias.

CameraMan wrote in post #12458751
Is Zack's name real? It sounds and looks an awful lot like Zacharias. I'll change my name to Hugh G. Rection maybe.

What are you, 12?

He's actually a really down-to-earth guy. Let him have his rant.