Process Driven

As we get into this Iteration, I’d like to take a minute to let you know about some changes that I’m working on that will be rolling out in the coming weeks and months. Iterations will still be weekly (mostly), but I’m going to mix up the types of posts I’ll be including and treat it more like an old-school blog. For example, you may have noticed that the Blips have been getting more substantial in terms of the research I do and the number of links I include. They started out as a just few links to things that I saw or found interesting during the previous week and have been evolving into something more comprehensive and hopefully more interesting and inspiring for you. Moving forward, they’ll still be part of their own section on Substack, but I’m going to lose the word “Blip” and the number in the naming convention of the titles to alleviate any potential confusion that comes with having Blip number 47 alongside Iteration number 124. I’m also going to be adding reviews into the mix—and that could mean books

Over the past few days, the photography world has been buzzing about the “global shutter” on Sony’s new flagship A9 III. I’ve listened to various YouTubers andinfluencers talk about it as if it’s the second coming. They’re saying “it’s the most remarkable camera I’ve ever used” and calling it a “a game changer,” insisting that “it will change photography forever.”  But here’s the thing: for 99% of photographers, it won’t change anything. If this is all Greek to you, let me back up a minute and briefly explain what a global shutter is—and I promise that this Iteration is not just about photography.CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Jeffery Saddoris

They say that one of the best ways to solve a problem—at least a creative one—is actually not to think abut it. After all, how many times have you been doing something like taking a shower or going for a long walk and you find yourself having one of those eureka moments where suddenly the solution to a problem you’ve been wrestling with forever seems so clear? It happens to me a lot and it’s one of the reasons that taking walks in the forest behind our house has become a daily ritual. Trying to be present in something other than active problem solving allows our brains to continue working in the background without us trying to consciously force a solution. The act of stepping away from a problem is called the “incubation period” and it’s been studied for decades. In his book The Art of Thought, Graham Wallas proposed that the creative process is made up of four stages: Preparation (the acquisition of knowledge to some task), Incubation (the background process that occurs when conscious attention is diverted a

As I was working through the recent redesign of my website—which you can read about or listen to in the last Iteration—I started to look at some of the other software I was using to see whether what I was using still made sense for the projects I’ll be doing in the coming year. I think it’s sometimes easy to get into a routine of using tools that are “good enough” that we just don’t look for potentially better options. I know that’s been true for me. About eight years ago, I ditched Photoshop completely and started using the Affinity suite of Photo, Designer, and Publisher, which by and large have been great. There are a few features I miss, but nothing that’s really kept me from doing the work that I needed to do. CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.

Last week I did a soft-launch of my newly redesigned website, which in an of itself isn’t all that unique since I’ve resigned my website dozens of times over the years. What is unique—or at least different—is the overall focus of the site and the process I went through putting it together this time around. I started by asking myself a relatively simple question: do I even need a website? The most common answer is “Yes, of course,” which is often followed by “especially because you’re an artist.” But I actually know quite a few “creatives” who don’t have their own websites. Some rely on a strong social media presence, some have gallery representation that drives sales of originals or prints, and others just have a storefront, so that a dedicated personal site isn’t really necessary. CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about inertia and motion and how it applies to my creative practice. We know that Newton’s First Law of Motion says that an object in motion tends to stay in motion unless some sort of external force acts against it. Conversely, an object at rest will tend to stay at rest. But I would argue that the Fist Law also applies to intangibles like thoughts and ideas. For example, this week has flown by. Actually, the past couple of weeks have and I think it’s because I’ve been working through so many ideas and potential projects—and I’ve been working on them differently than I have in the past, which I think is what’s making all the difference. And to be clear, when I say “working,” sometimes that means just letting an idea go until it needs to be addressed. For some things that means now, but for others, that may mean next year. CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Ev

Next month is the tenth anniversary of my dad’s death, so naturally I’ve been thinking about him a lot. Last year, I completely forgot about it, which I tried to tell myself was actually healthy, but I just ended up feeling guilty about forgetting. If you’ve been following me for a while, or you’re an OTP listener, you know that my relationship with my dad was often difficult, to say the least. But as I’ve been thinking about him lately and how I’ve talked about our relationship in the past, I feel like maybe I’ve been a little incomplete in how I’ve portrayed him. I loved my dad, no matter how close or how far we were in the moment, and the truth is that he’s just as responsible for my creativity and to an extent my curiosity as my mom and my stepmother were.CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full w

Are you overwhelmed? Do you ever get overwhelmed? Man, I do. All the time. My brain is always on and processing—either trying to process existing ideas or trying to figure out where to put all of the new ones that I haven’t had time to really think about. And it doesn’t stop. It’s all day, every day. There’s always a bunch of potential somethings bouncing around my head. And let me be clear—I love it and I’m grateful for it, but it is overwhelming and exhausting trying to keep track of it all and figure out where to put all of those ideas.CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Jeffery Saddoris

I’m still not quite 100% myself, but I wanted to share a quick update. Yesterday was day 12 since testing positive for COVID, and it was the first day that I finally tested negative. Both Adrianne and I had very mild cases, especially compared to some of our friends and family members who really had a it bad. I had a temperature of 100.8 for one day and, other than feeling fatigued and brain fogged for the past week or so, that was pretty much it. Adrianne had it a little worse than me, but not much. The most frustrating part was continuing to test positive for days after the symptoms had subsided. And according to the latest from the CDC, you can continue to test positive for 90 days.CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Je

I know I’m a little late on this Iteration and I apologize for that. As you can hear, my voice doesn’t sound the way it normally does and maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it sounds better.In the Iteration I was going to do, I was going to talk about finding that thing you live for, that thing that you love, that thing that lights you up. But I have to postpone it because I’m just having a hell of a time stringing two thoughts together. Even going through this right now, I’m live without a net, as it were. I don’t have a script or any outline like I normally would have when I record one of these. For this one, all I have is COVID and apparently have had it since sometime over the weekend—and let me tell you, it is not fun. Don’t listen to all of those stories telling you how great it is and how all the cool kids are getting it. It’s a lie. I’ve been vaxxed and vaxxed again boosted and, you know, while all of that probably means that it’s much less severe and means that the odds of me needing to go the hospital

This Iteration was going to be about some of my recent musical explorations into things like VCV Rack and the Arturia MiniFreak (which I may actually end up selling), but instead I’d like to share a recent story with you that sort of blew my mind.CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Jeffery Saddoris

When I was a kid, one of the things I would look forward to every year was going to the fair. The LA County Fair was massive and in elementary school we always got free tickets—I think they were stapled to our report cards, but I could be wrong. Although I moved around a lot as a kid, it seemed like we never lived very far from the fairgrounds, which are right next to the Pomona Raceway. My dad would take us there to watch the NHRA Winternationals every year and see people like “Big Daddy” Don Garlits and Don “The Snake” Prudhomme drive like bats out of hell down the 1/4 mile. I remember reading that at one point the LA County Fair was the largest county fair in the nation, but I don’t know if that’s still true. That said, to a 10-year-old, it was huge. QUESTIONSWhat’s your favorite part of your creative process?Do you give that part of your process the time it deserves?Email me at talkback@jefferysaddoris.comLINKSSanta Anita Montgomery County Agricultural FairMaryland State FairOlympus EM1 MkII12-40mm f/2.8

Over the weekend, Adrianne and I watched a fantastic new documentary by Anton Corbijn called Squaring the Circle. It’s about Hipgnosis, the legendary design agency in London formed in the late 1960s by Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey Powell, or “Po” to his friends. I knew I was going to love it before I even saw the trailer because so much of their work has been etched into my brain over the past four decades of my life. The work they did for Pink Floyd alone would have made them industry icons, but they also worked with Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, T Rex, Yes, Genesis, 10cc, and a ton of other bands over the course of their 15-year run.LINKSSquaring the Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis) | Official Red Band Trailer | UtopiaAnton Corbijn on Squaring the Circle, Hipgnosis, Album Covers & Kurt CobainCategory:Album covers by HipgnosisStorm Thorgerson | Designing The ImpossibleStorm Thorgerson, Pt. 1Storm Thorgerson, Pt. 2CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @je

I’ve come to the conclusion that I can no longer care what you think about my work. And it’s not that I don’t care about you as an audience, but if I’m worried about you liking what I make while I’m still making it or even in deciding what to make, I’m not putting 100% of myself into it. By not caring what you think, I get to put 100% of my ideas, my skills, and my experience—not to mention effort—into what I’m doing, and ultimately that’s better for everyone.LINKSKate BushThe Kick Inside22 consecutive dates at the Hammersmith ApolloCONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Jeffery Saddoris

I’ve hesitated to really talk much about AI, mostly because I’ve been on the fence about whether I think it’s got the potential to save us or destroy us, and depending on who and what you read, it seems like it’s 50/50 either way. It’s just too soon to tell and I think these technologies are being adopted so quickly that we haven’t given ourselves enough time to think about the ramifications or the potential. Instead, everyone is rushing to become an armchair expert so they can monetize it into oblivion before they even understand it. Honestly, a lot of the talk around AI feels like a YouTube short that promises to teach you how to make thousands of dollars a month from affiliate marketing and drop shipping. Still, some of the image generation tools are interesting and I’ve been wondering whether or not there’s a place for AI in my creative workflow. I know there are a ton of legal and even moral and ethical questions that I still need to sort out for myself, but for the purposes of this Iteration, I’m going

I know we’re only a little over the halfway mark, but if I could recommend one book as my “must read” of 2023, it would be Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act: A Way of Seeing, despite the fact that I haven’t actually read it from cover to cover. Let me explain. I started to read it from the beginning but within just a few sentences, I knew it was going to be more of a reference book than a “read it once and move on” kind of book. So I just leave it on my desk and whenever I need a creative boost or a little blast of existential insight, I’ll pick it up and flip to a random page and read for a bit. Sometimes I flip to something new, while other times I end up reading something I’ve read before, which I think is a perfectly reasonable solution given the often-esoteric tone of the wisdom contained within it. My mom used to say, “you’re not ready to hear until you’re ready to hear it,” which is really a variation on the adage “when the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” That’s exactly what makes this a book t

This is my eighth summer living on the East Coast and aside from the heat, I am still not used to the humidity. Actually, I don’t think I ever will be. I spent the first 48 years of my life living in Southern California and starting when I was about 4 until probably my freshman year in college, I spent most of my summers in Arizona, which was hot but not humid. The landscape and the people left an indelible impression on me and though I can’t see myself ever going back—at least to live—I’ll always be more drawn to and more at home in the desolate beauty of Arizona and the American West.LINKS152° at Persian Gulf International AirportBuckskin Mountain State ParkParker DamParker, ArizonaLake HavasuLondon BridgeThe Spy Who Loved MeWetbike CONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this It

I’m going to try something different, so I really don’t know exactly where this Iteration is going to go. I thought I’d just put on some music and write whatever came to mind. At the moment, Dark Star by Crosby, Stills, and Nashis playing in the background, which I love despite not really being a CSN fan. Adrianne found the album at this little record store in DC a few weeks ago that’s across the street from our favorite ice cream shop.LINKSMy Mixcast 4 long-term updateMy Mixcast 4 initial reviewDavid Carson nucollage, vol. 1 reviewCONNECT WITH MEWebsite: https://jefferysaddoris.com  Twitter: @jefferysaddoris  Instagram: @jefferysaddorisSUBSCRIBESubscribe to Jeffery Saddoris: Almost Everything in your favorite podcast app to get more conversations like this. You can find the full written version of this Iteration on Substack.MUSICMusic For Workplaces by Jeffery Saddoris

This has been sort of a weird week for me. Friday would have been my mom’s 79th birthday and for the past 14 years, not a day has gone by that I don’t think about her. Sometimes only a little, other times, I think about her a lot. I miss our Sunday brunches at Molly’s, though Molly sold the place years ago. I miss her smile, which I can no longer remember without looking at a photograph. Mostly, I miss her optimism and her goodness. I miss her advice and her belief in me and her unwavering faith in something greater than all of us that allowed her to see that people were basically good if we could just get out of our own ways and accept one another for the brilliant beings that she believed us to be. I need that right now.LINKSGrand Theft Auto: https://www.rockstargames.com/gta-vSkyrim: https://elderscrolls.bethesda.net/en/skyrim/Zelda: https://www.zelda.com/Red Dead Redemption 2: https://www.rockstargames.com/games/reddeadredemption2On Taking Pictures: http://www.ontakingpictures.com/CONNECT WITH MEWebsite:

How do you know when it’s time to rethink or refresh your personal brand? It’s something I’ve spent a fair bit of time thinking about lately. But before we dive into that, I think we first need to answer another question and that is what does “personal brand” even mean? According to Gary Vee, “Your personal brand is your reputation.”  Another way he put it was, “Your brand is about how someone feels in the moment when they interact with you or your business.” On the other hand, Harvard Business Review says that your brand is not your reputation, which is based how other people see you, but rather how you want people to see you. Reputation is certainly part of it, but it’s not the whole picture.LINKSGary Vee article: https://garyvaynerchuk.com/5-strategies-for-personal-branding-online/Harvard Business Review article: https://hbr.org/2022/02/whats-the-point-of-a-personal-brandThe Futur: https://thefutur.com/Rethinking My Website: https://jefferysaddoris.substack.com/p/rethinking-my-websiteIt's Not About a