How To Read A Photograph 

More of these please! Or even deeper dives into individual photos

I always feel like I’m in a hall with one of the top Photography professors when you do these more theoretical/ history based videos. It takes me outside of the RU-vid photography/ videography bubble (which I do love as well) but so heavily based on landscape/travel/ big adventures rather than developing ones eye/creativity even in the most mundane situations.

I really enjoy these types of videos!!! Theory, history and inspiration to practice.

The Art of Photography, YES!!! I love this type of content! Thank you for making such a great video. This type of content inspires me to get excited about photography all over again.

My Grandad was not a photographer and was not classically an artist, but the way you do things really reminds me of him. Thanks for your videos, I really appreciate being able to feel closer to my dead grandfather!

This was a great video, Ted. I started watching your iTunes videos years ago and was enthralled with your knowledge and ability to communicate about photography and its greatest exponents. This was a refreshing return to those days about the true art of photography, the heart of photography. More of these and fewer equipment reviews would be gratefully appreciated. It's not the camera, it's the photographer that makes the image.

The Henri Cartier-Bresson photograph at 7:23 was taken on an overnight train in Romania. I used to ride one of those trains about once a year, visiting family across the country.

I missed these kind of videos! More of them, please 🤗

The experience that you put in your videos - I'm talking about experience with photography - and the informations that you can give to your audience is always... amazing. Thanks for your videos, Ted!

Terrific video, Ted. I'm sure many would appreciate more of these sorts of pieces. BTW, I love your story about the B&W photograph that drew you in! :-)

Pollock has the most perplexing composition of them all....And the most Beautiful !

Loved this video. I didn’t think it was too long at all. I really love when you dive into the art of photography it’s one of the main reason I always look forward to your videos. We are standing on the shoulders of giants and most of us aren’t even aware of it. Keep enlighten us please and stay safe

Thank you for this. Reviews of lenses, cameras and phones are fine, but it's your videos like this one, that keeps me coming back. Composition is the difference maker in my book. You can master every other aspect of photography, but if your composition is (in lack of a better word) weak, the image probably won't capture interest - unless you caught something or someone sensational with your camera.

As most people I enjoy a good photograph. I recently saw an interview with Rachael Talibart. She is a very smart woman who used to teach law at the university level. Because of her love for photography she made it her new career. I bought, what I guess, is her latest book called “Tides and Tempests”. A photograph is a slice of time and I find hers amazing. She lives near the ocean thus her interests. Rachael doesn’t shoot time exposures she shoots violent storms. Thanks for another great Art of Photography!

Hey Ted, feel free to ignore that little voice that says 'this video is getting too long' and just have at it. Some of my favorite RU-vid videos are the ones that are 30min+ which allows me to fully immerse myself in any given topic. Indulge us!!

The Arnold Newman photograph is interesting for a number of reasons - it was shot on large format and there is a contact sheet which shows the whole set of images. It also shows the pre crop of this image, but the crop works so well with lines, triangles and rule of thirds. I would truly love a print of that image.

Ted, thanks for your teachings. I found this video very interesting.

I really didn't get the photo at first but Joe Louis' fist makes all the difference. Stravinsky's arm is so key to that Newman picture. He turned Stravinsky into a shape. Jackson Pollock is a genius but you have to experience his art in person. I didn't get Pollock until I actually saw one up close.

Great stuff! I’m so glad I checked your vlog/video. One of your very best. Thank you for sharing.

The education and intention here...best quality stuff...wish I was so learned in photography and the intention of it. But I'm not giving up. Love the content.

Great video again Ted. This past year has made me a bit of a recluse, and if I wasn’t a key worker and have interaction with people I would probably have gone mad! I’m lucky enough to have some great countryside on my doorstep, so I go out on my bicycle and take photos on my iPhone. I also live in an old market town with interesting buildings, and love to go out with my ’proper’ camera and capture their timeless charm. I always feel inspired after watching your videos.

This is great Ted. More of this (and less of the gear reviews) please. I really miss your educational videos.

I definitely appreciate this video and message so to speak. This really has me thinking about my own perception and how to better convey visual communication!

Great video as always. Love your knowledge of photography and the way you deliver it. Hugely inspiring. Thank you so much

Great episode. Before the pandemic, I would carve out time to go to the library to leaf through photo books. Everything you mentioned I would get out of those sessions. Thank you for bringing that exercise back to me.

Thanks for these insights. It’s clear that you think deeply about your art and it’s great that you share that.

I like how you not only talked about composition and being intentional with the framing but you practice it. The way you set up your desk and framed your background with a view through to the double French doors. How that splits the left and right side of your background with negative space and blank wall on the left. Nice 😊

Amazing video. So much covered, really inspiring... Thank you, Ted.

Excellent video Ted. Hopefully you keep bringing us your knowledge, which is so much more valuable than another camera review. All the best

I just found your account 2 days ago and I'd like to thank you for your very hard work and amazing content. I've been taking pictures for a little more than 3 decades, started with a Pentax P30N. My dad, grandfather, uncle were all in photography, all from prestigious school in Paris, but somehow, I never learned from them. with digital photography, my passion for this art became an obsession, so far that I've now been traveling exclusively for it, 6-7 months per year, one country after the other (mainly in Asia for the last 6 years) and am now based in Thailand, where I'm sorting and editing 158'000 pictures of my archives. Cartier Bresson, Avedon, Kertész, Georges Eastman or painter like Toulouse Lautrec, have always inspired me, and finding your channel rejuvenate the desire to get deeper into it, get back to the ART and away to the destroying influence of social medias, especially considering the collapse of Instagram and Co. again, thx a lot for lighting the flame again :-)

Love this, Ted. No one covers the art of camera work like you do. Thank you.

Excellent video, Ted. It brought back memories of a photography class assignment back in '69 or '70. We were to sit somewhere nondescript and bring back at least one frame which pleased the instructor. We were limited to a normal lens, black and white, a 36 shot roll and a 12-foot radius. This current situation has given me a lot of time to think creatively in limited circumstance and I am eager to practice it when "normal" returns.

I loved the pace of this. I was captured through and through. Adding my like midway through

Thanks for not altering despite the medium of RU-vid. There are some who appreciate your depth. I for one, was always the one getting lost from my group in the museum because they took so little time to take in the art.

This is the content I originally subscribed for. Awesome! Please make more of these.

Excellent clip Ted. Inspirational indeed.

This is a really insightful video! Thanks for making this video.

Engaging, entertaining as usual. I appreciate your efforts bring these fantastic clips!

Excellent wrap Ted during difficult times. Thanks.

Ted, thanks for this. Wonderful issues for consideration. As a photographer, I find myself often starting with the fourth point, “what moves you (me).” As you mentioned, sometimes there’s an anticipation of something happening that will move us. Those moments require great patience to sit and wait. I also appreciate what you said about the woodshed. The first few times I went into our back courtyard, I didn’t see a damn thing. But I kept going out and suddenly there were moments all around. And they moved me! Since beginning my journey in photography, I’ve become a much better viewer of art. It’s a reciprocal relationship I find very rewarding.

I agree with you Ted about the Mona Lisa. This painting was much overlooked before the mid-19th century and it’s theft by a Louvre employee in 1911 made it famous exposing it to the entire world. As for her smile, many of Da Vinci’s woman have very similar ones. Adding to that is the fact that Da Vinci has painted four Mona Lisas, each exposed in different museums around the world. But as we know, there is only one with a great past history that many acclaim, i.e. the one in the Louvre. I’m a fan of museums and I wasn’t surprised of the result. My guess was 5 to 7 seconds - which is a shame. As for your subject this week, it’s one of my favorite one. “How to Read a Photograph”. Definitely composition and aesthetics play a vital role and I can’t help remembering Henri-Cartier Bresson’s method to judge if a composition works or not when he inverse an image - to identify if dark and light masses do their work by bringing the viewer inside the image. It’s a worthwhile method. I think one can learn composition faster when working with Still Life. You have the ability to interact with each object to create a worthwhile composition. You learn what is distracting, and you understand the value of space and geometry. Thanks for a great video Ted!

I love it when you make videos like this! Keep em coming!

Great video, I feel like some of the most increadible times I ever spent shooting was in highschool when we would get assignments and had to go out and capture images that explored a specific design ellement or use a specific type of composition we would have to shoot 1 roll of film and each frame had to be a carefully composed and exposed image. We went on to creative projects shooting slide presentations that we would put to music. I think the assignments were such a valuable part of my education both in part because it influenced how I looked through the lens to compose and how I saw others work.

I think this is the best video you have made to date. I really enjoyed it 👍

Many thanks. Nice video, as always. Love it.

I love your videos that keep me thinking about the subject after the video has ended.

It is this kind of content that made me subscribe to your channel years ago - please continue!

Great video and that offers stimulating thoughts. Can watch this episode over and over again and take time to contemplating each of your points, and more than 3 sec..

I'm really enjoying these videos Ted.

Very nice video! Thank you!

Thank you so much for always providing what's behind an image!

Great analysis and splendid words as always Ted. Thank you

Happy to see you're still doing videos. :) Be safe

Thanks for producing this Ted.

Looking forward to more stuffs like these Ted. Great video.

I reality liked this video! Your conclusion about force ourselves to creativity it find me 100% agree

Very interesting episode. Love it!

Love these art videos, love being introduced to new photographers

Wonderful Ted, thank you 🙏

Well done. Thinking about photographs seems more and more to be key to improving one’s own photography.

This is my favorite type of content that you make, and it's unique among other photography channels.

Back to basics, thank you

I think you're the only photographer I've NEVER met, who continues to give me a such fresh perspective with your insights. Thanks for always generously and passionately communicating your knowledge! It's inspiring!

Hi Ted, Jose from Puerto Rico. You and Hugh Brownstone are my favorite Photography scholars. There is another young woman who has a RU-vid channel, and she goes by the name T, Hopper who dives deep into the history of Photography. Her views on the subject are wonderful. Having said that, I never get tired of watching your content man! Getting better in the art of Photography is always a great goal; but you articulate it in a way that makes the journey to that goal enjoyable.

Thank you for this video! I needed it!

Please make more of these videos! I really enjoy it!

Great video! I love this!

Immaculate timing a little reflective motivation from Ted 👌😀 Resetting what is important to Us as Creators . Thanks Ted

This Blew me away. Thank YOU

Great stuff, as always my dear!

This is an interesting video. I'd love it if you were to do a series about the subject.

Dear Ted, thank You for the help in these years and lately. Many of your advices helped me. Actually I started To take care of the way I want To photograph, observing, following the process; thank You, Ted, for your help, Ariana

I am happy to watch your art video again!

Loved this

Great content, thank you for sharing

I did notice all in your video the lighting setting is amazing

Inspirational repackaging of what I've heard from Ted and others. Reminded me of the many ways to stay engaged and grow creatively.

You have awesome videos on photography, keep up the good work!

Great episode!!! 👍🏼👍🏼

Great video - and especially the idea of "exploring your front yard" - I've been doing exactly that - and not Macro, but making videos of the nature around the house. There's so much going on, if only you sit still for a while, and observe the animal life. I've decided to create meditation videos, doing ultra slow (not timelapse) macro of plants - but in a way, that it feels like a discovery ride. I had to build my own camera rig, to accomplish this, and in the process, learnt a thing or two about microcontrollers, stepper motors, and image stabilization - to name a few ... a really fun discovery journey, and so rewarding...

This is possibly the channel/person I've learned most about photography. Thank you.

I understood in a revelatory way that a photograph can be a work of art when I first saw Eugene Smith's 'Walk to Paradise Garden' - that was 53 years ago, I was 14 years old and I haven't stopped photographing since.

Excellent episode.

Great Ted. Definitely more like this, please.

We Love our TED TALKS on the Art Of Photography. Nice one Ted !!

Thanks for the video Ted, got an exam tomorrow, studying semiotics, and this video has somewhat been helpful ❤

Love your videos nice job 👏

great music choice's!

Excellent talk. About exploring your yard, last year I did just that, saw a ladybug in a tree and litteraly ended up spending 2 days photographing ladybugs and wasps in the leaves.

Great, great, great! Love these deeper videos :D

Great video Ted.

I love this!! Would love to see more

Hi, Ted. Thanks for another great video. You mentioned looking at the photos... so my question is where to look for a photos to look at? Is there a comprehensive and friendly intro to the history of photography?

Love this. Looked for that book, The Decisive Moment”, $570 on Amazon 😳

Ooh, the Art of Photography is back! Yay!!!!!!

How to read a photograph - I think we need to learn this skill spending more time observing and paying attention to the environment in order to make better compositions.

Ted back being ted....plz keep doing such videos... Dont loose urself in gear reviews.... I loved this channel for such content... I can hv reviews on 100 other channels....

thank you Mr. Forbes for that great Video.

I love these kinds of videos

This video was really interesting. Thank you