{"id":15116,"date":"2015-05-12T11:55:14","date_gmt":"2015-05-12T15:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.johnpaulcaponigro.com\/blog\/?p=15116"},"modified":"2015-05-12T11:55:14","modified_gmt":"2015-05-12T15:55:14","slug":"alumnus-olaf-willoughby-on-being-interviewed-interviewing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.johnpaulcaponigro.com\/blog\/15116\/alumnus-olaf-willoughby-on-being-interviewed-interviewing\/","title":{"rendered":"Alumnus Olaf Willoughby – On Being Interviewed & Interviewing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"001_tock\"<\/a>
\nIn June 2015, Olaf will be co-teaching \u2018Visual Conversations<\/a>\u2019, a creative photography workshop with Eileen McCarney Muldoon at Maine Media College in Rockport. They will also be running a LightDance workshop in Brooklyn in Sep 2015.\u00a0<\/em>
\nOlaf Willoughby<\/a>\u00a0is a photographer, writer and researcher. He is co-founder of The Leica Meet<\/em>, a Facebook page and website growing at warp speed to over 7,800 members. After conducting many interviews for the Leica Blog, Olaf\u00a0was recently interviewed there too.\u00a0Read his interview here.<\/a>
\nHere, Olaf shares his thoughts on interviewing and being interviewed.
\nWhat Makes Photography Tock?<\/strong>
\nThis was the question uppermost in my mind when I started interviewing photographers for The Leica Blog some time ago.
\nWe\u2019ve all worked on ideas which tick like a Swiss watch. They have a magic flow resonating with ourselves and others. But some don\u2019t, they linger on that haunting to-do list and never quite get done. Why?
\nPhotographers are often considered not to be the best judges of their own work, so asking a direct question was unlikely to be productive. I was wondering how to tackle this dilemma in my interviews when, luckily, I stumbled on this quote from Duane Michaels,
\n\u2018Photographers look too much. They have to start thinking and feeling and make that the source of their work. Don\u2019t just look for curiosity\u2019. (For more words of great wisdom check Sean Kernan\u2019s interview with Duane Michaels here.<\/a>)
\nI understood. It identified for me what I love about Michael Ackermann in \u2018End Time City\u2019and the shortcomings I see in my own work. Time and again I pressed the \u2018thinking & feeling\u2019button in my interviews and it always resulted in a deeper more engaging response.
\nSo when the Leica Blog turned the tables and interviewed me on my \u2018Leica in London\u2019Street Photography project (link below) I felt well prepared. Yet initially I fell into the same trap. Rationality ruled. It was only when I let go of the left brain that I could articulate the bigger picture.
\nSeeing that I had sat on both sides of the interviewing table JP kindly suggested that I might like to share any learnings on his blog.
\nWorking through the process from the questions, to pulling together the images and text and finally telling the story, here are three pointers emerging from my interviews which have helped me to show the work of others in the best light. I hope they work for you too.
\n\"002_questions\"
\nQuestion the questions <\/strong>
\nLet\u2019s start at the beginning. The fact that I (or anybody else) am asking the questions doesn\u2019t mean they are the right or the best questions for you. If you have thought through your project then you\u2019ll know the one or two critical points you want to get across. Sense check the questions to see if they\u00a0 put the spotlight on these areas. If not, suggest changes or take advantage of the more generic questions to make your point. No apologies if this sounds \u2018duh\u2019, obvious. Apart from the big and experienced industry names, most photographers are honoured and excited to be interviewed. Often too excited to pinpoint how they think and feel about their project and whether the questions really search out the soul of their work.
\n
\nIn a similar vein, avoid \u2018speed dating\u2019. The tyranny of 140 characters has given rise to questionnaires seeking one word, one phrase answers. \u2018What’s the best thing\/worst thing about\u2026\u2026.?\u2019\u2018What keeps you up at night? What gets you going in the morning?\u2019.
\nThese work as entertainment. After all, any creative play is good. But they are sound bytes, lacking the conversational element necessary for a good interview. A lot of that dialogue takes place outside the direct questions and answers which are mostly conducted on line. In my interviews I almost always talk with the photographers about their projects beforehand and it is in these conversations that we discuss and sometimes uncover the essence of their work.
\n\"003_di
\nA good example is an interview with Italian Leica photographer, Guiseppe di Santis. He had some intriguing shots of the Palio, a horse race, unchanged since 1656 around the Piazza del Campo, Sienna, Italy. At first sight this is already a great sporting moment. Yet it emerges that the real story lies in the \u2018contradas\u2019, the neighbourhoods which compete with one another. They have their own flags, costumes, parties. And deeper still is the relationship between Sienna and the horse, which after this dramatic and chaotic race returns to normal life in the community.
\n\"004_less
\nLess is more<\/strong>
\nMoving on to assembling the images and text and to paraphrase Ira Glass, \u2018Kill off the poorer stuff so the good can live\u2019. I\u2019m astonished how many times a request for 12 images and 1,000 words for an interview will arrive with 18 or more images and anything from 700 – 1500 words with a request to leave out what doesn\u2019t fit.
\nWhilst I treasure the trust of these photographers there\u2019s something else going on here. Attachment. It\u2019s all too easy to stay in the comfortable cocoon of an inside-out view of the world. That\u2019s fine when the work is being developed but when it is time to subject it to the sometimes harsh glare of the public, it is better to adopt an outside-in view.
\nWhat\u2019s your signal to noise ratio? In our frantic busy world, what is it about your project that will signal the reader to stop and pay attention?
\nBe aggressive. For the interview to communicate well you\u2019ll need to articulate what makes your work tick. This is where the 140 characters come into their own. Can you communicate the essence of your work in a Tweet? Crazy? Yes. But no-one need see it.
\nUse those words as a benchmark to review and align both your text and your images. Be ruthless in removing redundancy. This is hard but ask yourself, \u2018If there were only space for one image to illustrate my main points, which would I choose?\u2019Repeat twelve times and you\u2019ll have a good idea of which images to submit. Tackle the text in a similar way. \u2018If I had to cut every paragraph in half, how would I do it?\u2019Try it, it works.
\nThat\u2019s the disciplined route. But some people, especially photographers tend to think better visually. So another, far looser approach, is to turn the process upside down and start with the images instead of the words.
\nUsing small prints or software like Adobe Bridge, arrange your images side by side so you can easily change the order. Now simply look for the energy. Which images seem naturally to cluster together, almost to rhyme with one another, as though they are part of the same story? Which are the outliers and why?
\nThe beauty of this more freeform method is that the final 12 images seem to come together organically and it is an easier entry point from which to move on to the text.
\nStart with words, start with images, or bounce around between the two. The aim is to get to the optimum balance between less and more.
\n\"005_single
\nA journey of 1,000 words<\/strong>\u2026<\/strong>
\nSocially we may pride ourselves on being as stable as a rock but if we look back at our photography, we\u2019ll notice how it has shifted over the years. Maybe we were influenced by a new camera or lens, perhaps we went back to film, tried medium or large format or were simply inspired by a workshop teacher. Just as Picasso went through a \u2018blue period\u2019, as Georgia O\u2019Keeffe\u2019s color palette changed when she moved to New Mexico, we are all on an artistic journey.
\nOur images reflect a snapshot of us at a given moment in time. But the creative process also changes us and causes us to evolve in turn. Your project narrative has a beginning and a middle but has probably not yet reached its end.
\nIn an interview it is important to convey a sense of this dynamic. Too many questions stop at, \u2018who were your major influences?\u2019. This tends to trigger a dutiful response parading the names of the greats.
\nA better rider to the question is, \u2018\u2026and how did they influence you\u2019. Now we\u2019re getting back to how we each think and feel about our work. And that is what fascinates our readers.
\nLet me use myself as a brutal example. Major influence? Michael Ackermann. How? By making me feel that much of my work is too literal, failing to capture the looseness and depth of life.
\nWhat about mistakes? Projects never run completely smoothly.\u00a0 When did your creative SatNav take you into a cul de sac?
\nThere are always hiccups, which demonstrate our shared humanity and show how we all learn through trial and error. These resonate with readers because they have questions too.
\nOur personal work should be the product of asking ourselves questions, but so often it isn\u2019t.
\nGood interviews grab the reader\u2019s attention and then release them to answer their own questions.
\nFind out more about Olaf Willoughby here.<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/span>
\nRead more Alumni Success Stories here.<\/span><\/a><\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>
\n\"006_the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In June 2015, Olaf will be co-teaching \u2018Visual Conversations\u2019, a creative photography workshop with Eileen McCarney Muldoon at Maine Media College in Rockport. They will also be running a LightDance workshop in Brooklyn in Sep 2015.\u00a0 Olaf Willoughby\u00a0is a photographer, writer and researcher. He is…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[361],"tags":[657,1269,2556,3430,875],"post_folder":[],"yoast_head":"\nAlumnus Olaf Willoughby - On Being Interviewed & Interviewing - John Paul Caponigro<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.johnpaulcaponigro.com\/blog\/15116\/alumnus-olaf-willoughby-on-being-interviewed-interviewing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Alumnus Olaf Willoughby - On Being Interviewed & Interviewing - John Paul Caponigro\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In June 2015, Olaf will be co-teaching \u2018Visual Conversations\u2019, a creative photography workshop with Eileen McCarney Muldoon at Maine Media College in Rockport. 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