The Culinary Philosophy That Changed My Photography Career
My secret to mitigating failure in the field.
Part of being an intentional creative is making an effort to draw inspiration from many places, especially outside of your discipline. For me, one of those places is the culinary world. I’m not quite sure when it started but I developed this fascination for the focus, intensity, and creativity that chefs employ to bring their vision to life. From Bourdain to Chef’s Table to The Bear, I love pulling life lessons from the world of cooking. I’m currently on assignment in the Arctic Circle with Quark Expeditions and I thought I’d share the most important lesson I’ve ever pulled from the culinary world—the one that had truly led to me being productive in the field—is on the concept of mise en place.
What is mise en place?
Mise en place originated from French cooking and is used across kitchens all over the world. The idea is quite simple: it’s about extreme preparation before you begin cooking. From chopping ingredients, to labelling containers, to sharpening knives, or washing down the entire kitchen after service, mise en place is a detail-oriented process that’s designed to mitigate points of failure.
The entire process is about developing efficiencies so that when it comes time to do the work, the chefs can get into it without distractions. Since everything needed has it’s place, you’re not searching for something. You’re recalling it. Since everything is checked for operation, you’re unlikely to have tools fail on you during service. Mise en place is about attention to detail. It requires discipline. And it’s something that’s done in service of delivering great work.
How do I translate this to photography?
Look, we can’t control the environment for out photographs. Especially with respect to nature, wildlife, street, or documentary. You just have to make yourself available and let the environment come to you. But what we can control is how we prepare. And when it comes to the regular preparation for a day of photography, I spend a lot of time sweating the details.
Once I’ve arrived at my home base for a photo trip, I’m setting up a work station that has cameras, batteries, storage, and accessories all in a designated area. If I take something, I put it back where it goes; no shortcuts, no excuses. Every tool has a place to call home and for me, I’m gonna make sure that they get back home once I’m done with them.
Each night, I have this involved process of wrapping up. I’ll start laying out the memory cards from the various cameras. Before I get to downloading, I’m swapping fresh batteries and putting the used batteries to charge. Next, I’ll look to clean the cameras and lenses to make sure they’re not going to bed with residue (especially salt from seawater). And if necessary, I’ll review my saved camera settings to make sure they are set up for the type of shooting that’ll be happening the next day. Once all of these items are checked off, I can move onto the footage.
I’ll start by downloading the cards one by one to a folder for the date on a 4Tb SSD (which sits inside a root folder for the project). The footage is then triaged for photo or video. That footage is then triaged further by the camera model. And that footage is separated once again according the place or activity I was involved in. Once this is done, I’ll copy all the footage of that day to a second SSD to have as a backup incase of the first drive failing. Once this is done, I’ll take all the photos and import them into a dedicated photography SSD where I have a Capture One Session created for the overall project. This allows me to have a place to work on my photography separately from the archive and start messing around with some edits.
Now that’s already a lot of work but it doesn’t stop there. I’ll take the mise en place philosophy even further as the projects become more involved.
Because of the work I do and the clients I partner with, there’s a lot of video production on many of my trips. For this reason, I’ll look to build a little voice over studio that’s always ready to record my thoughts. Whether it’s in an AirBnB, hotel, or this cabin at sea, I’ll build out a space with a camera, light, and audio solution that’s ready to go so that if I’m inspired, I can just sit down and document the thoughts. Once I’m done, the footage will go through the same process I mentioned earlier and the space will be set up once again for the next recording.
It’s a lot of work. It might sound simple but on a trip like this, where we’re getting minimal sleep, constantly on the move, jumping on excursions, and just pushing ourselves day after day, well, it just takes a sh*t ton of discipline to maintain a process. For bigger projects like this, I’ll even invest in bringing a producer or cinematographer that helps with a good chunk of this process because it’s crucial to my success.
When I don’t have to worry about the gear having issues, batteries dying, storage failure, smudges on a lens, or trying to find that one clip from that one specific day, it means that more of my mind is available for the art. It means that when I’m holding a camera, I’m as tuned as I can be to what’s in front of me. Mise en place is something that demands effort and delivers peace. It asks a lot of you but in return, puts you in a good head space for the environment to come to you while mitigating the chance of any catastrophic failure.
While it might not be for everyone, I would strongly urge any of you involved in photography trips abroad to scrutinize your process. Take the time to really look at all the steps around your photography and how you can sharpen your workflow. I never thought that a concept from the culinary world would have such a strong influence on my work but I gotta say, it may be the most important process in journey.
New May Contest!
Each month, I run a contest for the Church & Street community and try to feature something that I think people will appreciate.
For May, I’ll be giving away a five-pack of Kodak Portra 400 35mm film. This is the colour stock that I use the most when I’m shooting film and I know that many of you reading this wouldn’t mind having some extra rolls for your inventory.
How am I picking the winner? All you have to do is be a member of this community and leave a comment on this post. As with every contest, I’ll be randomly picking one person, confirming they meet the requirements and then contacting them directly before announcing the winner publicly.
Due to shipping restrictions, this contest is only for US residents and void where prohibited by law. Good luck!
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Reader Question: How have your first few days been in the Arctic Circle?
My goal for this trip with Quark Expeditions was to come in with an open mind and just take whatever the environment made available. While I’m most comfortable around street, documentary, and portrait photography, I wasn’t gonna shut the door on what this part of the world could deliver. And man, did it deliver.
I managed to find that point of departure for this project; this thread of an idea that I’d follow and tug on to build a story around. And with each passing day, I was able to make some meaningful steps forward, creating work that I genuinely enjoyed. Now, it might not be for everyone but I gotta say, a handful of these compositions have brought me quite a bit of peace. I’ll make sure to carve out some of them for a few posts in the coming weeks.
What’s Next?
We have four days left on this expedition and more than anything, I’m thankful for the guides and crew that are making adventures like this possible. There’s an incredible amount of work and resources that goes into creating safe expeditions and I’m really getting an intimate look at it now. Over the next few days, I’m gonna wrap up some video work to flesh out a more comprehensive story so stay tuned for that in the months to come. Anyway, that’s enough for this week. See ya next time.
GB
Great stuff, hope you make a video about this trip