The Wild Photographer

One Thing, One Frame: Talking with Jason Edwards on Powerful Storytelling Techniques, Advice on Becoming a Photographer, and Much More

• Court Whelan • Episode 69

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 1:25:33

Today’s guest is National Geographic legend Jason Edwards—a photographer who doesn’t just document the world… he translates it via powerful storytelling techniques, which we cover in excellent depth in the conservation.

Jason talks about storytelling as a responsibility: becoming a portal for people who may never stand where you’re standing. We dig into his deceptively simple “five frames” storytelling challenge, his ruthless “one thing per photo” rule, and a powerful litmus test: does your image land emotionally without a caption?

We also get wonderfully practical—how he builds images in-camera (no object removal), how he culls his thousands of photos per trip, why “context shots” still matter even if everyone’s taken them, and how to think like a pro without getting swallowed by social media.

Top 10 takeaways

  • Storytelling = connection: you’re sharing an experience for someone who may never get to be there.
  • The 5-frame storytelling concept forces clarity—every frame must earn its place.
  • A single image can be “the one” if it moves someone without needing a caption.
  • Use an adjective test (cold, lonely, chaotic, tender) to strengthen emotional storytelling.
  • Jason’s core rule: you only get one thing in a photo—build everything around that anchor.
  • Supporting elements are “actors,” not clutter: if it doesn’t add, it subtracts.
  • Don’t copy the internet: avoid pre-researching other photographers’ shots if you want your story.
  • Practice “context shots” (the obvious wide/establishing frames) so your story has structure.
  • His culling workflow is brutally efficient: 3 passes + color labels to find the true story set.
  • Be a pro by acting like one: protect your credit, respect your work, and don’t let social metrics define your worth.

Court's Websites

Sponsors and Promo Codes:


Jason (00:00)
So the call for storytelling for me is connecting people with my experience, thinking that they may never actually have that experience. So I become the portal through which they appreciate the wider world.

And I take that quite seriously.

Court Whelan | The Wild Pho... (00:18)
Hey friends, welcome back to another episode here. ⁓ another marvelous one. Today on The Wild Photographer, I sit down with National Geographic legend, Jason Edwards, a globe trotting natural history and editorial photographer whose career spans more than three decades in every continent on earth and more countries than I can count.

His unforgettable work from wildlife and cultures to climate stories has appeared in hundreds of magazine articles in National Geographic and elsewhere and is truly whether you realize it or not has helped shape the narrative and how we see the wild world because of how prominent his photography is. Jason doesn't just take photos. He tells the bigger story behind them through his techniques, through his experience, and he shares so much wonderful wisdom today.

including things like the five frame concept of storytelling, the litmus test for knowing if you've got a truly great photo on your hands, why you're only allowed one thing in each shot. I particularly love that one.

He also shares a very simple editing process and a great photo culling strategy that he's honed throughout the years. And of course, there's so, so much more. Before we get into the episode, I'd like to acknowledge the sponsors of this show.

First I wanna talk about something that pretty much every photographer deals with sooner or later. The want and need for new photo gear. Our needs change, our style evolves, and sometimes the lens just isn't getting the love it deserves anymore, and sometimes it's just because there's a new piece of kit and gear calling your name.

That's where MPB comes in. MPB makes it ridiculously easy to buy, sell, or trade camera gear all in one place, all on their website, all in one platform. That's mpb.com. And without the uncertainty that comes with random online marketplaces, when you buy from MPB, every single item is carefully inspected, professionally tested, individually packaged and photographed. So you know exactly what you're getting. There's no surprises. Plus everything comes with a warranty and

hassle-free returns, which is a very, very big deal when you rely on your gear for your next photo expedition or just day-to-day life. On the flip side, if you've got equipment sitting around collecting

to MPB is refreshingly simple. You get a quote fast, they handle free, insured shipping, and once your gear is checked, you get paid directly to your bank. No awkward meetups, no time-wasting messages. It's just certainty, which is very, very key in our busy lives.

I also love that MPB keeps gear in circulation. Buying and selling used is truly not just better for your wallet, but it's better for the planet. And they back that up with plastic-free packaging and a real commitment to sustainability. So whether you're upgrading, downsizing, or reshuffling your kit for the next adventure, MPB makes the whole process feel easy and professional. Check them out at MPB.com.

I'd also like to thank Bay Photo and address the importance of printing your work because honestly, this is one of the simplest ways to elevate your photography. Love what you do more because seeing it in the flesh and getting yourself out there more is really, really important to appreciating and showcasing your own work, simply put.

I've been partnering with Bay Photo and they are just an absolutely top professional photo lab. Their quality is next level. And just having a photo printing company, AKA lab, because they're truly scientific about what they do. Having one that you just trust makes it so much easier to confidently

offer prints and wall art to clients and also just print for your own sake, for your own home. It's so rewarding to see your favorite photo from a recent trip on the wall. One thing I really love is how intuitive their online ordering system is. including custom wall previews. You can actually see and share what your images will look like on the wall before you even place an order. That's a massive benefit.

Bayphoto offers an incredible range of display options, including metal prints, acrylics, frame prints, canvas wraps, Turnaround is fast, shipping can go directly to you or to your clients, and their customer service is rock solid as well. And here's a great bonus for listeners of The Wild Photographer. You can get 25 % off any one wall order display.

with promo code TWP25. Those are just three letters, TWP25. Head over to bayphoto.com slash The Wild Photographer to create your next high impact print. Trust me, seeing your work printed just beautifully changes everything.

Okay, and now let's get into the conversation with Jason Edwards.

Court Whelan (04:47)
Jason, welcome.

Jason (04:49)
Mice, G'day, how are you?

Court Whelan (04:51)
So happy to have you on the podcast. So my first question is gonna be a little bit of a, well, I'd say a robust one. It's got layers to it, I'm sure. I wanna talk about storytelling. So you're a phenomenal storyteller in photography and it's one of these topics that we hear so much about. It's all about the storytelling with any sort of media, whether it's video, whether it's photos, even just art in general, storytelling is at the heart of it.

And it's an abstract concept. It's kind of hard to grapple with. And talking to a pro like you, I want to know what does storytelling mean to you and what are some bits of advice to those wanting to do more or perhaps harness storytelling better in their own photography?

Jason (05:36)
Yes, well, that's definitely layered, isn't it? I mean, I remember years ago that when I'd be in the field, I'd come back from assignments and I'd be talking about stories or storytelling and things like that. And even as a young photographer, no one was really sort of paying attention to the phrase storytelling. Everyone was just out there taking pictures and so on and so forth. When I look back at the fact that that's the only way I ever saw photography.

I realise now not only did it put me in good stead, but I was ahead of the pack in that space. So of course, when social media and everything came around and next thing you know, you've got all these people prattling on about storytelling. And to your point, there's not a lot of coherence around what it is. For me, it's about, I see every day that I have in the field as a privilege.

because I get to travel the world, I get to see amazing things, meet incredible people. So for me, what do I do with that? How do I share that back with people who may want to go to those areas or may never have the opportunity to go to those areas? So the call for storytelling for me is connecting people with my experience, thinking that they may never actually have that experience. So I become the portal through which they appreciate the wider world.

And I take that quite seriously.

Court Whelan (07:03)
You know that something stuck with me of what you just said, doing this under the guise of creating something for people that may never get to experience this. Cause you know, myself as someone who's very, very deeply entrenched in travel photography and in a lot of the promo and the marketing, like you want to make a place look so good or an experience or an animal looks so good. like you, you, you want people to go see it themselves, but that's an interesting angle to approach it from as if they're never going to be on the ground.

in that landscape. They're never going to have taken that boat ride out to that secluded island. They're never going to have been in the bumpy Jeep to see the lion and the Serengeti. What does the whole experience feel like and look like? So that yeah, that really strikes me is like intentionally you're you're setting it up for someone that will never see it. They may go see it. They may be so inspired to say, now I've got to go see it. But looking through that

lens, pun intended obviously, is really important and really interesting. ⁓ So when you set all this up in your mind with storytelling, what are some of the things that go through? And of course, I'm trying to distill a lifelong career into a few words in a few minutes. So I realize it's challenging, but like for someone that may be a couple of years into their own photography, or maybe they've been doing it longer, but they have never quite moved away from that kind of document.

Jason (08:12)
Yeah.

Court Whelan (08:26)
the pinnacle, the climax of the trip. We're finally seeing the Cheetahs at sunrise. How do you look at your own work or structure your day or even plan what the next few moments, minutes, hours might be like through that lens of storytelling? How does it work for you in the inner workings of your mind?

Jason (08:45)
I think it's mainly alcohol Court to be honest. ⁓ No, look, mean, I don't, surprisingly, I don't do a lot of forward planning because I move so often, which again, I don't want that to sound egotistical that I don't need to plan, do most definitely. However, looking at, I'm from Australia, obviously, so looking at the other end of the snake is as we would say.

Court Whelan (08:48)
Hahaha

Jason (09:12)
I built a scholarship for National Geographic a number of years ago, ran it for many years and we'll talk about this a bit later because I'm probably going to reboot it at some point. But the premise of it was storytelling. And when I built the scholarship, I thought to myself, how can I engage people that were amateurs or pro-amateurs, so the scholarship wasn't open for professionals, about storytelling? And so I gave, I set a goal for people.

tell me a story about a place you visited in five frames or less. So I gave them a platform, a mat to sit on, and then in Buddha pose if you like, and said, okay, I don't care if it's the corner store, I don't care if it's Istanbul, I don't care if it's the Serengeti, I don't care where it is. ⁓ A park that you can walk to.

locally, I don't care, but I want you to tell me a story in five frames or less. So what that means in my storytelling math is every frame is crucial in those five frames. So every frame has to tell a story and then the five or four or three, it'd be difficult to do it in three, but five or four frames has to work as a unit.

Does that make sense? So basically it very rapidly focuses your creative intent down to a bullet point.

Court Whelan (10:28)
Mm.

Jason (10:36)
And then you can take 5,000 frames, 50,000 frames. But if I asked you to show me a new photography, if I said to you as an exercise, just pick something and send me five frames so I can see the story, you'd realize rapidly how difficult storytelling is because we're emotionally connected to our work. And I am no different. I'm just a little bit more brutal than most people. I've been with National Geographic for 25 years and I've had editors who have

exponentially more brutal than me which has helped me hone that craft as to less is more in my storytelling so if I'm doing a shoot for the first time and I wind up in a location that I've never been to before I don't Google I

search the internet for what other photographers have done. don't go looking at places to shoot. I don't look for shoot lists or anything like that. We have some people on the ground that normally assist me with those things, but I actually want to see it for myself the first time. I don't want to replicate my story so it looks like your story.

I just want to turn up and experience it because photography for me is a very emotional and experiential process. I do it because I love it. So if I turn up to a place, I don't want to see what 50 other photographers have done. I want to create a story of my experience. so that puts a lot more pressure on because I might have an hour, I might have three hours, I might have three weeks. The perception that we have as much time as we want is no different for me than it is for anyone listening.

you never have the time that you want. And so I go in and I go hard and that process, that on the ground process, is being forged over decades of looking for composition, looking for points of interest, ⁓ looking for things that people don't normally see.

when they go there. mean, we were talking about Antarctica before. I do a lot of landscape photography using 800 millimeter lenses or thousand millimeter lenses, dissecting the landscape, seeing things that people don't see. Because I want to tell a story that someone hasn't seen before and looking at other photographers work as much as it's a great way to learn and be inspired. And it's always great to do that. But as a professional, my field time should not be predicated on the creativity of another photographer.

Court Whelan (13:03)
You mentioned the five photo breakdown and potentially three. And I think I know what the answer is going to be, but how difficult is it? How feasible, how realistic is it to tell the complete story in one photo? Do you, do you, try, is there a need, is there a special sauce to wrap it all into one? So, you know, let's just say that person can win the photo contest. can get

that one photo elevated online, so all of a sudden they become a bit more of a name for themselves. Is there a one photo potential with super high level storytelling?

Jason (13:40)
100 % and when I do presentations for corporations and things like that.

Depending if there's a teaching element in that presentation, I'll have sometimes sets of images as an example of this, but then there'll be a slide, you know I'm a primitive, it'll be in PowerPoint or something, you know, there'll be a slide that says the one, and there'll be a series of frames where those frames work as a single frame to tell a story. Now, ⁓ if you photographed, for example, say a riot in West Africa or something like that, that is not...

That doesn't tell the sum of a country, it just tells the sum of a moment. But it also can politically put you in that time frame, who the government is, how the people are struggling or whatever the case might be. And that one frame can tell an incredible story. I mean, the world press for news photographers, world press awards is a good example of that. They're single frames, they have story segments in that competition.

But you really do need to be able to have that single frame. So a good way to look at a frame for photographers that might be listening is that if you have a single frame that is just your all-time favourite from wherever, it doesn't matter where you photographed it. And you look at it.

The litmus test, the test of whether that frame tells a story is that if someone else can look at it and be inspired or moved or find it funny or learn something scientifically, do they get that without a caption? Does it inspire curiosity? Does it inspire any emotional response? And one of the things that I do teach people sometimes is think of an adjective.

in your frames, you know, like if you're in Antarctica.

It's beautiful, but how do you show cold as an adjective? Because it could be a blue sky and it could look like it's 70 degrees when in actual fact it's below zero. So think of an adjective that describes that picture. So a single frame or the one, to your point, is the one where people can look at it without a caption, get an emotional response, want to learn or actually learn something, and so on and so forth. And so it is possible, but in the event

that I run?

you would never pull it off with a single frame because I want you to tell a story and it's very hard to do it in three frames because people can come up with three great frames but they start falling apart at four and they really fall apart at five and then they get emotionally Court up in that's got to be this and they'll have four fantastic frames and that fifth frame and you look at it in the judging going why? Why did you give me that? It's an amazing frame but it doesn't help the story so they get penalized

for that. can't ignore it because as a judge, as an editor, they've given it to me to consider. So I punish them for it. It's like you should have known better. Even as an amateur, it's like, get it. But I'm there to teach. I'm there to help people with that process.

Court Whelan (16:54)
A fascinating thing you said that I just want to reiterate. I think this is a great takeaway from that one frame concept. And it obviously translates to multi-frames too, but can your photo tell a story, the story, know, intention has to be built into this. Can that photo tell the story without a caption? That's so powerful. I love that. You've mentioned the word inspiring a few times and this is something that I...

I feel inspired when I look at your work. I've done a deep dive in your collections on your website. How do you make photography inspiring? What are the ingredients and how do you get that to turn into action when taking or making the photograph?

Jason (17:38)
I mean, when I started, when I was a child, drew, I drew heavily. So pencil, initially, ⁓ I was always fascinated by the sciences and I did all the sciences all the way through high school before I did my tertiary degrees. But I always did art and art history. But for me, was, was in my compositions, even as a kid, it was, I was really focused on what didn't belong rather than...

you know, sort of what belonged. I had it reversed and I was very, very hard on myself about that. So in answer to your question, I'd say that when I'm composing an image, even rapidly working fast and something's going down in Africa or wherever I'm working,

I'm thinking always constantly, like every neuron in my brain is thinking in compositional sense that that shouldn't be there, that shouldn't be there, that shouldn't be there, that shouldn't be there, while simultaneously trying to build up those interesting elements. Thinking again, always, if I had a pentagram thinking about someone's never going to see these wildebeest sleeping into a river, but that doesn't mean I'm allowed to have that element because it shouldn't belong.

You know so to build an inspiring image humbly I would say that you have to have all of those element those composition and elements Leading you into the story. I mean I'm editorial so we don't have anything too close to the very edges of your borders because in press you get clipping when it goes to press you lose some things I grew up on press. So I'm very aware of that. I want my lines to lead me into the elements I think are important or the most beautiful color or the reflection or someone's

face or someone struggling in an impoverished community and something like that, I'm still trying to find something in that person's life that will connect them with someone who's sitting in another part of the world. So I'm using my composition and my depth of field to very strictly govern the journey I take people on. if I'm doing it well, then that journey should, as I said, be inspiring or it should be

give you a moment's pause to reflect or to want to learn about that moment. I'm not sure if that answers the question, but it's very much linked to how I compose and build an image because again, I don't, ⁓ and just to put on the...

put it out there, I don't remove elements from pictures. I'm old school, I grew up on negative film, then Ilford HP5 black and white, and then I went to Kodachrome 64, the National Geographic staple for like 85 years. It had a one third of a stop.

you lost it at a third of a stop. Your blacks were too black, your whites were too white. So I don't want to remove elements. I don't know how to build a layer or dodge and burn. We can talk about post-production later if you like. so for me, it's getting it right at the time, thinking to myself, is this the only opportunity I will ever get in my life? Not just you, not just the person who hasn't seen it. This could well and truly be, and I treat every moment as the only chance I will ever get to build that image in that.

moment for me in this mortal life. So I love it, I enjoy it, but that's my only moment even if I know I'm coming back.

Court Whelan (21:02)
This reminds me of ⁓ a quote unquote rule of photography. just recently recorded kind of like 14 major rules of photography. And of course everything's in quotes because rules are very much meant to be broken. one, you know, is if it doesn't add to the photo, it subtracts, you know, and I think that what you're saying that that really hits that that rule right there. Again, they're all meant to be broken, but that's one to really think about with a master of composition such as yourself. So I want to ask.

Now about composition, I've talked to many pro photographers and I ask, know, well, how do you approach composition? And, some of them will say, I don't even think about the rules of composition. I just try to find balance. Others will say, well, I always start with the traditional rules and then I just let my mind and my artistic vision guide me into or away from that rule just based on how the scene is set up. How do you, how do you use composition or maybe more accurately? should, I should ask.

How do you think about composition when setting up a photo? Are you naturally or subconsciously drawn to rules? Are you more trying to find that je ne sais quoi, that balance? Are there any favorite rules that you employ if that's something that you do? Talk to me about how you walk up on composition for inspiring photography.

Jason (22:21)
Yeah.

And look, it's interesting those points that you make because I think we've all crossed that territory at one point or another, know, sticking to the rules, not sticking to the rules being inspired in the moment.

But I have a Jace rule. So in Australia, it's hot. You know, it was 120 yesterday. So Jason becomes Jace or Jay, you know, so, you know, if I talk about myself in the third person, forgive me. But I have a Jace rule. And to anyone listening, here's my rule. Once I say this, you're never allowed to go back from my rule because it's my rule and I can say what I want. So my rule is you're only allowed one thing in any photo. One thing.

And that one thing is the thing that made you want to take that image. So whenever I look at a scene, it doesn't matter if it's the most spectacular sunset with clouds and everything over the Pacific Ocean, reflections everywhere, there will be one element in that scene that I'm looking at that made me want to take that picture. It could be a rim light on a cloud, it could be a god ray, it could be the silhouette of a fishing boat out on the ocean, but there's only one thing.

and then I build my composition around my one thing. So basically every single frame I have taken, and I think this is true for most people, most people don't look for their one thing, but every single frame I've taken for much of my career, maybe my entire career actually, there's one element in that picture that was the trigger point, was ground zero. And then I build my composition, sometimes using the rules of course, ⁓ whether it's the, you know,

the standard golden mean for the triangles or whether it's sort of rule of thirds or whatever it might be. Obviously there's compositional elements attached to that, but I will build, say very rapidly in my brain, what's my one thing? I'll build the composition around that and I'll use my depth of field, my f-stop, to create the story. Because remember, all photographs are two-dimensional.

We make them three-dimensional by increasing the depth of field. And this is one of the things a lot of photographers don't learn is those relationships, the exposure triangle, know, shutter speed versus depth of field versus sensitivity, all of those things. But I create that story by leading people in with how much depth I want. But there is only one thing.

you can only have one thing. So even when I'm a judge or an editor or I'm doing something for major competitions or whatever, I'm looking for someone's one thing. I just do it more rapidly than most people because I've always looked for that. And I see the world Court in 24 by 36, know, literally 24 seven.

I can walk down the street non-stop and I had to work at that when I was about 19, a curator, I was a zookeeper for 12 years. One of the curators was a very good German photographer, won lots of awards and everything back in the day and he pulled me aside and said, what you're doing with a camera I could never do, but you need to bring it to the fore. You need to visualise a rectangle in landscape and portrait.

And he said, if you do that nonstop for six or eight months, just visualize, visualize, visualize, you'll be, it'll come to the front. And that's what I did. And so basically now 24 seven, it's tough on partners, of course, sometimes when they know that you're only seeing the world as a photo, but, but immediately the minute I land or I pick up a camera, I'm in that space and I'm looking for one thing. So compositionally just.

to people who are starting out or have some skill, go back and look at your favourite photos.

You know, and try and see what actually made it won't be the rules that make it so strong. They will contribute to why you like that shot, but have a look at your shots that you love the most and say, wow, why did I take that shot? Yeah, okay. It's my first ever lion or it was a lion on the back of a wildebeest or whatever. There's all those obvious reasons, but dig a little bit deeper. know, what did you, is it the glint in the eyes at this posture and whatever it is, there'll be one thing that made you want to take that shot, especially if

is someone like me who won't remove elements in post-production or change the pictures or anything like that. So there has to be an anchor that got that process running. And that is a cardinal rule for me, if I shoot hundreds of thousands of frames a year or whatever it is, it doesn't matter. It wouldn't be that many, I guess, but ⁓ every single frame I'm trying to have one thing and every frame after that is better or different, better or different, better or different.

just me 365 days a year for 50 years, about 40 years on the road. It's like, I don't have to compare myself with what anyone else does compositionally. I'm actually just interested in doing better or differently than I've done before. Building off that rule.

Court Whelan (27:16)
Fantastic. So it sounds to me like if I were to summarize, you identify the subject, you identify the other elements that are in the frame, because they have to be because your lens or just the way the environment's set up, and you ensure to the best of your ability that everything else complements it somehow. It's like a supporting actor or actress. It has to be something that props up, gives more exposure, you know, not camera exposure, but more.

Jason (27:37)
Yes.

Court Whelan (27:45)
more visibility to the thing that you are really trying to showcase.

Jason (27:49)
Correct, yes. And if I don't get that right, if I find my one thing and I don't give those supporting actors, have them standing where they should be standing and things like that, I'm pretty hard on myself. I think to myself, I wasn't on my game. I'm entitled to make mistakes and things happen fast and sometimes things aren't perfect, of course. But I work really hard at having all those actors. And I think that's a great way to put it because no movie is great

without everyone else that's in it. There's the person who's the lead actor, of course, but ⁓ everything is supported by those foundations underneath it. And so I use those other elements as anchors in my pictures. That's the phrase I use for myself. So I'll have my one thing and then I have all these other anchors that add to it. And even if it's a completely washed out scene, ⁓ there's numerous I could explain to you, but like ⁓ a...

sea ice with a red flag sticking out of it because there's a crevasse there and it's a white out day and even then where there's barely any information in that image at all that pole and that red flag and that movement of the red flag in the wind is crucial and I you know what will be my one thing well obviously I've only got a red flag but that's not the one thing the one thing for me in that shot and I know because I actually took this shot numerous years ago my one thing was how do I

show a plate of ice the size of France on a whiteout day with no data, no mountains in the background, whatever, how do I use these voids of both land and sky? That's the story I wanted to tell. So I had to create my composition around that, which, but people might look at that shot and go, well, yeah, it's a pretty simple shot, it's actually, it wasn't, if I might say so myself. It's, ⁓ yeah.

Court Whelan (29:34)
Mmm.

Yeah, it doesn't sound simple being there. That's for sure. So it sounds like

the one thing kind of going back to that part of the conversation could be literal or even metaphorical when you're thinking about, I'm trying to show a feeling. I'm trying to show a temperature. I'm trying to show a vibe. Ooh, I love it. That's, that's really cool stuff. Appreciate that, Jason.

Jason (30:01)
⁓ Yeah,

doesn't have to be the actual physical item. ⁓

Court Whelan (30:07)
Hmm. So a couple of follow ups there. ⁓ Do you find yourself leaning into a shallow depth of field often to minimize importance or prevalence of those supporting actors in the scene? Is that kind of like a go to or is it just every situation is different? Like, yeah, every situa- yeah.

Jason (30:27)
Yeah, every

situation is different. I think... ⁓

I remember there was a period where I think it was the Canon 35mm 1.2 or maybe it was a 1.8 and it had a natural vignette. So for those who don't know what that is, it's a bit of a darkening of the corners when you use it at about 1.2 or 2.5. I didn't use the lens but I had friends who did. And everyone's people portraits were shot on this lens and it became a thing and then everyone's work looked the same because the depth of field was the same.

And I think that was a bit of a trigger for me to try and always mix it up.

and that's something that I would advise people to do. There's horses for courses and certain f-stops. By all means, mix it up. Shoot that flower at f-22 or f-32 or f-16, whatever you want to get the depth of field on a macro shot, but then have some fun with it. Open it up to 11 or 8 or 6 or 4, 2.8 or whatever your lens goes to, and then drop the background out, drop the foreground out. Drop half the stamen out of the center of

the flower out, know, ⁓ experiment. I remember sitting on the tundra in Greenland once and it was misty rainy day and I just was walking along and there was tiny, probably fifth of an inch, maybe two fifths of an inch most, know, ⁓ alpine flowers. It was the spring in it. But what I took, went to take a photo and they all had the condensation dew drops on them.

So I spent the next two and a half hours trying to actually get something inside. My one thing wasn't the flower at all. Climate change, everything, that all went out the window. My one thing became how can I create an upside down world in a dew drop on a flower in the tundra, in the Arctic, that's one fifth of an inch, which means that the dew drop is smaller than one fifth of an inch. But what I wanted was actually inside, the dew drop.

You know, two and a half hours later, I'm saturated, I get up and I showed some people the photos and I went, wow, yeah, that's unusual, that's a bit pretty. And I'm sitting there in my brain going, are you kidding me? That's genius. It's like, again, photography is very personal for me. If I like it, that's all that counts really at the end of the day.

Court Whelan (32:54)
That certainly is. That is the most important thing. So Jason, you have a phenomenal new book out, Icebergs to Iguanas. ⁓ Can you talk to me, tell me a little bit about how that came to be? I think that a photo book like this, which is just extraordinary, is a short-term, mid-term, long-term goal of so many photographers, very likely so many listeners. Yeah, can you walk me through that? think everybody's probably got a different journey, but I'd be very curious to hear how this concept originated.

even getting into the idea of publishing and selecting the photos, really anything you want to share on the creation of icebergs to iguanas.

Jason (33:32)
Yeah, thank you. Look, it's interesting that we started out so heavily on storytelling because when you've got a career, you know, I've been on the road a while now, you know, my images in the National Geographic Archive, they don't keep everything, of course, that we shoot, you know, they keep us a handful of frames. But my collection in the archives is the equal largest with another photographer, you know, just because I shoot quite diversely and...

For many years, Geographic and I, some of the book division and I discussed doing a book. And everyone's waiting for budgets, things like that. And so I decided to take a different path. Most people will sit there and look at their careers after decades or whatever and say, here's my 300 favourite pictures or whatever. And I'd love to do that at some point in time. But I went on this insane journey of...

what stories meant something to me. I literally gave myself that privilege of saying, okay, in my archives at Geographic, what stories meant the most to me emotionally? And that was just literally ground zero because to do a book, if you have a book that's on a particular subject, football, birds, Africa, whatever, you need some foundation platform on which to build.

the story around. I took it to an extreme and said, what stories meant something to me? So then I went back through, I sat down one day with a glass of red wine, with no imagery in front of me at all. And I literally just, without thinking, without looking at my life's work, I just went.

Okay, wow, I did this, wow, I did this, wow, I did this, and I made a list. And then the editors and I went through the list. There were some stories, of course, that were, will we be a book project? So they were first on the list, things that I knew well. And then I went back through all my field journals and then back through the archives, just looking to see what I liked, just personally, you know, or what I thought told a story well.

⁓ for each of those stories and there was about 40 on the list, 40 stories on the list roughly and genres on the list and I ⁓ wrote drafts for stories for 16.

And then we put the then the team decided to split them in half and make this a trilogy, you know, hopefully, you know, and and and so then we said, OK, well, we're going to do Serengeti and we're to do shipwrecking and things like that. And we went back to the journals and got journal entries. And I did and I wrote the book, you know, I didn't need to write the book. read the book and and but I also wanted people to have an understanding of the behind the scenes from my voice as a photographer, because some of those stories have been going for decades.

and some might have only lasted two and a half weeks because it had a large emotional impact for me. So it was quite a cathartic journey, that's an obvious thing, ⁓ but also too, it's quite something to sort of sit there and say in some cases you might have tens of thousands of frames. ⁓ For Serengeti is a good example and...

that'll be a book project in its own right. That's a 30 year project, but you can't have all of those pictures. And then you have the psychology or the lack of the insanity of what pictures can I have if I can only give it 20 pages or 30 pages or something. ⁓ So for people, I guess, to say on that,

Books are marvelous, tactile, emotional objects. I love books, I love when photographers do books. I think it's important for people to...

have a book in mind when they're shooting ⁓ and you don't have to go to sort of high-end presses and do some giant monster project. There many, many companies around the world that do them for you now and they do them beautifully. And the actual exercise of laying out a book, you know, ⁓ I've done numerous books for my family from our family trips using blurb and American company, you know, and... ⁓

You sit there and you're laying these pictures out and it is wonderful. And then you realise as a storyteller, where am I short? it's okay to be short. You know, I only had this opportunity, I only had this. What works in this story flow and things like that. It's ⁓

But if in doubt, you know, someone knocks on the door to deliver a parcel, take the laptop to the front door and say to the postman, which one do you like out of this frame and this frame? You know, I had offices for many, many years and I used to get the couriers to come in look at my pictures if I was torn or I just get total random strangers or people who weren't photographers just to look at images and see which one's sung to them more because they're looking at it objectively.

Court Whelan (38:20)
Yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head with the idea of like the exercise of putting together a book, which is kind of a collection is of course storytelling, but going back to kind of the beginning of this conversation of how to harness storytelling, how to get better at it, you know, as budding photographers out there, how do you improve your storytelling ability? And I've, I've known through some of my own work and putting books together and whatnot.

You start to realize pretty quickly, even if you put a book together on your second day photographing ever, it is going to teach you where the holes are. It's going to teach you where the holes in your own storytelling are the things that when you're laying out the chronology of whatever it might be, you say, I would never have thought to take this photo because it's almost like a stock photo. You know, it's just, it's, this is just the door to a cathedral. Why would I have ever taken that? But you need that. So I, yeah, the, the take home point that I'm sort of, um,

making as a result of your answer is, is I think that there is some great value in trying to put together a book, even if it's just a one-off one print for yourself or friends or family, because it gets to get you to see where you might be able to improve in storytelling on a specific subject or an area or a vibe or a concept. So yeah, I love, I love those points that you made.

Jason (39:40)
One of the things just on something you just said is, you know, I call it a context shot. And a context shot is that doorway to the cathedral or it's the shot looking down the beach or it's the whatever. It's just the overall shot. It's the Blue Ridge Mountains or something, know, whatever it is. And you would be surprised, court, how many photographers, professional or amateur,

forget to take a context shot and I know I've done it myself. So if you go away on holidays or you've got a project or you're shooting for yourself, it doesn't matter, shooting for a client, make sure you take a couple of run of the mill frames that are context so that you can build from it. You may never use them in the book or in the story or anything like that, but it gives you that backup. I mean, if you walk into the Taj Mahal and you don't take that run of the mill shot of the Taj with the minarets,

I can guarantee you you'll never work for a publisher again. It doesn't matter that 50 bazillion people have taken that same shot. doesn't matter that there's a thousand people standing around you taking that shot. Snap it. Get it in the can. And then once you've taken that first one thing, okay.

what made me want to take that shot and then try and do it differently. Even if you're standing in the same position, do I have more sky? I have more foreground? Do I do this? Do I do that? You know, ⁓ and things like that. So I think books are a wonderful thing, a wonderful exercise for people to do. Everything you said, I agree with wholeheartedly. It shows you where the holes are. But also too, as a tactile exercise, when we were doing it and I was speaking from the first person about why the stories meant something to me,

⁓ It was also one of those things that had helped me relive those experiences.

and then see how I've changed as a storyteller over time. And so that was important for me personally. And at the back of the book, I actually put in my 10 judging criteria and everything from the scholarship because that's the thought process I go through every time I'm taking a picture. So, you know, there's a behind the scenes in the book and then the stories and things like that, or a snapshot of some of those stories. But at the back, it's also my thought process about how I go about creating those images.

Court Whelan (41:57)
what do think it takes to be successful with photography in today's world? I'm speaking kind of from the business side, of course, there's a lot of success and just enjoying your own photos. And everybody should really hone in on that and appreciate that because at end of the day, you create art for yourself. But what do think it takes to be successful? I'm sure you've seen changes in photography. It's like exponential.

at this day and age. And then maybe as a little follow up and part of that question, what's a bit of advice you might give to others who either want to do something a little bit more professional, like I'm not speaking just to the people that want to go pro, but something, but to people that want to have photography as part of their career or as part of their livelihood or as just a meaningful part of their life.

Jason (42:49)
Yeah, might I start with the second part first? ⁓ I think probably if you don't treat yourself or portray yourself as a professional, no one will.

Court Whelan (42:53)
Mm-hmm.

Jason (43:05)
That is in every industry on earth and in the arts it's really important to do that and by that with photography if you want to add a few dollars to the kitty or you want to have your work out there or you want to be published or you want to start doing books or whatever or you want to do fine art then you have to portray yourself in a way that you're taking your own work seriously.

And the reason I wanted to start with that is because when I was a zookeeper, I was probably only 18 or 19, maybe a little older, 20 or something. I spent six months of my salary on a copyright lawyer because I decided to build a stock agency for all the natural history, all the wildlife work and landscape work I was doing. So six months of my salary went to the lawyers. There was no Google, there was nothing back then.

and we designed a very, very, very brutal contract so that when I sent out my images, the negatives or the transparencies, I was protected. Now two things that were in that contract that are still with me now. One was... ⁓

⁓ a loss and damage clause because it was filmed back then so there was thousands of dollars for each frame if someone lost it or damaged it in press but importantly I had a clause in there that said if they did not publish my name Jason Edwards or my stock agency named bioimages, preferably both, I invoice them another 100 percent.

Now, like I'm like 19 years old or something. I wish I had that business acumen now, to be honest. But ⁓ what did that do? OK, people suddenly signed a contract. They knew I was serious about my IP. They knew I was serious about what I was doing. They didn't want to pay double the money. And also, too, it got my name in the market. And there was no Instagram and all of these sorts of things now.

That's how I got into the market court. I was relentless. Whenever work went out, people had asked me for pictures. How did they get me in the first place? And people are probably wondering about that. I worked at the zoo. The zoo would get requests all the time. I was a zoo keeper. But they'd say, look, there's this young guy with a camera. Here's his fax number. People would fax me. The old sound most people don't know anymore. And they'd say, we need a green tree frog or we need an elephant or whatever. And I would go and photograph them if I didn't have them.

and I spent every cent I earned as a zookeeper and every cent I made $50, $20, whatever as a young photographer on film.

traveling and equipment. If I bought a $60 lens and I had that for three years and then I could afford a $150 lens, I was relentless. I did not take a day off court, not a weekend off for 10 years straight. So I ran the stock agency, I had a full-time position at the zoo and I did three degrees. Now I was not a great partner to the people that I was dating at the time for all the obvious reasons, but that's what it required to get it done. So if you want to do a little bit of ⁓ professional work,

of

the genre of photography you're doing. ⁓ You need to take that seriously. You need to say, okay, you're taking my work, okay, here is my rates, or here's my name, this has to go here, this has to go here. This is what I'd like you to do. If you're on social and you'd like to be shared, you can't force people to do that, of course, but it'd be great if you could give me this plug or whatever the case might be, but have a little bit of respect for the work that you're creating, or a lot of respect.

Photographers have amazing egos. It's one of those things I've seen my whole career. And some people I think deserve it and others maybe less so. But you know the reality is that you just do it nicely. Just be polite and professional.

you know, polite, professional, smile, be friendly, things like that, but make it really clear nicely, even as a young photographer, or if you, you many people want a photography career after they've had a corporate career for 40 years. They suddenly retire, they've got the time and the financial means to buy equipment.

This is not just directed at someone who's 20. I don't care if you're 65 and you're starting out. My rules are the same in this, you know. Don't burn other photographers. Try and charge a reasonable rate so that you are building on the industry as a whole.

and you're not exploiting those around you just because you've got an opportunity. And a lot of photographers will give things away for free. Unfortunately, some of the corporate photographers, whether they've finished corporate careers or they're doctors or surgeons or whatever, I know some of these people, they just give it away for free. And I say to them, you are burning me. You are burning everyone else. It's great you're successful. It's great that you've retired, whatever. But that's not great for the art form. ⁓ you know, think about it. It's always, we all do pro bono. I help people out all the time.

But at the end of the day, folks can't see it but I need a haircut. Haircuts cost money, petrol costs money, all of those sorts of things. So sorry, I probably waffled on a little bit about that but I'm really, really committed to making the photographic industry stronger.

when there are so many forces against us. using that as a segue to the first half of your question, you what does it mean to be a professional? You know, so, yes, how you behave, the quality of the work that you do, and so on and so forth. But what do you see personally as being a professional? And that's something that someone has to look in the mirror and look for themselves. You're a creative, and look, I am the first one to cry at a rom-com. You know, I mean, you know, it's like, we're creatives. That's why we do photography, you know.

if you're shooting very clinical kind of work, you're a creative kind of person. So how do you see yourself as a professional? The industry has changed exponentially over recent years and a lot of people have thrown caution to the wind and that's unfortunate. But I think if you are passionate about your photography and you want people to respect the work that you do, then it's like, okay.

think about how you do it differently. A lot of people waffle on about storytelling, but they're not great storytellers. And I'm not saying I necessarily am either, we all have our days. But the reality is that ⁓ don't get Court up in the psychology of social.

you know, just don't. ⁓ You know, it's easy for me to say that and people will say that's just some old guy saying that and maybe it is. But I've been through the trauma, like everyone else has on social media of going, well, why did that critically endangered animal or that shot I took of that indigenous person that's the first time I've done it in 40 years on the road or whatever, gets five likes and the fluffy kitten gets 5,000.

you know, or someone else who understands the math better of how to use these platforms. You know, and they can get the work out there to more people and they're networking and they're doing all of these. They've got enormous numbers of followers.

That to me is not, I've never believed that social is a reflection of how you are as a creative. I don't believe that because it's so fickle. It's like judging competitions. It's not who you are, it's just how people are perceiving your work. If the basis of who you are as a photographer is the only metric you have is social, okay, I get it. And good luck with that.

But personally, I think that there needs to be ⁓ there needs to be more to it than that. And even so much, I struggled post COVID. You know, I mean, I live in Melbourne. We had the world's longest lockdown on earth of any major city. was inside for two years. I was off the road for two and a half years. Lost everything. And then my journaling struggled in the field after that. You know, I was emotionally damaged, Court You know, I mean, I had to work my way back as a, you know, geographic put me on 18 months of back to backs and everything, you know, they're desperate to get me on the road.

But I struggled with, I'm still struggling with my journal. I stopped posting all the time, you know, because it was like that wasn't a reflection of who I was. I lost enormous numbers of followers, know, 10, 20,000, whatever, you know, and it wasn't through a lack of love. I love the people who support me. It's amazing that they like my work. I just haven't had the emotional energy to contribute to that when I'm bouncing thankfully from one field assignment to the next, you know, so

I had to shift that, I'm not just preaching from a very, very deep personal position. I've had to shift that myself over the recent years because I realised that was doing more harm to me as a creative because...

I'm shooting a lot, I can't even get to see it sometimes before it goes off for editorial, let alone post it. So what did I want out of my photography? What did I want out of my field time? Yeah, it's great. And sometimes I put stuff up and someone must share it and it gets a lot of likes or something. But the reality is that...

You know, I've now had to shift tack and go, well, okay, I have to lose followers if I just don't have the emotional energy, because I'm paid to be in the field. I'm paid to be there creating, not sitting there spending seven hours a day managing my socials. You know, I'd rather be in the field, you know, if I can. Sorry, I probably got a little sidetracked there, but yeah.

Court Whelan (52:20)
No, no, that was that was fantastic. Now you got you got to take care of yourself and you got to you got to understand how you're filled up. Right. I mean, if the social is draining, then it may not be the right thing for you. There's all sorts of reasons why social is difficult and challenging and mentally taxing. There are some positives, too. But no, I fully agree with everything there. So.

Jason (52:38)
Yeah, that's sweet.

Yeah,

and sorry, I hope I didn't give that impression that I think it's all negative. It's not it's amazing. You know, we can share what we can create we can do all that by all means do it. guess what I was you know, and I apologize to anyone who think that I was bashing social because I absolutely wasn't. But it is one of those things that if it if it's if you think it's doing you harm, still do it but do it less. If you think it's still causing you harm, then don't do it at all. You know, try and find some sort of balance. But yeah, we get to see all these amazing things. I get to see work from people all

over the world, I think it's fantastic. for me personally, it's been a journey that I'm still navigating and probably always will.

Court Whelan | The Wild Pho... (53:18)
All right, quick pause here because I want to tell you about something that has honestly been a huge game changer for me as a photographer. And that is my website with art storefronts. If you've ever felt that kind of tension between wanting to create your best work and have your work be used for some bigger purpose and then stressing about how the heck you're actually gonna sell and use your work.

That part used to feel overwhelming and very time consuming for me. What I love about Art Storefronts is that it's not just a website builder, it's a full system design specifically for photographers who want better results with way less stress. Their software helps you grow and the marketing tools actually automate a lot of stuff we all know we should be doing, but never quite get around to. That's blogs, that's social posts, that's all sorts of key wording around your photography so it's searchable online.

and the support from Art Storefronts, it's very top notch. Real people, real help, and they genuinely want to see you succeed in its shows.

With the new year and new sales season coming up, this is honestly one of the best times to get set up. And here's a huge benefit for listeners of the wild photographer. If you mention this ad, Art Storefronts will build and optimize your website for you completely free. That's an eighteen hundred dollar setup fee that they're waiving. So head to ArtStorefronts.com. Check it out. And don't forget to mention the wild photographer to get that professional website set up included for free.

Court Whelan (54:42)
so I can only imagine how many thousands or probably hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of photos you've taken and, and stored and sorted through throughout your years. Can you talk to me a little bit about how you cull your images? Like how you, how you select the ones that

make it to the submission, make it to your final catalog, even just stay on your hard drive. And then maybe as a little follow up to that, if you can talk a little bit about your approach to editing, whether it's robust or very simple. So kind of a two parter there, ⁓ primarily interested in, yeah, the culling of images because of the volume you've done over a professional career. And then, yeah, any feedback on editing that you could share?

Jason (55:29)
Yeah, for sure. So, I mean, use, ⁓ primarily I use

guess it's probably best to start at the start of the workflow. So every day I'm in the field, I create a folder for that day. Day one, day two, day whatever. I do triple backups every night, so I don't get more than a couple of hours in bed.

and just three drives, and I do them independently. if there's video footage or whatever, I have my stills, my video, whatever.

When I come back, I put those into Lightroom, I create that catalog, and then I go through the shoot three times. So I look at everything three times. I have it generate ⁓ previews so that I can space bar, know, if you hit the space bar, brings it up to 100%. Because you know what it's like, you you have sequences sometimes, and is it sharp, is it not sharp? ⁓ So I go through. The first round I label anything that I think could be like the best I've ever taken to, will that be of use to me or National Geographic at some point?

in the future so the whole kit and caboodle gets labelled green. So for those who don't know if you just hit the numbered keyboards it applies a colour so think 8 is green. So I go through and as I'm going through I tap 8.

and then I go back through the greens I have a break from it of course because there could be 20,000 shots and then I go through the greens and then I hit blue and so I change the blues which is 9 on the keyboard I start culling my greens down I don't go back to the non-labelled unless I think of me something so then I do blue and then I go through the blues and I go red which is 6 so I go basically 8, 9, 6 and it's very fast process a little trick for those who might know if you've

got

your caps lock button turned on, at least on a Mac. ⁓ When you hit a color, it forwards it automatically for you, so you don't have to tap forward. Just speeds up the process with 20,000 frames, every little bit helps. So cap locks helps it advance by itself. ⁓ And so basically that means that at some point in my career, if I have to go back to that shoot, I just set the labels for green, blue, and red, and I've done the heavy lifting.

Now the reds would be the core of what I would look at and say, okay, this is the core of what I shot on this assignment that tells the story of that assignment. And if it's a shoot that's going towards an ongoing, you know, like I'm...

working on that story, then at least I know that the reds are where I need to be if I'm adding frames to the potential for a book. And that's the good way to look at it. So if I go back and I don't want to do the whole process again, I'll grab all my reds, maybe the reds and blues, and I'll throw them in the shoot folder for that book or for that story for that book. It just helps keep the process moving. So once I've got my reds,

⁓ And this is where people who have exponentially more skill than me are going about to be horrified So hold on to your seats folks, but basically what I do then is I hit auto on Lightroom

I literally hit auto. then ⁓ talking a little bit of shops, I apologize, but the menu goes down and the way apparently Adobe have built these things is you start at the top and you go to the bottom. I start at the bottom and go to the top ⁓ because I find that I'm a less is more kind of guy. So basically I check my black and white points to make sure I'm not clipping because I'm going to press. I don't want to throw away data. ⁓ And I make sure that there's a little bit of clarity, you know, which is like what we used to call an

and mask. And for me, that's like three or five on the scale, 3 % or something, 5%. And then I make sure that there's no highlight or shadow burnout. And then I check the color slider and I am done Court. I am done in 17 seconds. 17 seconds, I am in and out. I don't know how to do a layer. I don't know how to dodge and burn. I don't know how to do any of those sorts of things. I've had assistance up until COVID. I'd had assistance for decades. They were never allowed.

to do that stuff to my files because I am so anally retentive that if I wasn't getting it right at the time in the field I shouldn't be rebuilding it you know and so I've always had a policy which has annoyed some P-photographers in that area that I will show anyone any raw from a transparency a negative or or a digital file and everyone's going how do you do it you can't say that you can't do that it's like well you know show me the raw

You know, that's my mantra. Show me the raw, whether it's film or digital, I don't care.

People say, I've got this, I've got this, cool, show me the raw. Because I'm more interested in the art of photography. Yeah, we can all butcher out those photos and make them into whatever. so, so mate, I am in and I am out. And all of the photos that are in that have gone into my archives at Geographic have had that 17 to 25 second process done on them. No layers, no burning, no dodging, nothing like that. No artifacts, no items removed. Because I have to submit my raws as well, remember, you know, so they've got to match up.

If you want to work for Geography, you've to be willing to submit your raws and all of your raws. So the whole shoot so that they can see how it works. So if you think you're great at post-production and you might be amazing, it doesn't matter. People want to see the raws at this level. They want to see what you actually captured. ⁓ so then, yes, I do that. However, other people who license my work through me or through Geographic or through whomever,

they're paying a licence fee to put that in a book or put it in the National Geographic magazine or a National Geographic book or whatever. ⁓

they might modify the color correction on those pictures because they're doing a know, five-play process or something like that, but that's what they're paying the license for. However, when I've seen my work ⁓ in the magazine or especially in the big art books that Nat Geo does or whatever, they look pretty much exactly the same as on my screen. So I think less is more, you know, don't, people want to, they want to, landscape photographers, it's a different genre. I mean, they're out there and they're stacking filters and they're...

dodging and burning skies and it's all fine art. You know, that's the thing. So to reiterate again, you know, I do that, people buy my work for art of course, but I'm an editorial photographer, I'm a storyteller. So as much as I like to get a great raw, that all of that could still happen to it. But when I'm putting it in as a story, ⁓ I want it to be what I actually captured. And that's my workflow. I am field, triple backup every day, bring it in green, blue, red in lightroom.

⁓ then hitting auto, literally checking those sliders and then I am done exporting as a TIF and archiving and then I've got servers literally sitting next to me and I also have backup ESATA drives as well plus what gets backed up in Washington so it's a pretty robust process but I'm not one of those people with the volume that I shoot that I'll be spending an hour on a picture or anything like that. It's just physically not possible.

Court Whelan (1:02:38)
so happy to hear about your auto technique because I do a lot of that myself and I often wonder, am I shortchanging this whole process? I need to be... Is this wrong? And no, hearing it from you, I feel a lot better. So yeah, don't be afraid of auto. We trust auto and AI and computer generation and computer intelligence for a lot of things in life. And it does it pretty darn well in Photoshop's Lightroom, Camera Raw, all that.

Jason (1:02:50)
You

It does, yeah.

Court Whelan (1:03:07)
So yeah, I'm very happy to hear that.

Jason (1:03:10)
The other thing is Court too is that if you are getting the capture right and here's something people don't often think about but if you are getting the capture right in the field so you're not blowing your highlights you're not sinking your shadows all of those ⁓ just in an exposure so forget composition take all that out if you are getting your tonal ranges right in the field

when you hit auto, you should be 90 % of the way at least because you've got it right at the time. So if you're hitting auto and your shots are all over the place, then that means potentially, and I don't want to start some turf war, but maybe what you're capturing in the field is not necessarily exposed correctly. And I don't even use histograms. I mean, I've looked at two histograms in my life. I just turn the backs off on my cameras. I still shoot film on every shoot in an old Hasselblad on every assignment I'm

still shooting film and I don't need the backs of the cameras. Now I've been doing this a long time but you know the way I expose I hate hot spots.

I hate overexposure with a passion. If I've got to have it, I'll make it a compositional element. You know, what we talked about that already. But the reality is, that ⁓ I don't want to see that in my pictures. And so when I'm hitting auto and even when they did the plates and everything for icebergs to iguanas, know, Ash, the genius who did my files for me, he went through, he was looking at stuff from old film all the way through. And when they put them in the system, the scans or whatever in the system,

numbers in Photoshop and Lightroom were almost identical. It's like I'd had a career of getting my curves and everything almost right. But you've to work hard at that. And that's the joy of it. I mean, this is not pain. It's like learn and then you turn up in the field and you can be passionate and you can be creative and you can do all of those things because you're thinking about the math. And photography is all math. It's like you're thinking about that highlight and that shadow and should I be underexposing a little bit or whatever the case might be.

Because when you get back into Lightroom, you hit that auto, you are almost all the way there.

Court Whelan (1:05:20)
So I want to switch to the gear section in a minute, but I wanted to ask you a quick question because I saw a recent headline or something about you have a new appointment or position at University of Pennsylvania. Is that is that correct? Can you tell me a little bit about that?

Jason (1:05:36)
Yeah, that's an amazing honour. So I was awarded the distinguished visiting fellow role this year for the University of Penn. I began that and you know, it's funny, I shouldn't know whether it was October or November or maybe it was both, I can't remember. I was in Philly, never been there before, fantastic town, loved it. ⁓ Everyone was incredible there. And I've come into Perry World House, which is their global department. And they look at things like biodiversity, climate, ⁓ democracy,

all of these pillars that help economies and wild places survive. So I came over for, began with ⁓ a couple of weeks of climate work and all of that kind of thing, meeting with world leaders and people leaders in their scientific fields from all over the US and internationally. So ⁓ I'll continue that roll on, but it was really, really successful and just amazing to be surrounded by people.

It was so mind-bogglingly intellectually stimulating. It was wonderful. But one of the exciting things is that...

⁓ that I ⁓ haven't posted on it in a while because we've just been doing all the logistics and stuff, but I'm building a place on the coast here in Victoria. And I've expanded this property where I was going to sort of move to and moving the office down there and we'll be running programs for storytelling and biology and conservation and mental health, a whole raft of things. And my office is like the Natural History Museum of London, know, it's full of things from all over the world and art.

animal bits or whatever and hundreds of books and things like that. So I decided that I want to be able to do what I do for people around the world but also when I'm home in Australia. And so the project it's called Stormcatcher that's the property's name because it's literally on a 70 kilometer like just over the dunes from the land is a 70 kilometer ocean beach and it leads to Antarctica. so Stormcatcher will be built there and the programs that we will run

which are under Narata, which is a Latin word for storytelling. They're going to be also, University of Pennsylvania have been involved in that now moving forward as well. we're going to have a whole, it won't be just for university people, but it was really exciting that they were so excited about how we can use storytelling.

and science and conservation and everything to change people's understandings of the world or for the help them be more creative because it's not just I was lecturing people there who were doing venture capital students who were doing venture capital and they're sitting there and at the start of these lectures it was you could see that they weren't necessarily well I have to do this but you know okay it's a bit of time off but no I dragged these students down the path of storytelling if you want to invest in venture capital if you want to have good economic growth if you want to do if you want to find

opportunities in the United States or other parts of the world. You need to take people on a journey. You have to do this. Storytelling is in everything we do. Humans have been telling stories for at least 60,000 years through Australia's First Nations people. It's the oldest continuous population on earth. What we do now with social and photography and other forms of art and creativity and marketing and things, that's our current version of storytelling. All these people, they were going, my God, my God, there was lots of student tears.

and everything was great, know, happy tears of course. So yeah, thanks for asking. It'll be really fascinating to see what we can achieve over the coming year of my fellowship position, but now we'll expand it and bring other elements in. And then of course, you know, once we're up and running, I'll jump back on and then, you know, people will be able to come and spend some time down there and walk on the beach and shoot some frames. It's down near Biosphere Reserve, one of only 700 on Earth.

⁓ So yeah, the Philadelphia University of Penn relationship's just expanding through storytelling and other mechanisms to hopefully reach a lot of people who may not have realised, not just the creatives, but others who think that it might be useful in their careers.

Court Whelan (1:09:49)
Well, that is just amazing. So congrats on all that. I mean, it's such an amazing big picture vision because it's not just the appointment. It's this Institute and the teaching and bringing it all together. So yeah, kudos on that. Fantastic stuff. ⁓ Okay, so switching over to gear. Yeah, tell me what are you shooting on?

Jason (1:10:08)
So I'm on Nikon, you know, so all the Canon and Sony people will be going, no! But yeah, you can hear them in the background. So shooting Z9 bodies, so I always go away with a couple of bodies in hand and then lens wise, I'll always have a 14-24, 24-70, 70-200, the macro, know, the...

Court Whelan (1:10:13)
No. You can hear him in the background.

Jason (1:10:36)
whatever it is these days, the 100 or 105 or whatever they're calling it these days. So 70 to 200, then I was on the 200 to 400 as an interim, but I destroyed that and I haven't replaced it yet, but 200 to 400 would be in there. And then the 800 mil, which also comes with the, it comes with a 1.25 converter if you wanna bring it up to 1000 mil or something. So I'm pretty much covered from lens-wise,

⁓ from 14 mil to a thousand uninterrupted, ⁓ which is great. ⁓ And then I'll take a couple of strobes. don't do a, I never did a lot of flash photography except if it was in macro back in the day, but I always preferred natural light. And now with digital, you have more opportunity to avoid flash. So I have a couple of flashes in there. Always throw in a Rode mic, you know, in case I remember to hit record. ⁓ And I should do it more often and I don't and I hate myself for not doing it.

⁓ And then there's a raft of, I don't really have a...

big filter kit or whatever, there's a couple of neutral densities in there that again, I always forget that I have in the kit and forget to use them until I get home. ⁓ And then I, you know, I took numerous times, it's actually sitting to the right of me, I take ⁓ a little DJI drone away with me and things like that. I seem to be a magnet for incredibly strong winds and every time I put it up a gale force it's starting to get flying away. But what I did find was that,

There's, it takes so much to do photography well that even if I was taking, and I do, take GoPros and all of that kind of stuff,

If you're actually just working in the stills regime, and I'm one of these people that still predominantly does, a lot of people do bit of everything, I'm in awe that they can do that. When you see some of the things people do, I find that amazing that they can do it. But when you're in there trying to tell deep stories or you're revisiting something, you're visiting something for the first time or for the 20th time.

It takes a lot just to run the gear. And so I, yeah, that kid is there, the underwater side of things. I run Seacham housing, which is beautiful alloy housing. It's like two clips and the whole thing is sealed. And then I run Nikon in that as well. then the great thing about it is I can use the 14 to 24 if I'm doing marine mammals, or I can use the 100 macro or whatever the case might be in the underwater. And that's got big strobes and everything in it and so forth. So it adds up.

you I end up being probably at about, I'm doing underwater plus the terrestrial plus the clothing, I'm at about 100 kilos, that's like 225, 240 pound of stuff.

Court Whelan (1:13:24)
Yeah, I was going to ask

what's your what's your packing game? I mean, are you are you in hard shell waterproof Pelican cases or do you have a mixture like, yeah, how that was me. My next question is, how do you travel with all this?

Jason (1:13:31)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's a nightmare these days. It's a nightmare. And everyone's it's getting much harder. But yeah, Pallies, I run lots of Pallican cases. ⁓ But there's so many good ones out there now that Pallies amazing, but ⁓ you can find some that are equally as sealed and a lighter and stuff. So always hunt around. And then I have some very battered and beaten duffel bags and things like that, that I just throw all the clothing in.

One of the problems that I have of course is that if I'm doing a shoot where I'm moving from one area to the next, I could be in the Amazon and then I'll be going to the Himalaya. So all of a sudden, and I might have to present along the way, I mean I might be giving a corporate presentation along the way. So I've got to have nice shoes, nice clothes, stuff for the Arctic, stuff for the Antarctic, for the shorts and t-shirts or whatever and hiking boots for the Amazon, weather gear. And that duffel which you could fit a human in suddenly weighs about, what would that be in pounds?

60 pound by itself or something you know and

So I just, loaded up. Over the years, I've tried to call it down as much as possible because a lot of airlines make their money out of excess baggage fees now. and, know, we're geographic, we're a not for profit, you know, we, you know, we'll get the gear on, but you know, you really, you know, budgets are tight for everyone on airlines these days, the airlines and for people like us. So I try and, I try and call it down, but it's, it's one of those things that I took a lot of stuff, a lot more stuff in the past, but that's a lot, guess, does that

sound like a lot when I'm already taking. I don't know. ⁓

Court Whelan (1:15:13)
It's I mean, it's it's not that much, but my mind immediately

goes to are you are you checking some of this? I mean, you must be checking a hat. You have to check it like how? Yeah. Yeah. OK, so that's that's the need for the hard shell cases and just complete bomb proof. ⁓ Yeah, I don't even want to ask if you've ever had any snafus because I don't want to know. I don't want to jinx myself, but.

Jason (1:15:21)
All of it. Yeah. Yeah.

This

year actually a couple of months ago. But that was only the third time in my career that I'd been robbed. But it was very frustrating and very difficult and I had some battles with the airlines over that. ⁓ I mean look at the end of the day, the other thing that's a bit of a kicker is that

is the backpacks and everything that you need. Have you found that? You put a backpack in a check-in bag so you can take a roll-on on the plane and you've automatically suddenly got two backpacks in there which fills a whole bag which is another check bag. It's hard to avoid all of these sorts of scenarios. ⁓

Court Whelan (1:16:13)
If you want to do it

right, it's a lot of gear, know, you know, myself, you know, as one, but then I also often travel with a videographer and then that's a whole different ball of wax and that's five more suitcases. So to do it right, it is a lot of gear. It's always nice and tempting and definitely easier on you if you can go with just the minimal kit. But again, at your level, at the highest level, it's, it's a lot of stuff and you just have to grit and bear it.

Jason (1:16:17)
It's a lot of money.

And if I'm doing TV, like if I'm hosting shows for Nat Geo or someone else where I'm in front of camera, I don't even get into those conversations with those teams because as you said, you know, they have a mountain of stuff, but a lot of actual airlines because of the unions and things like that, the videographer teams, they get dispensation in a lot of countries. Like they can put their cases on. And I've had these debates literally standing next to my team going, well,

You know that my camera is like their camera and they say well are you doing video? Well, no, I'm doing stills I can do video but you know, this is and they go no Give us $200 or something, you know, but but yeah the the video guys That's a whole different ball and I look at those systems now and there's leads going in and out of them and everything and it's you need you need a PhD in how to turn turn something on now kudos to all of these people who do that in in their photography or

as a primary source because that is a whole nother world.

Court Whelan (1:17:45)
Okay, so my second to last question, this is one that I ask all guests, ⁓ what is a piece of gear that you find more or less indispensable that is not directly camera or lens related? Might be something that helps you travel easier or something to get the shot that, again, it's not like the camera or the memory card.

Jason (1:18:08)
Yeah, that's a great question. That's a question I've never been asked before. Wow. ⁓ Let me think. mean, the knee-jerk response that popped into my head just then, and it's very non-camera related, but I spent so much time sitting in economy seats and Qantas tells me I'm the, I do the most economy miles internationally of any Australian in history. That is not...

that is not a title I want. I want to be turning left on the plane, I don't want to be turning right. I want to go to front of the plane, I don't want go back. But I think the knee-jerk reaction would be sets of headphones. know, purely because ⁓ I spend hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours on planes. And as much as I can sleep reasonably well in economy or coach, as you would call it, I think it's...

Court Whelan (1:18:37)
you

Yeah, no, that's fine.

Jason (1:19:03)
creatively it helps slow my brain down if I can put buds in or if I can put some large noise cancelling boson or something like that. But I mean, I guess the second thing, if we're taking all that equipment and everything out of it is like.

Be kind to your feet. Really be kind to your feet. Get pair of shoes that you're comfortable wearing as soon as you put them on. Don't take six months to break in a pair of boots. That's just insanity, because you will be crippled. So I think they're the two things that immediately pop in. But one of the things I was going to say to you, if I might on that, that what a lot of people don't...

A lot of people may have experienced this. Photography, the gear, it doesn't matter how much you spend. And all the cameras are great these days. People go, what should I buy? And I see they're going, well, Canon's autofocus is amazing, Nikon, I love Nikon, but they're really rugged. You can't destroy these damn things, and believe me, I try. Olympus has beautiful glass, Pentax always had the best weather sealing. They're all great, whatever you use. Don't get caught in the upgrade wars. That's just a path to destruction. But you've got to carry whatever you own.

And so photographers are notorious for having bad necks and backs. And unfortunate, I'm ambidextrous, and so when I was a zookeeper, I could work both sides of my body with all the heavy tools and the lifting.

But when I'm home, I actually, I swim multiple times a week. I'm on the treadmill every day. I ride the bike, whether on the road or in the gym, I'll do some light weights. I'm solid enough as it is. I just do things that help tendons, know, so shrugs and all of these things. It's a little bit of a coach sports coaching thing here. But if you are not doing that and you are a photographer, you're not doing yourself any favors. So if you're going to go on holidays and you're going to carry the gear around for a week or two weeks or three weeks or something like

about, well you're doing it professionally. I am still knock on wood. ⁓ They call me the last of the Mohicans. You know, my standard day pack, just my standard day pack is 100 pound. And I will carry that from 5 a.m. in the morning all the way through to midnight or if I even go to bed. And I will do that 365 days a year. But when I'm home.

I work the body, you know, I try and get some sleep, but I swim and I exercise and just do things so that when you go back in the field, you've got a little bit of muscular strength and this is male, female, it doesn't matter, the cameras wear you down. So, you know, if you want to be in the field or you want to go on a long holiday, do some exercise before you go because I can promise you, I've seen it a thousand times and people who have assisted me, they're broken, like they're sitting there crying, you know, because it's just a lot.

It's just a lot to do. So do some exercise that helps your photography.

Court Whelan (1:21:51)
Oh yeah, I know many a wildlife photographer that will just walk around the house with like a 15 pound dumbbell as if it's a lens, you know, cause they're toting around a 600 F4 all day and with your 800 it's a big lens and they're getting lighter. That's fine. That's great. But it's still, when you think about extending that, you know, a half meter, you know, a couple of feet away from your body, it wears on you for sure. And you don't want to.

get that strain, you don't want to lose ⁓ your strength right when the perfect shot happens. So yeah, there actually are techniques to strengthen the photographic muscles. Well.

Jason (1:22:23)
He's funny.

Yeah, yeah,

that's right. Get it done. Maybe we'll even find, I don't know if the publicist has it, I'll try and find it if you email me and remind me and I'll find you a shot of me hiking out on a remote island between New Zealand and Antarctica. It's a great shot that a mate of mine took, but it's my standard day kit. You can't even see the backpack, which in itself, as I said, was about 70 or 80 pounder at least. But there's all these lenses and stuff.

and he took this shot of me just out there by myself on the tundra and I look at that and I thought, I'm sure I was taller, you know, when I started out, you know, the gears shrinking me over time, but you know, it is what it is.

Court Whelan (1:23:13)
Well, okay, so we're down to the last question. ⁓ Jason, where do people find you? This is just the tip of the iceberg. ⁓ I guess pun intended with all your iceberg photography, but there's so much more to your career, to your media, to your collections. How do people find more?

Jason (1:23:30)
Yep, so ⁓ on social I'm ⁓ on Jason Edwards NG, obviously for National Geographic, so Jason Edwards letter N, letter G. That's on Insta and Facebook. ⁓ I haven't, I started posting a little bit, but it's mainly reshares on...

You know, what's the other one, Twitter or something? Anyway, ⁓ I'm sorry, I'm tired. But yeah, so Jason Edwards NG on the usual socials, maybe on all of them. ⁓ And it's Jasonedwards.co or Jason Edwards Photography for the website. And I appreciate your comments at the start of the podcast. ⁓

to make people feel better, you know, I struggle to find the time just to even get work on the website, the fine art prints and things like that, so there's some work up there.

⁓ But it is hard, so if you're not getting that stuff done, don't feel like you're alone because I can guarantee you are not. Some people are just more organized than others. ⁓ Hopefully this year in the next couple of months we'll get thousands of images loaded up from that geo and a whole raft of other new material up there and the website will go into a rebuild mode over the next few weeks. So hopefully that'll be done by the time we go live. yeah, so JasonEdwards.co for company or Jason Edwards photography both will show up.

Yeah, and I hope this has been useful for people and but be excited, know, do photography for the love of it and ⁓ if you step some toes or some feet or fully jump into the professional world then, you know, be grateful for the opportunities you receive and try and make the industry stronger. We survive by being stronger. It seems very competitive out there and it is but at the same

I think it's such a beautiful and wonderful way to see the world that you know takes some joy in that.

Court Whelan (1:25:22)
Well said, well said. Jason, it is a privilege and an honor and a pleasure to have you on. Thank you so much for joining today and really appreciate the time.

Jason (1:25:32)
Thanks, mate. Much appreciated.


Head Shot

Court Whelan

Host