Make My Tequila Reposado, With a Shot of Snapseed

How do you like to shoot tequila? Try it blanco or añejo, with lime or with salt, and add Snapseed for a finishing touch.

Ask Yourself Six Questions to Skyrocket Your Creativity

Curiosity can shift your attitude so that you’re seeing magic in what’s been seemingly mundane, and your creativity will skyrocket.

How to Talk to a Photographer Like She’s an Artist

Photographers, like painters, present their vision of what they see to the world. Like painters, they’re artists. Talk with them about their art the same way.

How To Keep Shooting—At 75 MPH

When you’re in a car, itching to shoot what’s flashing by, but there’s a window and 75 mph between you and your fast-moving subjects, you can still shoot the scenery with these pro tips.

How Can We Turn Distractions Into Focus?

The impulse to distraction will always be with us. But to find focus, we can look within, where our own best experts live.

Cursive in the Crosswinds This Week

Sometimes themes emerge and merge; this week, letters and cursive and sketching had the upper hand. Pick and choose from the stories in the crosswinds.

What Remains

For inspiration, all you need is patience to see what remains.

Are We Enslaved By Our Tech Tools?

The marketplace is so crowded with content and platforms for sharing and communicating. Choice is a powerful thing. But it can leave little space for the creative ideas that are waiting to bubble up.

Pi in the Sky Writing

Look up. You can retrain your eyes to shoot above and beyond and indulge in some sky writing.

Has HDR Gone Too Far?

Did your (very) human eye see the scene you photographed and post-processed the way your HDR image looks? Not likely.

There’s an App for That: Achieve Your 2014 Tech Resolutions

Get your tech affairs together so you have more time for creativity in 2014. It’s nearly 2014. The year will begin with experts’ columns, advising us on New Year preparations, resolutions and goals. Generally the best recourse is to read these columns, save them in a location where you’ll never find them, and then procrastinate until…

The Gift I Treasure Most

There are lots of lovely gifts under the tree, but there’s one I treasure above all others.

Raise a Glass to Pressgram: An App That Plays Nicely With Cava and Creative Control

Thanks to a new iPhone app by John Saddington called Pressgram, creatives are able to publish their own images directly to their blogs and — here’s the big concept — maintain ownership of them, by sharing on a platform that insists they must own their content, too. Unlike Facebook and Instagram, there is no fine…

Time for Some Wine with Art

Wine seems to be a favorite of many artists and photographers (whether using it for subject matter, or using it to inspire subject matter). If you read my July 16 post, “Have Some Art with That Wine?” you probably noticed some comments about wine’s amazing powers to make creativity flow. “Wine and art are just…

How To Assess Where You’re At

“If you don’t know where you’re going, you might not get there.” —Yogi Berra Being prompted by a WordPress Daily Prompt, State of Your Year, is a great way to start a regular habit: assessing where you’re at mid-way through the year, or at any time that’s right for you. Why assess where you’re at? Well, just…

Time Traveling

Time travel right from your own iPad, your desktop or your car. Just get there when you can.

About Jann Alexander

Words make art and photos better. And who doesn’t like a good story?

On Art + Magic

“It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it.” ― Anaïs Nin  Right, Anaïs Nin circa 1920; Wikipedia  When is the last time you saw magic in…

How Creative Is Multitasking?

There’s more creativity to be found outdoors than at your Mac.

Get Your Tech Affairs in Order for 2012

Mail thinks this is junk. Mail is right. Welcome to 2012. The day that experts’ columns appear  with abandon, advising us on New Year preparations and goals. Generally the best recourse is to read these columns, save them in a location where you’ll never find them, and then procrastinate until it’s too late to act…