How Music Influences Photography Storytelling with Garret Torres
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[00:00:00]
[00:00:27] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Alright, this is gonna be really fun. I, I wanna just, just kick things off. You, you've got this project or I think I'm gonna call it a project 'cause I don't know anything about it except you just shared with me like two weeks ago or something and was blown away because it's really good. Looks and sounds like there's a band, and I'm unsure if it's a side project, if it's a band band, if it's just you or what, Don Dawson, what the heck is it and how long have you been doing it? What's this whole story behind that?
[00:00:58] Garret Torres: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:00:59] The Origin of Don Dawson
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[00:01:02] Garret Torres: So [00:01:00] Don Dawson is just me. Really, I, I chose the name because I needed something else to call it because I didn't want SEO results to be muddied
[00:01:09] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yep.
[00:01:09] Garret Torres: by it. so yeah, it's just me. it's, I guess a project, a passion project is a good term for it. yeah, I, I, I needed a way to just, you know, do something with music and that was the outlet that I found.
So I started writing my own music. I play all the instruments. I record all the instruments, I produce it all. I do have a friend, Dave, who mixes everything for me 'cause I'm just not very, in tune with what needs to be done. but he, he's got that covered. But yeah, everything else is, is really just comes from a place of wanting to be creative in a way that isn't.
Gonna be seen by thousands of people every day, which is what wedding photography is for me. so yeah, it's, it's more of a, just a release and a, a way to express myself in a, a different way, I guess, as cliche as [00:02:00] that sounds.
[00:02:01] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: it's, it's great.
[00:02:02] Early Musical Influences
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[00:02:02] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and is this your first time, this is Dawn Dawson, your first time doing recordings and, or were you, were you in a band with, with other people prior at, at some point in your, in your history?
[00:02:19] Garret Torres: Yeah. like 12 years old, 13 years old. my neighbor Chris and me would, would make up bands all the time, and it was always just the two of us. We, we just have different names.so yeah, I, I was like playing music with friends. I was in a little bit more of a, a serious band, I guess. just post-college.
we only ever played two shows, so I don't have a lot of experience in playing in bands. but I always have been interested in recording. my grandfather from as early as I can remember, two, three years old, would record us singing and I would listen to it back with him. And just, just hearing [00:03:00] those voices on tape was fascinating to me at the time.
so I always had that in me to want to record and, and hear it back then once, you know, windows audio recorder, whatever it was, back on Windows xp. Once I discovered that and you could like change the speed of things and reverse it, I was like, oh my God, this is the coolest thing ever. so I would say yeah, around like 12, 13 is when I got into like recording and actually producing I guess music, very loosely producing music.
I did also have, a four track tape recorder. That I would plug, you know, directly plug my guitar into and like record a rhythm part and then record a lead part. And I thought I was the coolest kid in school for that. but yeah, that's like, I guess that would be my origin of it. really comes from just like that curiosity.
[00:03:49] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: That's, that's great. That's, in a similar way, that's, that's how podcasting came to be for me. I, I
[00:03:56] Garret Torres: I.
[00:03:58] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: very clearly, and I wish I had these [00:04:00] tapes, but I, I remember very clearly up and there was a girl on my street. That, we would get together and just grab my parents' boombox, hit record and record fake radio shows Like,
[00:04:15] Garret Torres: great. Yep.
[00:04:16] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: what they were about or anything, I'm sure they were absolutely horrible, but super cute as a kid. and, but like, so I, I like to say I've been podcasting before podcasting was a thing 'cause,
[00:04:28] Garret Torres: There you go.
[00:04:29] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: but yeah, so it, it's, it's, it's, it's. great that you've been doing it for so long and now you've got this, this music that doesn't the waters as far as the SEO goes for your photography that is under your own name. and it's so, is very smart to choose a persona, so to speak, for a different art. so, so
[00:04:54] Garret Torres: Yeah.
each other, for yourself.Yeah. And, and, and honestly, I [00:05:00] only have maybe like 20 Spotify listeners, so the SEO thing is like if, if, if huge, if it was ever to get bigger, then it would get in the way, but I don't foresee that ever happening.
[00:05:13] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: if, if you're keeping it as a, as a passion project that you're mainly doing for your own creative brain, and if other people find it great, then.
[00:05:24] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:25] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: that's all that matters. Like you're doing it for yourself,
[00:05:27] Garret Torres: Exactly.
[00:05:28] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: that's, I'm, that's what, why this podcast exists, right. I'm doing it for
[00:05:32] Garret Torres: Right. Right.
[00:05:33] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you know, there's so many photographers that have crossover and I just,
[00:05:39] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
this has to exist. Yeah, absolutely.
[00:05:42] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: a
[00:05:42] Garret Torres: It's a great idea. Truly.
[00:05:43] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: specific shift at some point where you're like, okay, I love music as a kid, but. I
[00:05:50] Balancing Music and Photography
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[00:05:50] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: wanna do photography, like how did that come to be where you, you spent your childhood, of your childhood playing music, but that's not [00:06:00] what you pursued.
[00:06:02] Garret Torres: I wouldn't say there was a crossover, but a lot of my childhood was kind of split between, I guess visual arts and music. I was always really big into drawing. and then around that same time when I got into music and, and recording 12 years old.I was really big into skateboarding, so like making videos with my friends, like skate tapes.
That was my, like bread and butter, so to say. so a lot of my, my visual background comes from those skateboarding days, which were happening at the same time as the music. And I guess maybe, you know, like those friends influenced some of the music that I was listening to at that time. but I can't say there's like a distinct moment or like instance where they crossed over and was like, okay, like I see these two things happening and there's a connection there.
[00:06:54] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: That, that's, that's perfectly good. That's perfectly good. Every, we've all got our own path.
[00:06:58] Involvement in Music and Photography Communities
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[00:06:58] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so [00:07:00] how, how involved are you because you're, you're very involved in the photography community, especially locally, right? you're, you're part of the Imagen Community,
[00:07:09] Garret Torres: Proudly.
[00:07:10] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and are you maybe not equally involved in the music communities? But maybe at some way are you involved in music communities, whether online or local or like offline, locally or things like that?
[00:07:24] Garret Torres: Not so much right now. I'm like doing the most I can not to promote my music, truly, because like I said, like it's a passion project and I don't want it to get to a point where I feel like I need to do anything. so I'm kinda just laying low on the music front. The people I I talk to, I share my music with.
but before I was making music, early on in my photography days, I was big in the local music scene in photography. so a lot of the people that I know now, people I'm good friends with, came from just like going to venues and asking if I could shoot their band. Dave, one of the, the, the [00:08:00] guys I mentioned before who mixes my music, is.
the guitarist in the very first band I ever photographed. So like, those connections have stuck with me a long time, which is, is really cool. And that was like 10, 15 years ago now at this point.
[00:08:14] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: can you name drop his band. What the band was.
[00:08:17] Garret Torres: Oh man. Okay. So that band was ascending from ashes. really, really cool, like local metal band. he's currently though in, I guess a Deathcore band, but they're, they're getting really big, like they're on tour right now. they just got signed to Sumerian records. Face Yourself is their name,
[00:08:35] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah.
[00:08:35] Garret Torres: but
[00:08:36] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I'll have
[00:08:36] Garret Torres: yeah,
[00:08:36] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I'll add that to the show notes. so
[00:08:38] Garret Torres: out.
[00:08:39] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: we're both, in Jersey, and,
[00:08:41] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
[00:08:43] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Definitely has been for years. Still is the New Jersey hardcore scene still exists. spent most of my youth in the punk scene in Jersey. played a lot of shows and stuff, and there's one Facebook group that is still pretty [00:09:00] active. it's the New Jersey Pop Punkthat. Even during COVID, they had, what are the quarantines was the name. That's what they named it. and it was just, they'd get different, musicians from scene, from the, from the nineties to early two thousands, grab their acoustic guitar and just put on a show through a, was it a Zoom?
It might have been a Zoom. And
[00:09:27] Garret Torres: wow.
[00:09:29] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: The Zoom app added the music feature. So the, it changed the way that it does the EQ the compression,
[00:09:37] Garret Torres: Oh.
[00:09:38] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: to allow people to hear the music better through the internet.
[00:09:43] Garret Torres: I didn't even know that existed.
[00:09:44] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: buried in the sound settings that literally COVID is what made that happen.
'cause so many things were, were
[00:09:50] Garret Torres: Wow.
[00:09:51] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It was, So as far as like
[00:09:54] Garret Torres: Yeah.
[00:09:54] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: find,The, that has been really to like, [00:10:00] back memories and like, chat with people you spend a lot of your childhood with and stuff. it's always, it's always fun. Yeah.
[00:10:07] Garret Torres: to check that out. Yeah, I might know a few people in that group.
[00:10:09] Musical Inspirations and Photography
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[00:10:09] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: have you noticed the way that you, approach music has impacted the way that you approach your photography? In any way, is there any
[00:10:21] Garret Torres: Yeah,
[00:10:22] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: way you approach both?
[00:10:24] Garret Torres: definitely. and I, I don't think it, it came from the way that I make music, but the way that I consume music, and I'm very much an album listener. Like I. All of my favorite bands are my favorite bands because of their albums, not because of certain songs, not because of their life performances or their technical abilities, because of their albums and the way that they make me feel, the stories that they tell sonically and lyrically.
so, you know, with that always being my approach to listening to music. That's kind of how I want my wedding clients to consume their [00:11:00] photos. not as, you know, singles or like the Instagram posts, like the wow photos, but as each little moment as its own song, you know, take it. and, and there's, you know, 15 to 20 photos of that moment that tell that story and, and sing that song, and then we move on to the next one and, and they all flow together.
But there are the ebbs and flows and the highs and lows that make a good music album that also make a good wedding photo album or photo gallery. so I think that's probably the biggest connection between the two of them.
[00:11:34] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you do your album sales. Do you ever bring that up? Like, do you ever, approach the conversation as, think of this as album and like your music album, not your album. and, and basically just going along with what you just said, but your clients. Do you ever approach it like that?
[00:11:58] Garret Torres: That's pretty much how I, one of [00:12:00] the things that I say in every first consultation
[00:12:03] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so
[00:12:03] Garret Torres: in a, in a, a different way. but I always try to bring it to that because music is something that I can really talk passionately about and a lot of other people can too. so I find that's a good, like convergence point, to take it from like small talk to business.
so that's, it is something that I bring up a lot.
[00:12:21] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I think it's a great analogy, if that's what you wanna call it. It can work with any genre of music your client might might like. Like the new Taylor Swift album, right? That just dropped what, two weeks ago? From the time when we're recording this and within four hours, the Swifties to the whole album and know all the words by heart. By heart. They listened to the
[00:12:49] Garret Torres: Oh yeah.
[00:12:51] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: in one
[00:12:52] Garret Torres: Yes, my 8-year-old daughter included in that. Yes.
[00:12:55] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so it's relatable for anybody. I love that [00:13:00] method of selling a photo album to clients. such a good, such a good way. that is a fantastic crossover between the two. Arts for sure.I'm,
[00:13:10] Garret Torres: Thanks man. I, I never really thought too much about it.
[00:13:13] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I also wonder if, From times when you have performed maybe in front of people to how you approach recording and playing the music, has that impacted the way you photograph people?
[00:13:27] Garret Torres: I, I, I guess maybe in a way, in terms of recording music where again, the same way with an album, it's not about like. The hits, it's about an overall feel, and when I'm recording, I, I don't try to get it perfect. And the same goes for when I'm shooting. Like I really just wanna be connected with what these people are feeling to get that through in the photos rather than like.
I should be at F four instead of 5.6 or, you know, this lens [00:14:00] is a little too wide. Now it's, it's, that's neither here nor there for me. If I can make someone feel what that moment felt like, that's, that's priority number 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 for me. I.
[00:14:12] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: are there any struggles that you have experienced in your time with music that might.might replicate, might have replicated themselves or shown a similarity in the, on the photography side.
[00:14:27] Garret Torres: Hmm. Dang. This is a hard one because I don't, I don't try to, like, I, I try not to let struggles affect me with music because I, I am using it as such like a, a fun thing. So if, like, if I'm stuck, I just stop and I, I, I move to something else, or I'll, I'll just like go outside. so I, music truly, knock on wood, has been so fun for me and I, I have honestly have not faced any struggles.
I, I can't answer that honestly.
[00:14:59] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: That's good. yeah, I [00:15:00] find that when I, when I sit down to, to write something and I feel stuck, I. So I, I have a subscription to Ultimate Guitar, like the the
[00:15:12] Garret Torres: Yeah, me too.
[00:15:13] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I love when they
[00:15:13] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
[00:15:14] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: off. That is like $20 for the
[00:15:16] Garret Torres: day.
[00:15:17] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and and what I'll do if I'm like trying to write something and I'm stuck, I stop trying to write and I just pull up a something to play as a cover and just stop thinking about the
[00:15:28] Garret Torres: Yes.
[00:15:28] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: just play. and then,
[00:15:31] Garret Torres: You know what I like to do too is like if I'm writing something in a certain genre. I'll just go to a completely different genre and listen to like three hours of music in that genre, and then I'll come back and I'll have a, a whole different approach to like, what's wrong or what needs to be done to that piece.
I, I, I'm a big fan of, if I'm trying to write something with lyrics and, you know, a catchy chorus or something. Put on [00:16:00] jazz. with words,
dude.
[00:16:03] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: freestyle. Like,
[00:16:04] Garret Torres: All over the place.
[00:16:05] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you ever heard , Medeski Martin and Wood? I wish they still play. They don't play anymore.
[00:16:09] Garret Torres: I can't say I have no.
[00:16:10] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: true free jazz. It's like, almost like the Phish are Grateful
Dead of jazz. They are
[00:16:16] Garret Torres: Okay.
[00:16:16] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: all over the place. No lyrics though. It's all instrumental. you need to check it out. It's like the craziest,
[00:16:23] Garret Torres: send it to me.
[00:16:24] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: yeah, I lo I I love them.do you have any specific songs or records inspire your photography specifically? Something that maybe if you're at a wedding, like Sam Hurd, for example, he listens to heavy, heavy metal in his AirPod
[00:16:42] Garret Torres: Yeah.
[00:16:42] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: weddings.and he talks about, in his episode on Lenses & Lyrics, instead of listening to the band or the DJ at the wedding, and the cheesy wedding songs.also at the same time, there's also maybe music that might inspire the editing side or the cooling side. Do [00:17:00] you, is there any specific songs or albums that inspire your photography one way or another?
[00:17:06] Garret Torres: You're going to laugh at this, but the way that I pick my music for editing is based on how long the album is and how long I wanna work for. So if I feel like I wanna work for, let's say, two and a half hours, I'll pick two albums by the same band that fall right around that timeframe, and then just listen to those.
so it's, it's a, a grab bag a lot of the time. at weddings I do love to listen to pretty heavy stuff. death metal, black metal as, as, as heavy as I can go because I just need a break, like as, as fun as it is to be at a wedding reception. Sometimes I just need a break from where I am and Bruno Morris for a little bit and just get into my zone for a little.
[00:17:54] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I, the way that Sam described it. 'cause I don't, I don't photograph weddings these [00:18:00] days. I stopped a long time ago. But, the way that I, that he described it is hilarious. It's, you, you're listening to metal, but then they're dancing to whatever it is. And the, he said the, the best part is when they actually sinks up.
But it, like, it doesn't make sense, but it also makes sense that you, Yeah.
[00:18:19] Garret Torres: I, I used to take videos of, of receptions, people dancing and then play, you know, put the music that I was listening to in my earbuds. And it was hilarious seeing like people dancing to, I want to dance with somebody, but then hearing Gojira, so I, I totally know what you're talking about.
[00:18:37] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I'm, I'm excited to hear this one. 'cause you're, so far, you've been leaning towards the metal side of things, which is, which is, which is cool.
[00:18:43] Hypothetical Scenarios and Advice
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[00:18:43] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and it, now if you could photo, photograph any musician band. Past or present, who would it be and why?
[00:18:55] Garret Torres: Right.I mean, I would love to have been [00:19:00] able to photograph Pink Floyd on the original wall tour just because of the set design. I'm gonna go a little bit more niche on this one though, 'cause that's the cool thing to do. Foxy Shazam,
[00:19:12] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Okay.
[00:19:13] Garret Torres: they're, a, a kind of like a, I don't know, like just a, an American rock band outta Cincinnati, but the singer Eric Nally, his antics on stage are.
He's all over the place swinging from chandeliers. He used to take cigarettes from people in the crowd, light a bunch of 'em in his mouth, and then eat them at when they're lit. Like the guy is insane. And their music is super fun too. And, and the crowd engagement, just everything about it, that's like peak for me in terms of performances.
[00:19:47] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: would it be, media, press type photos, portraits, or would it be like concert?
[00:19:55] Garret Torres: That's a good question. 'cause then that if, if the, if like the behind the scenes is [00:20:00] available to me, I would love to follow Brandon Flowers, the singer from the Killers, on like a studio day because I, I love his work ethic and. Just what he brings to the table in the studio in terms of songwriting, producing, performing.
[00:20:22] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: He's really versatile and I admire a lot of what he does. So I would love to be able to like really get the inner workings of that and, and give back to the world the way that he gives back and show everybody his process. I think that would be like such an honor. I, I like,
[00:20:41] Garret Torres: yeah. So it, that would, that's like, that's number one.
[00:20:44] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: a, that's a good variety of different things, like starting with Pink Floyd.but a specific tour, moving on to this like wacky Foxy Shazam. I gotta listen to that music now,
[00:20:56] Garret Torres: They're fun.
[00:20:57] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: and then move, moving to branded from the Killers. [00:21:00] That's a, that's a good variety. That's a good variety depending on the situation.
[00:21:03] Garret Torres: the spice of life. Yep.
[00:21:06] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: similarly, is there, A specific song or album that kind of brings back memories from a wedding you shot or a a, a engagement session you might have done or something like that. Or even if you photographed a band once before, is there specific song or album that sort of brings back a really nice memory from the photography side?
[00:21:26] Garret Torres: I, I don't know about a memory, but, it, it maybe one day will be a memory. father daughter dances. I usually, they're like country songs and I, I really, I try to like country sometimes and I just really don't. But
[00:21:41] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: a whole nother. He is. He is.
[00:21:43] Garret Torres: yeah, I mean, there, there are exceptions for sure. Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson, like I grew up listening to those through my dad and those, those were all cool with me.
but. Not even like one specific song, but the emotion that I feel, and definitely biased because I'm a girl [00:22:00] dad. The emotion I feel during the father-daughter dances no matter the song. It's always beautiful. It's always like a really, nostalgic feeling song that always like. Hits me really hard and I, I always come back to that feeling when editing and I, I feel like those photos, just because of that feeling, they always get a little bit extra attention.
so I, I wouldn't say it's one specific song or, or album, but one musical moment in, in the day, for sure.
[00:22:31] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: quick story. My older brother, who's my best friend, I have two brothers, my younger brother. No longer lives in New Jersey, but my older brother lives like the road from me. he and my sister-in-law to Ben Folds' song, the Luckiest one of his friend's weddings. then they, got married and their first dance song was the Luckiest, of course, a few years back.
[00:23:00] Prior pre COVID when, PhotoPlus Expo was still a thing.Ben Folds actually spoke on behalf of Sony and did a whole hour, hour and a half, whatever, talk. Super inspiring, super fun. and afterwards he stood around and talked to people and I got the nerves calmed and went over, and I had to thank him because, that song means so much to our family. You know,
[00:23:31] Garret Torres: Wow. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:23:33] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: touching that, I was able to like, share that with him and then get a photo with him, of course, but
[00:23:39] Garret Torres: That's, that's like a dream of mine to be able to personally thank some of my favorite musicians. That's awesome. That's so cool.
plus his talk about photography was just really cool. I would love to hear that. I, I saw him play, last year, I wanna say, and he did a set of all requests, like, that's so cool. I I never heard of anything like that. It's awesome.
[00:23:59] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: dude. Just a [00:24:00] very cool dude.
[00:24:00] Garret Torres: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
[00:24:02] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: here comes some really fun ones.
[00:24:06] Garret Torres: All right, I'm ready.
[00:24:07] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: style was a genre of music, what would it be and why?
[00:24:14] Garret Torres: all right. I guess it, I mean, it, it's, it's based in rock, but it's very avant-garde, very, dynamic. There's, there's a lot of dynamic, shifts. So I guess like. A a, some kind of like pop punk prog rock,
[00:24:35] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Okay.
[00:24:36] Garret Torres: a new genre.
[00:24:36] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: All right. All right. if you had to choose, now, I know that your music is not a focus business-wise. But let's say you got an offer from a very large band to open for them, okay? had, you had a backing musicians to, to learn your, your stuff[00:25:00]
[00:25:01] Garret Torres: Yep.
[00:25:01] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: stuff. You had a
[00:25:02] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
[00:25:04] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: between playing a music gig wherever the venue is, but you're getting paid for it to open for this huge band, let's say The Killers.
[00:25:13] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm. Okay.
[00:25:15] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: or getting paid really well to shoot a wedding and they were scheduled at the same time, same price and everything. Which would you choose and tell? Tell me about that decision.
[00:25:29] Garret Torres: Oh man. So easy. So easy music. I would be on stage opening for the killers in a heartbeat. and that's not because I don't like weddings. I love shooting weddings and, and I love like a good. Highlight wedding, like, you know, those highlight weddings. but I've only played on stage like three times in my life.
So like that, that experience will never, ever come to me on my own
[00:25:54] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah.
[00:25:55] Garret Torres: I'll never earn that. But I could earn, I could earn some, some awesome [00:26:00] weddings. And I have, so I, I have some faith in that.
[00:26:02] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: like you
[00:26:03] Garret Torres: enough weddings that could skip a wedding. You'll
Oh yeah, yeah, for sure. And I'm getting paid. I'm getting paid to be on stage. Come on.
[00:26:12] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: which, which instrument would you play if this was the thing and you had a backing band to do the rest?
[00:26:17] Garret Torres: I would play guitar. I feel most comfortable on guitar. Yeah. Plus you could like kick and
[00:26:21] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Jump.
[00:26:22] Garret Torres: do fun stuff on guitar. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:26:24] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: my last question for you.what is one piece of advice you'd give to a musician who is thinking about picking up a camera for the first time?
Or say they have a camera, they're, they know photography, and they're thinking about starting their business now. What's one piece of advice for that musician?
[00:26:44] Garret Torres: So one thing that I used to do, and I, I never, like, I didn't share it, I didn't make it public, but I would listen to an album. Over and over, over the course of a week or so and jot down things that it made [00:27:00] me feel at each track.a feeling, a color that I would associate with. And then I would make it my assignment to go shoot a roll of film representing that thing or that feeling or that that object, and that, that kind of.
I guess gave me the foundation that we were talking about with, like, telling the story through the entire album. so if that is something that appeals to you as a photographer, being able to tell that entire story consistently and, you know, coherently without jumps and gaps, that's a really good exercise.
and again, you don't have to share it, just do it. Just do it and critique yourself. Explore, there's no right or wrong way. Like there's, there's no, one song can mean something completely different to you than it does to me. So it's just whatever it makes you feel. And, and by doing it more, you kind of understand what you're feeling and how you can visually represent [00:28:00] that in your work.
I guess that's my, on the cuff, off the cuff, advice.
[00:28:04] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: good advice, from I have hosted the years, many, many photowalk, before photowalk became commercialized when they were just purely fun. and at every photo walk I would start it by giving sort of.challenge to, similar to what I did at the, at the meetup that you came to.
[00:28:29] Garret Torres: Yeah.
[00:28:29] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: give some
[00:28:30] Garret Torres: Mm-hmm.
[00:28:30] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: to just make everybody try something different, have some fun with it, whatever. And think going along with what you just said, a really fun challenge for people just starting out to do and try is going along with the album idea and that an LP might have, let's say 14. Songs on it. A double sided might have more 24 exposures, 36 exposures. you're shooting digital, only [00:29:00] capture 24 photos for the whole day. I'm not saying at a wedding, I'm
[00:29:04] Garret Torres: Yep.
[00:29:05] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: just spend a day for yourself and only capture 24 to tell a story or only capture 36. Whatever you wanna do, match an album. Listen to music throughout the day or match, a roll of film with your digital
[00:29:18] Garret Torres: Yes.
[00:29:19] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: limit yourself. You have to force yourself to stop, slow down and limit yourself and, and limit how many photos you can. You can with that shutter button. and it's a
[00:29:28] Garret Torres: Right.
[00:29:29] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: So.
[00:29:30] Garret Torres: I used to do that too, actually. 2014, I like tried to make it a thing. I called it dig log. and I, I would limit myself to one ISO to keep it like a roll of film and I would slap the same preset on everything. And that's it. Like I would dodge and burn a little bit 'cause I knew how to do that in a dark room.
So I gave myself that leniency. But that was it. And I would just let it be what it was. And that was so fun. I, I, I think that's great advice too.
[00:29:55] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: sure. Awesome. Garret, this has been a, this has been a blast. I loved, I [00:30:00] love learning about, your music history and, and how you see the world of music and photography, how it blends. and I hope that it made you think about things that you probably never thought before. That's part of the fun.
[00:30:13] Garret Torres: Absolutely. Well, I've been listening to all the episodes and my mind is spinning with, with inspiration and ideas. It's, it's really valuable resource. I.
[00:30:22] Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so in the show notes, I.
am going to share, where everybody can find you on Spotify and Apple. So hopefully we'll get your listens up even more. and, yeah, thank you again for, for, for chatting with me about this and look forward to seeing you soon.
[00:30:39] Garret Torres: You too, man. Thank you. It's been a pleasure.