Hi Wicked Hunters,
Welcome back to another week of The Art of Photography Podcast.
José Ramos is a landscape photographer and psychiatrist based in Lisbon, Portugal. His photographic career began in 2004, with a body of work strongly focused on long exposure technique and storytelling. His images are multi-layered, starting with the immediate attention-grabbing landscapes bathed in exquisite light, moving to the symbolic detail of archetypical natural elements, and then completed with the written reflections accompanying each artwork.
José divides his time between his artistic and medical career, strongly feeling that there is a creative synergy between both crafts, where the commonalities and differences of each discipline mutually enrich and foster his artworks.
His photos have been featured in National Geographic printed editions and many other international photography magazines, exhibited in collective and individual shows, and sold as large format fine art prints and NFTs.
You can learn more about Jose:
https://instagram.com/joseramosphotography
https://twitter.com/jose_ramos
https://linktr.ee/joseramosphotography
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• Spotify - http://bit.ly/twhspotify
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• Website: https://podcast.thewickedhunt.com
• Tune In (Alexa) - https://bit.ly/TuneInTheArtOfPhotographyPodcastWithStanleyAr
For those of you who want to learn more about The Wicked Hunt Photography by Stanley Aryanto:
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewickedhunt/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thewickedhunt/
• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/thewickedhunt/
• Photo prints: https://www.TheWickedHunt.com/
Don't forget to leave a review on the podcast if you enjoy this conversation. It would help us to get found and help to inspire other photographers.
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Transcription:
Jose Ramos 0:00 summing up the purpose is to ever voice trying to convey the things that are important that I really want to share with others. We are all together in this so I think every one of us as kind of the duty I would say to try to enrich the world we are in and photography seems like a beautiful way to do it
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt 0:29 Hey, wicked hunters Welcome back to The Art of Photography podcast, where we share photographers journey and how photography have given us hope, purpose and happiness. And today, we have someone who been very inspiring to his voice to me, as well as his photography, he take amazing sunset sunrise as well as photography in general. So today, we have Jose, hey, Jose, how you doing? H
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Episode Transcript
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Jose Ramos (00:00):
summing up the purpose is to ever voice trying
(00:04):
to convey the things that areimportant that I really want to
share with others. We are alltogether in this so I think
every one of us as kind of theduty I would say to try to
enrich the world we are in andphotography seems like a
beautiful way to do it
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (00:29):
Hey, wicked hunters Welcome back to
The Art of Photography podcast,where we share photographers
journey and how photography havegiven us hope, purpose and
happiness. And today, we havesomeone who been very inspiring
to his voice to me, as well ashis photography, he take amazing
sunset sunrise as well asphotography in general. So
(00:52):
today, we have Jose, hey, Jose,how you doing? Hi there, how are
you? It's very good to be here.I'm pretty excited. And thank
you for the invitation.
Jose Ramos (01:03):
And I greatly admire your work. I want to apologise
to everyone because of myEnglish. I'm not a native
English speaker, but I'm doingmy best. And I hope everyone
understands me well. And so I'mpretty excited to be here today.
And to have a conversation withyou.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:21):
Oh, man, you're just too humble.
Your English is perfect.
Jose Ramos (01:26):
Sometimes I struggle with words, I'm very used to my
Portuguese, which has a veryrich vocabulary. And sometimes I
get a little bit lost withEnglish, but I'm doing my best.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:37):
Fair enough. Fair enough. So, you
know, like, I've been followingyou for a while look at your
photography, and they are justincredible. Like, you know, it
really speak to you. Right? Itreally pops. But before we get
into your photography, give us alittle bit background about you
know, who you are and how youcome about photography.
Jose Ramos (02:01):
Okay, sure, I could give you the short version or
the very long one. So I'll justtry to find a balance not to
bother our listeners. But Iusually say that first of all,
long before photography, I waspassionate about nature. I was
born in Portugal, in a smalltown in the south of Portugal.
(02:22):
So we were quite used to go tonature, I used to do a lot of
mountain biking, I always feltthese instinctive needs to be in
quiet places, beautiful places,forests, etc. And right from the
beginning, I've always lived innature. I didn't have any
artistic background in my in myfamily, unfortunately. But I
(02:46):
know that from quite early, Iwanted to express myself and I
wanted to use art in some way. Iused to live literature,
philosophy, spirituality. Butthen I got into music. Actually,
as a rock band still in thissmall own town when I was still
(03:08):
a teenager and heavy metalbands. We are we were kind of
the outcasts in our town. Butalready had this need to, to
express something. And I used touse music to do this. At the
same time, I continued myventures into nature with no
artistic purpose. Then, when Iwas 18 years old, I had to go to
(03:34):
college and I went to medicalschool in Lisbon. And I found
myself all of a sudden,completely overwhelmed with 10s
of things to study, and barelyno time to devote to music. We
used to play electric guitar.And I was really struggling with
that because I needed an outlet.Medicine was extremely demanding
(03:58):
10s of mental work and not thatmuch in terms of expression. And
as if that wasn't enough, I wasin a big town I was in Lisbon
and contact with nature wasgreatly reduced. So it was
absolutely everything. A big bigangle over of both nature and
creation. And my encounter withphotography. It was extremely
(04:21):
spontaneous. Digital Photographyjust became a thing. This was
probably 18 years ago. Yeah, I'mnow 14. This was 18 years ago, I
was in the middle of my of mygraduation. And I asked my
parents to buy me to offer me adigital camera. It was a three
megapixel compact camera, noartistic purpose at all. I just
(04:44):
wanted it to be as small aspossible. I didn't care about
megapixels, anything like that.But the interesting thing is
that when I got the camera,which I just wanted to capture
some snapshots of my daily life,it just made me so starts
looking for things that werespecial things that were
(05:04):
beautiful and inspiring. And assoon as we, as I realised, I was
starting to venture much moreinto nature than before I
started capturing images. Still,I didn't have any artistic
purpose in debt, but the imageswere just kept on my harddrive,
I was starting to feel thepleasure of capturing the beauty
(05:24):
that I was seeing and recordingit with the camera. And that was
until a friend of mine suggestedme. This wasn't so long ago,
1817 years ago, to share some ofmy nature images on online.
There were no there was nosocial media back then we
already had photo communities.So I started posting in a
(05:47):
website, which still existstoday, which is DeviantArt. It
had an absolutely incrediblephoto community back then, every
one was there incredibleartists. So I just accepted to
put one or two terrible photosthere. And I was extremely
surprised with the communityenergy. I got comments, I
(06:08):
commented on other people'sphotos, it was extremely clean
in terms of energy, there wasnot the current vibe, numbers
and everything else. So all of asudden, I was finding the
creative outlets, which joinedboth my my wish to express what
I felt, and also my love fornature. So it was kind of a
(06:31):
perfect combination. It replacedmusic, it became my favourite
form of expression. And so Ijust got absolutely addicted to
it. Then I entered my specialtyin psychiatry, when I officially
finished graduation. And thingsjust kind of exploded from
(06:51):
there. Because I got extremelyeven more fascinated with
photography, when I learnedabout its power, not only for
expression, but also forwellbeing for so many things.
And then publications,exhibitions, photo tours, and
social media and everything elsestarted appearing. So I just
(07:14):
found myself having to kind ofdivide my time between
practising medicine and doingphotography. So I just got fully
addicted. And we are here todaybecause I'm continue. I still
continue to be addicted tophotography.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (07:31):
That's incredible, man. Like, this is
why I love like, you know, thispodcast because like, in just
six minutes, I know you morethan I would have, you know,
following you for all this time.And so yeah, that is so cool.
You used to play in a band. Iused to be a drummer, actually.
So,
Jose Ramos (07:49):
so that's awesome. What musical style may I make?
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (07:54):
I used to like a punk rock. That
was okay. It's like cool. That'sjust like the blink 182 sort of
a thing. But it's reallyinteresting because you you say
you used to like music, and thenyou kind of found photography
and you shift across you stilllike music or kind of what makes
(08:18):
photography take over from beingable to express yourself through
music instead?
Jose Ramos (08:25):
Yeah, that's a very, very interesting question. And I
would give a superficial firstanswer, which would be
convenience. And I'll explainwhy. Because most of the members
of the bands, they actually alsocame to Lisbon to study. We were
all 18 years old, and we triedseveral times to reunite the
(08:48):
band and continue rehearsals.But the thing is that doing
rehearsals in Lisbon is totallydifferent from doing in our
small hometown, where we werethe garage of one of them, we
just anqing we just hang outthere, or virtually all
afternoons. And in Lisbon, allof a sudden, we had to book a
studio, we had to have aschedule, we had to pay, and we
(09:11):
tried multiple times, and itjust did not happen. So the
thing is, all of a suddenphotography gives me something
that I love, which is my ownspace, my own silence my way of
doing things of breathing, oftaking my time. And even though
I lost kind of the teamwork partof it, which is important. I
(09:34):
gained a lot with photography.So firstly, it was convenience.
But then I felt that I wasgaining much more. expressing
myself through photography, andthe potential of sharing,
communicating and discoveringother people's work was
incredibly it was moreamplified. So that's why in a
(09:56):
very smooth way photographyreplaced music in I live.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (10:01):
That is awesome. Thanks for sharing
that. And it's reallyinteresting how you say that,
you know, you can't have thesuperficial reason to start
photography, but you get deeperand I feel like it's a common
occurrence, you know, afterlike, interviewing over 45
(10:24):
people in my podcast, that'skind of what I see, you know,
like most people start just justgo on a holiday take photo, but
they got really into deep on it.And it it seems like photography
habits way to do that. Now, onething that I'm interested in to
hear from you is, you know,expressing your you say this
(10:45):
notion about expressing yourselfto photography, right? So how
does that different betweenexpressing yourself to
photography versus expressingyourself in the music?
Jose Ramos (11:00):
Okay. First of all, I want to just a little
compliment to you, because youmentioned that we've interviewed
a lot, a lot of people, I wasquite terrified when I saw all
the big names you have alreadyinterviewed. So I congratulate
you for that, because it's avery important thing that you
(11:21):
are doing for photographers and,and also because I read your
very interesting manifesto aboutthe emotions that photography
brings to our own lives,including some periods and when
you have struggled, and you areclearly one of those that s
photography need his life toexpress something in to get a
(11:43):
deeper purpose and meaning. So Ijust wanted to congratulate you,
first of all because of that,and it's good, because I
listened to many of yourpodcasts. And yeah, you always
seems to search for these commonthreads, that people are not
doing photography just for thesake of it, which is quite
important. So go into yourquestion about expressing myself
(12:08):
through music and throughphotography. Once again,
photography was so much smootherand elegant for me than music.
In music, you have the craftparts, you need to practice a
lot, you need to be extremelyobsessive. If you want to play
well, you probably felt that wedid drums, I don't know if you
(12:29):
felt that as deep. Because it'sa punk rock. And sometimes punk
bands want to be morespontaneous. Our metal band was
kind of technical. So it gotkind of complex. So you were to
spend hours and hours and hourspractising scales and everything
else. And I just hated it.Because I already had the
(12:49):
discipline for the studies. AndI wanted for the expression in
arts to be something moreeffortless, more spontaneous. So
expressing myself with music, itwas extremely empowering. It
felt extremely good. It wasfantastic when we were playing
(13:09):
together when we were givingconcerts. But there's something
deeper and more profound inartistic expression through
photography for me, okay, soprobably many people, mostly
musicians will feel theopposite. But for me, the whole
process, the slower thoughtprocess and creating process and
(13:34):
the travelling and being in themiddle of nature, and thinking
about what you want to do. Andall the time you have in the
world to look at your images andtry to understand what they're
telling you and write about him.For me. It's a much much richer
experience. So music is morelike in your face. My visual
filling is this one. I'm fillingit right now. Please take hits,
(13:58):
and you can go into the mosh pitright now insert at all. And
photography is kind of a more, Iwould say existential craft.
It's a slower one. And well Ilike it more right now.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (14:13):
Oh, amen. That is That is awesome. I
love hearing that, you know. AndI appreciate what you said
earlier that you know, that'svery kind of you. At the end of
the day i i look for people whowho have inspiring stories and
one of the reason why I want youto be here is because the way
(14:34):
you you tell story not onlythrough your photography, but
also through your words. So, youknow, I don't just speak anyone
who big have a big following.But you know that what you just
said earlier just shows you knowwhy I want you to be here
because you really takemeaningful approach to your
photography right now, it'sreally interesting how you say
(14:59):
that In music, you kind of haveto work hard to get good at it.
And then you become you burnout, right? You hated what
you're doing, because you'rejust practising too hard. Now,
when it comes, I mean, withanything in life, right? If you
want to be good at it, you gottalearn. And then you got to
practice. And I'm sure you'vehad a lot of practice a lot of
(15:21):
trial and error with yourphotography as well. So how, how
is that different with yourexperience in music? And what
sort of advice you could givefor people who are feeling that
way, you know, who are feelinglike, they've been at this
photography for so long theypractice and practice and
(15:43):
practice and they hit a wall,and they just burn out?
Jose Ramos (15:47):
Yeah. It's also a great question. And I love this
kind of interviews, not just thetypical technical questions, I
prefer these ones. Yeah, firstof all, I didn't want to send
out the message that for me,photography is absolutely easy,
because it's not, I have alreadystruggled a lot with
(16:09):
photography, not in terms ofcreative block, because I have
kind of a controversial opinionabout that. I don't think that
there's creative block when oursubject that we capture is
nature, which is something kindof endless, in its beauty and
possibilities. But I think wecan F inner blocks. So
(16:35):
photography, it took me a longtime to get to where I am right
now. But it was not as hard andas tough as it used to be music
because with music with thepractice of the instrument when
I was practising, I didn't feellike I was doing something
inspiring. And when I'm learningphotography, I'm in the middle
(16:58):
of nature, or not closed insidemy room, looking at nothing and
trying for my fingers to move asthey should. I'm in the middle
of a beautiful forest, takingterrible photos, or in a
seascape doing terrible photos,but I'm there. So the act of
doing photography is just asmall part of everything, just a
(17:19):
small part of hiking, of lookingat the sunset of chatting with
friends while you are doing awalk sharing with your partner.
So we just became extremelyspontaneous, because I just
loved everything about theprocess, not just the click of
the button. But all the processwas good right from the
beginning. And just like yousaid, my first images were not
(17:41):
satisfying at all. I'm one ofthe few that still has this
whole portfolio online. If yougo to my Deviantart, you can see
my terrible photos from 18 yearsago. And I think it's kind of a
small legacy that I have just toshow how terrible one can be in
the past, and how one can kindof improve, but I still have a
(18:05):
long way to go. So if someonefeels stuck going to your main
question. I would say andprobably this is kind of related
with my practice in psychiatry,and also with my notions of how
photography can have meaning toyou. I think that if you if you
are genuine, when we're tryingto really express something
(18:27):
that's inside you, you need tohave a purpose, you can just
want to share the beauty ofnature, this is a very deep
purpose. It's not somethingsuperficial. But as long as you
want to do something and reachsomething, I think you will
always channel all your insightinto it. So it will just appear
(18:49):
people that are struggling,usually, they feel blocked,
because there are some outsideexpectations from them. For them
that kind of overwhelmed them.Beat numbers beat many beat
survival beat anything. And allof a sudden, when you start
being absolutely genuine towardsyour goals, your body will react
(19:11):
Your body knows it. There's somesorts of this is controversial
also, scientifically speaking,and I should only say scientific
accurate things. But your bodyjust signals, the stress, it
signals the lack of genuineunity. And some people ever very
natural talents to enter intosome sort of false self state
(19:33):
where they pretend to besomething but most artists, they
just can't do it. So if someonehas a big, big creative block, I
would mostly suggests for themto stop a little bit, turn out
the noise of social media, thenumbers, the competition the
game and just think about whatthey want to bring to the table
(19:55):
what they need to channel fromthe inside. And I think this
makes a huge difference. Okay,it's easier said than done. But
well, I think it's the bestadvice I can give now.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (20:08):
Wow, that is one whole lot of wise
words in just few minutes. Yeah,listeners, if you, you know, you
probably going to have to gothrough this few minutes over
and over again, if you hit aroadblock or a mental block,
because I think what you justsay there really hits in the
(20:28):
nail. And as you were justsaying that I, I was I was, I
was thinking about the time whenI hit a burn out. And actually,
you're right, at that timealways Like, going up with the
expectation to shoot somethingthat is, you know, that is
(20:49):
appealing to the social mediamass, right, not really the
thing that but not not reallyshooting for myself. So that's
really interesting. I'm gladthat you share that, because I
think a lot of people might notrealise that until either, you
know, come across this, severalpodcasts talking, you know, with
(21:11):
someone like you or actuallybeing told. So, thanks for
sharing that. And I'm glad I'mtalking to you today for sure.
Because I'm sure other peopleout there will draw inspiration
from this. Now,
Jose Ramos (21:25):
it's my pleasure. And just sorry for interrupting
you just a little bit because Ijust wanted to add something,
which is probably also quiteimportant to the people that
might be listening to us. It'sthat I've also been there, I
don't want to come across as theguy that knows it all that I'm
the psychiatrist. So I'mprotected for from all kinds of
(21:47):
mental illness. I usually saythis to my patients. In the
middle of all medicalspecialties psychiatry, as the
the most the most increasedprevalence of mental illness
problems, okay. So I just wantto transmit that doctors also
suffer, just like photographersand artists. And I've also been
(22:10):
there I've been in the gamenumber, I felt, I wouldn't say
burnt out but and successful.And I remember plenty of times
of trying to enter what Imentioned as kind of a false
self state, where I wanted toemulate something or someone
(22:31):
when every image at to beabsolutely epic and bombastic.
And it just doesn't work.Because that's not how we were,
how we are wired. And it'sextremely, it's extremely
harmful for everyone. So I wantpeople to know that I've also
endured and struggled quite alot with those kinds of
(22:52):
feelings. Perhaps I had someextra tools to think about it.
So I'm still finding my way,truth be set. I'm currently in
the process of trying toreconceptualize many things that
I've been doing this is mostlyrelated with the controversial
NFT space, which has some verygood things along with it, but
(23:14):
I'm also in the path. So Ihaven't found the solution at
all. I'm just trying to learnhow to protect myself as much as
possible to make this pathgenuine. So that that's the main
message. Sorry for interrupting,you can continue.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (23:30):
No thanks for having that. I think
that's really important to hearthat, you know, even the best of
us gone through all that. I feellike the social media have this
notion that makes people who arein the social media looks
perfect, right? But at the endof it, we are just human. Now,
(23:53):
you say something reallyinteresting, earlier about, you
know, you go into this as well.And, you know, you have this
this issue as well. But youknow, like you say you are
trained, right, you have thetools, but something that I
realised from my own experienceis when when we look at someone
(24:15):
else we could, we could clearlysee it, right? It's like oh,
okay, you're, you're you'reyou're having this struggle,
this challenge and you shouldyou should do this a, b and c
because you should show it fromyou see it from the outside. Now
for ourselves, it's differentbecause we are part of it, we
are emotionally attached to theproblem to whatever it is like
(24:37):
you know, the survival method orsorry, the survival state that
you mentioned, for example. Sowhat is your advice to be able
to take to be able to recogniseyour own state and to be able to
give, take your own advice andactually implement it as if you
(24:58):
are talking to us someone else,
Jose Ramos (25:01):
when once again another extremely challenging,
but interesting question, thekinds of questions that I like.
Because there's a reason why Isaid it's easier said than done.
Because it's all extremely, Iwouldn't say easy, but it's more
comfortable when I'm sitting inthe doctor's chair, and quite
(25:22):
difficult when I'm on the otherside. So that's why I said that
I have some tools to help menavigate it. But that doesn't
always make it easier. It'slike, it's like diagnosing or
treating someone from yourfamily, you just don't do it.
Because you aren't attachedemotionally to this person, you
cannot have lack of biases thatwill kind of contaminate your,
(25:48):
your evaluation. So sometimesit's even harder for a
psychiatrist to be sufferingmentally, because it will start
creating all sorts of theories,it will start triggering lots of
alarms of what's going on withme, am I becoming a patient?
Will I need medication, and thenall the brain process to
(26:09):
approach this sometimes becomesharder when it's related with
ourselves. So the thing is, mostof all, I always try to build
back to what I mentioned before,which is the feeling that on
your inside, you feelcomfortable, you feel pleasure,
while you're trading your art,you feel that there's some sort
(26:33):
of narrative that is relatedwith you, it's aligned with your
goals, it's aligned with who youwant to be in this very short
life. It's aligned with what youwant to transmit to other
people. And it's only when I dothis, and this is completely
unrelated with psychiatryitself, it's only when I do it
(26:55):
is that I probably get a littlebit more grounded, and managed
to look at things from theoutsides. I also have some
further tools, because I've beendoing a lot of research about
using psychedelics for treatmentof psychiatric illness. And I
tried to bring a lot of thatalso for my creative expression
(27:16):
to my photography. And Imentioning this because in the
end, we are all so immersed inour own selves in our rigid ways
of thinking, in our rigid waysof feeling that when we get out
of this huge bubble, and we lookfrom the outside, it's so much
(27:38):
easier to fix things. And thisis achievable through therapy
through medication through othermeans. But we can also do it
ourselves, as long as we are notmentally Hill, as long as it's
not absolutely uncontrollable,we can stop and look at our
insight, we can meditate, we canthink about what we're doing,
(28:00):
once again, the purpose. Sothat's what I had to do with
myself, I could not be my ownpsychiatrist, I had to be used,
they're thinking about why it'sjust they're suffering so much,
and what's wrong? And what kindof external forces are being
toxic? And what did I want it totransmit with my time spent with
(28:25):
art. So this was kind of thepath that I was able to, to
follow.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (28:32):
Fantastic, thanks for sharing that and
explaining that. Now. Youmentioned something very
interesting in the answer thethe you know, you in order to
get away from this, what theycall it the burnout, you are
focusing on your purpose, right?In photography. So share with us
(28:56):
a little bit what is yourpurpose? What is photography to
you, and why do you take them?Now I know in the beginning, you
have an entirely differentreason. But now you are here,
and it gives you a lot offulfilment. How does that do to
you?
Jose Ramos (29:13):
Yeah. Well, photography, just like I told
you before, I think I'm still inthe middle of the path. I
probably will never reach theend of the path because it's all
about the journey. This soundslike a little bit of a cliche,
but it's the absolute truth. Butyeah, the the initial purpose it
(29:35):
was just to capture spontaneousmoments. And then all of a
sudden it became a channel to toexpress things that weren't
inside me. You could ask Whyhave I chosen nature? Why not go
to portrait photography, streetphotography, documentary,
photojournalism, etc. But justlike I said, In the beginning,
(29:56):
I've always been fascinated withnature. I think there's so much
more More to nature than what'simmediately apparent. And for
me, images have a lot of layers.I know that someone that looks
at my portfolio, if someonedoesn't spend more than 30
seconds on my portfolio, likeprobably 99% of people do on
(30:16):
social media, because it'severything is so quick and
accelerated. But if people lookat my portfolio, they'll see
lots of Hi Candy, as I usuallysay, very captivating images,
lots of colour, I'm not afraidat all to work with colour. And
I know this is also a little bitcontroversial. But if people
(30:37):
look at my images, they will seeintense slide long exposure,
immersive compositions, andpeople would think, okay,
there's another guy just doingpretty nature images. And that
said, let's move on, let's lookat something else. But the thing
is, be it with me or with anyother photographer, his images
(31:01):
will always have more layers.And when you stop to look at an
image, when you look at theintent, when you look at the
biography of the person, whenyou look at the purpose, you'll
see that there's the immediateaspect of looking at it and
being captivated. And when yougrab someone's attention, and
that person wants to spend sometime trying to understand what
(31:21):
you're doing, that person willsee that there are more elements
on the image, there arepotential symbolisms in the
image. And if the person theartist wants to write something
about it, you will probably seethat there's a story attached to
it. So my meaning right now, mypurpose is most of all, to grab
(31:45):
those subjects, which areextremely important to me, and
channelled him as well aspossible through nature. I think
photography gives me theprivilege of being able to get
someone's attention in a verybeautiful and spontaneous way.
And channel, something that ismeaningful to me, it can be just
the image, someone might choosenot to read anything at all
(32:09):
about it. And that's perfectlyvalid. Or it can go much further
than that. So my purpose is tocaptivate to show how beautiful
is the ecosystem we live in, andthen try to pass the message
regarding conservation,regarding mental health
regarding purpose, meaning,relationship between mankind
(32:33):
human kinds, and the planet welive in, not taking things for
granted spirituality 10s ofthings that are very, very
important to me. That's why Isay I'm still in the middle of
the path, because I can say thatI have some kind of branding,
and I hate this word branding. Ithink people should not need to
(32:54):
emphasise branding at all,because they are so much more
than a brand. But I'm kind ofall over the place, conceptually
speaking, and I'm trying tochannel this message in a more
effective way. But while this isa spontaneous conversation, and
summing up the purpose, is toever voice trying to convey the
(33:17):
things that are important that Ireally want to share with
others. We are all together inthis. So I think every one of us
has kind of the duty, I wouldsay to try to enrich the world
we are in. And photography seemslike a beautiful way to do it.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (33:35):
What a beautiful word. Word that is
Jose, I think what you say thereon that last sentence, you know,
to enrich the world, you know,whether it's through your
photography, or music, orwhatever it may be, you know, or
simply just expressing yourself,I think that is an absolute
important thing to do. So youknow, what you said is just
(34:00):
incredible about conservationsand mental health. It's all the
things that not always beentalked about, but it's so
important to focus on. Now, onething that I want to ask you is
going back to what you say,right? In order, we don't want
(34:25):
to get caught in this numbersgame about Instagram, or Twitter
or whatever it may be rightsales, whatnot. But at the same
time, they are important,especially for artists who are
doing it full time, right,because they are a way for them
to get seen and to share themessage. So one thing that I'm
(34:47):
interested to hear your thoughton is how do you find that
balance? How can you focus onthe numbers so that it can
support you to do more Have whatyou love, instead of crushing
your true purpose, or yourinitial purpose on why you want
(35:08):
to do photography in the firstplace?
Jose Ramos (35:11):
Yeah, that that's very interesting. And I want to
do another important disclaimer,which is my income also comes
from photography. Unfortunately,in Portugal, doctors wages,
they're not good at all. I know,this happens in a lot of
countries. But we get lots ofinvitations to go work to the
(35:34):
north of Europe and othercountries. And there's
absolutely no comparison interms of income. So right now,
I'm kind of splitting my timebetween photography and
psychiatry, I'm doing privatepractice, only to have time for
art. So it's like I care aboutit. I care about how people view
(35:55):
my work, I care about income, Icare about how to transform this
also into business, and this isa business. So reaching that
balance, once again, it's easiersaid than done. Because when you
are really struggling to pay thebills, when you need to put food
on the table, you just need tohave the numbers, you need to
(36:18):
have the exposure, you need tohave the licencing you need to
have the collaborations, and itcan be extremely challenging.
And the problem is that most ofsocial media of the social media
game, it kind of obeys topreconceived aesthetic notion of
what's good, what's of whatresults, there's this great
(36:40):
example of Instagram, Instagramkind of revolutionised, the way
that photos should look. BeforeInstagram, it used to be the
classical old schoolphotography, landscape
photography, with its strongcolours, like I mentioned
before, and then all of asudden, you had a revolution,
strongly attached to travelphotography, and not to
(37:00):
classical landscape photography,even though there's a strong
overlap in this, but people whowant it to survive, most of them
had to adapt. Now the thing is,can you keep being genuine,
while changing part of youroutputs and your colours and
your countries? And the way youedit your images? I think it's
(37:21):
possible. I think there's alwaysa balance, because as long as
you have some further purpose,they're not just making money
for the sake of it. I think itcomes naturally. So the way I
try to handle all of that isexactly by having something that
I need to transmit to otherpeople, and hoping that this
(37:44):
resonates with enough peoplethat will get me the much needed
income, if that didn't happen.And sometimes I wonder what if I
went full time. The main reasonwhy I don't go full time, is
because not only I love doingpsychiatry, I also feel it's
absolutely essential for thearts, just the way I feel that
(38:07):
art is essential for mypsychiatry. But if I went full
time, and all of a sudden, Icould not pay the bills, I would
not have any problem at all tojump into something that would
be a little more profitable,both in the photography field or
in other areas, as long as I addenough time to continue being
genuine, and creating my arts,because once you stop doing it,
(38:31):
then I think it's kind of arune. So it's probably a matter
of balance. And even though I'magainst the game number, I
understand why it happens. Ithink we need to play it just
don't be too caught up in it.Otherwise, if we all of a sudden
start thinking that our value isfully placed in the numbers.
(38:56):
That just means we lost contactwith our insight, but I
obviously like to have comments.I love to have exposure. I like
to have followers, I like to becontacted by brands because it's
kind of an extension that youare doing work that it's being
noticed. But most of all I wantthe main purpose of being not
(39:18):
just to be because peopleresonate with the message and
the rest is kind of a bonus thatspontaneously comes
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (39:28):
that is really really good way of
putting it and I love how yousay, you know, the most
important thing is about peopleresonate with your message and
then everything else if thatfits then it's good. If not,
then it's okay sort of thing youknow, well as you know, it's
different compared to trying toplease every single person out
(39:50):
there. So I think that is areally good thing to to notice
or to recognise when you are aphotographer or anyone no matter
as a matter of fact, right? It'snever good trying to please
everyone. Now, one thing that Iam, I'd love to hear your
(40:11):
thought on, you touch onphotography community back then
how genuine it was right. And intoday's world, I feel like a lot
of that genuinely, sort ofdisappear. It's more about like
you say, you know, a numbersgame, the exposure. More often
(40:33):
than not, we interact with otheraccounts for the algorithm
instead of for the genuineexpression of our feeling
towards the art. So one thingthat I'm interested in is to
hear your thoughts about how thecommunity was before, and how do
(40:54):
you feel the community is today?And what do you think we can do
to make, you know, whatever wehave today, a better place a
better community a betterinteraction with each other.
Jose Ramos (41:11):
Okay, well, thinking about the community before. And
using the example of sites likeDeviantArt, like I mentioned, I
was in another site, which wasphoto seek, which does not even
exist anymore. It had a veryinteresting rating system where
people had to write proper,thorough comments, detailed
(41:33):
comments on each other's imagesthat then would be voted by the
community. And people whoactually went through the effort
to write meaningful critiques,they were benefited with this,
because then they could postother comments, they could post
their own photos. And the systemkind of Fed itself in a very
(41:54):
healthy way. The same happenedwith DeviantArt. Not with this
ingenious system. But there wasa big, big sense of community
there were journaling there,there was journaling, there were
very detailed comments, peopleestablished very meaningful
relationships. There, there wasalready some kind of a draft of
(42:14):
the numbers game, it existed,but it was not as focused as now
because right now, it's kind ofhectic and frantic, fast machine
of media consumption. So whenyou have more time to look at
things, we're not constantlybeing overwhelmed with stimuli.
(42:35):
And social media sites are fullyengineered to get not only your
attention, but just your shortattention, they don't want your
long spent attention workingbecause that means less viewing
less ads, less profit. Soregarding what we could do, I
have a good example right now,which is a very controversial
(42:58):
example. And you know that I'mgoing to bring this up, because
we we kind of met also throughTwitter, which is the NFT space,
which, in the middle of all, itsbig toxicity, it brought
something very interesting,which is once again, the focus
on the message and the focus onthe relationship between
(43:19):
photographers, as a communitythat needs to support itself and
beyond the same boat to havesuccess as a wall as a whole,
and the relationship withcollectors. Because all of a
sudden, I realised that mostlyregarded with landscape
photography. It's not arespected genre of photography.
(43:39):
In the fine art gallery world,obviously, some people make it,
but the big, big bucks, they aremade with other styles of
photography. And many people arerealising through the democratic
zation of the access to the NFTspace, the collectors already
sent traditional collectors,that landscape photography also
(44:00):
has a place in these big galleryworld in this big museum world.
Where probably we can have agood balance between not being
constantly exploited byMicrostock, photography website,
websites not being exploited bybrands who want everything in
exchange of not that much.Possibly, we have a place in
(44:25):
this whole ecosystem of this alleconomic ecosystem where if we
have a message, if we havesomething different, that we
want to show to the world,perhaps we can have a sense of
community, we can have time tointeract with other
photographers, artistscollectors, and that will have
(44:48):
the added bonus the Editessential bonus of getting an
income from this. So I wouldmostly love to see all the
websites shifting from aperspective Have not just
focused on quick profits andquick visualisation, but on
taking the time to be withpeople and to be with art,
(45:09):
obviously, this is wishfulthinking, this is probably not
going to happen. There's way toomuch money in all social media
websites, probably the voice ofthe people can make itself
heard. It's happening with allthe backlash against reels on
Instagram. And I think that's,it's good that it's happening.
But I don't know how strong of avoice we can have to make that
(45:32):
much of a difference. But atleast we need to try. And I
usually never did podcasts, Ijust love being this behind
behind the camera. And I thinkthat we need to start being a
little bit more activists of ourown craft, and of the place we
deserve. In the globallandscape, no pun intended, in
(45:55):
the global landscape of the artworld. To make things better,
and to make interactions muchbetter and out here, most of
all,
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (46:05):
that was a good point, I must say.
Yeah, that's, thanks for sharingyour thoughts on that, it is
quite interesting how to seeyour perspective on this whole,
how everything kind of fit in,you know, with the NFT with the
landscape photography, and withjust other photography in
(46:29):
general, I think that's, that'squite an interesting take that
you have in there. So one thingthat I want to get into is that,
you know, you kind of dophotography, and psychiatry,
being psychiatrists at the sametime. And I love how you say
(46:50):
that, you each each one of themneed each other, and each one of
them support each other. Right.And I think that's, that's
really interesting, because Ican totally resonate with that
right. Now. One thing that I I'msure the audience would like to
hear, right, a lot of them lovephotography, you know, a lot of
(47:11):
photographer love photography,that's why they got into it.
That's why they buy they buy,spend all their money on these
really expensive things. Now. Ifthere is a chance for them to,
you know, earn back and just geta side income or whatnot, to be
able to fund their next travelor to be able to upgrade their
(47:35):
next camera. How based on yourexperience, how would you
advise? How would you recommendthem to look into being able to
find those side incomes?
Jose Ramos (47:50):
Well, first of all, if I focus mostly on nature,
photography, and landscapephotography, looking at the
overall situation of mostphotographers that I know, and I
will say, unfortunately, onceagain, because I would love that
landscape photography would berecognised as a type of art,
(48:13):
which is worth by itself, in artby other kinds of side gigs. But
most of all, as long as you havea good portfolio, as long as you
are inspiring, as long as youknow your way around editing, as
long as you have good qualityimages to show, you have the
(48:34):
classical photo tour route tofollow, which is extremely
profitable when when done,right. And it has a very
interesting purpose speciallyfor the people who live to
teach. It's an absolutelybeautiful way to practice
photography. I'm more of thesolitary kind of person that
likes to have its own space todo his photography. But for
(48:57):
people want to have a sideincome with their images, as
long as they have goodvisibility. And there we go with
the numbers game. If they havegood visibility, if they
establish meaningful contactswith people, they will probably
start being invited to show themto show them those places to
show them how they capture thoseimages. And in a very
(49:18):
spontaneous way, they will beable to get a good income from
that. And even more importantthan that, even more important
than the numbers, the good oldtechnique of taking people to
your website where you can showmuch more about who you are not
be totally dependent on socialmedia but use it as a way to
channel people into your ownplace. The place that you were
(49:40):
you chose the design you chosehow you present yourself and you
are not just someone else in themiddle of 1 million trade
photographers. And when you dothat, you get the chance for
them to subscribe potentially anewsletter and then all of a
sudden we have this privilegeaccess to show to these people.
What you really like to do, whatare your messages, what you can
(50:06):
offer them, and in a veryspontaneous way, as long as you
put your art into everything,and assuming your artwork
inspires other people, I thinksite income will always appear.
The big question is if it'sstable, and if it can become the
main income, but getting sidegigs, as long as you put some
(50:29):
effort into it, I think it's,it's doable.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (50:33):
Fantastic. That is great advice. And I want
to segue to I know that, youknow, you've your photo have
been published in Nationalgeography in, in Spain, right.
And, you know, first of all,congratulations, that That photo
was incredible. Now, I know thatfor many photographers, that has
(50:53):
been, you know, their dreams,including mine. Now, I'd love to
just hear right while I have youhere. What? How did you What are
your journey to get your photopublished with magazine like,
NatGeo? And how, what advicewould you give for someone who
want to have their photopublished with Nigeria?
Jose Ramos (51:15):
Okay? Before and i Unfortunately, once again, I'm
always regretting things, it'skind of like a pattern, I need
to analyse this as apsychiatrist. But I was going to
say that unfortunately, I lost ahuge opportunity to be noticed
by NatGeo, which was theirwebsite, the your shot
(51:36):
photographer, from NatGeo. And Ididn't used to pay attention at
all to it. And I know plenty ofphotographers that's kind of
noticed by them, and add somesort of special place to not
only publish in magazinesworldwide, but also to be
featured on their huge Instagrampages. So I missed that
(51:59):
opportunity. And the way I gotinto NatGeo, was mostly, it was
locally related. So there werethese big groups. In both
Portugal and Spain where peopleused to share their images,
these groups were kind ofscouted by the editorial team of
Nachteile. And going towards theguidelines of Nachteile. I think
(52:26):
they identified with some of myworks, because NatGeo is still
one of the few who once again, Iknow I'm constantly repeating
myself, but they put lots offocus on the message. It's not
just about 3d images, I wouldactually go as far as saying
that most of my images, they arenot natural or material, because
(52:47):
they are usually I would sayless edited less impactful. They
want to be a little bit moreimmediately related with the
perceived reality. And I usuallylike to give some artistic
expression on my images. Butsome of them they possibly could
(53:12):
potentially fit the magazine.And I think that it was along
with the story along with thefact that I always put great
effort into describing why thatimage was different white at
some meaning, why I captured it,why the viewers can relate with
it, that I got the first contextto publish with them. And as
(53:32):
soon as you get the firstpublication, then it becomes
easier, you have just opened acommunication channel. And right
now I have the privilege that Ican reach out to them when I
think I have something differentand relevant to show them like a
photo of the volcano that I did,like the Milky Way over an
Ancient Bridge in the south ofPortugal, which has never been
(53:54):
photographed before. When I havesomething that I think that
brings value to readers, Icontact them and ask them if
they're interested in publishingit. If I started bombarding them
with every image that I had,probably they would just block
me and shut down our emailcontact. So it's I think it's
mostly related with traffickingand adapting the message to the
(54:18):
medium where we want to bepublished. And I also need to do
another disclaimer, I've beenfeatured on their visions of the
earth section, which is just onesingle image with a small
description. But I've never doneeditorial work for them because
the work with lots of extremelytalented photographers with a
(54:39):
specific photo photographicpurpose to show something and I
didn't follow that path. Butit's also another very valid
pass to be able to be publishedthere. So adapt what you're
doing as long as it's genuine.Anyone identify with it to the
place where you want to getpublished.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (55:01):
fantastic advice, that is really good way
to put you know how people canpursue that path. So thanks a
lot for sharing that andcongratulation to you. Now we
are kind of coming into the lasthour, you know, the one hour
mark. And one thing that Ialways ask my guests in this
(55:22):
podcast is that if there was oneadvice, whether it's photography
or life advice that you wouldgive to your younger self or to
other people in general, whatwould that be?
Jose Ramos (55:36):
Okay, you save the toughest question for for for
the end of the podcast. So letme just put my neuron my brain
neurons firing and thinkingabout what could be potentially
inspirational. But, well, takingfrom some of the things I've
said during this podcast, Iwould tell and recommend people
(55:59):
to first of all, look aftertheir mental health. And I'm not
saying this in that classicalpaternalistic style, of like,
some cliche phrase, but most ofall, feel comfortable when you
are doing art, feel that there'ssomething you are showing of
(56:21):
yourself, which is genuine, andwhich is good towards others
when you are trading your heart,your art, and most of all, don't
get lost in the number game andvalue meaningful connections
with people that will bring youway more satisfaction, if I
could. And I've said before,during the podcast, that it's
(56:44):
easier said than done. And Ifind myself also caught up in
the game of numbers every nowand then the main message, I
would stream to myself and tellmyself to stop looking at the
numbers and establish meaningfulartwork and meaningful
connections. That's the mostimportant and I think that will
always bring something good, beit money being well being. I
(57:07):
think it's the path to go tochoose.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (57:11):
That is a fantastic advice. Jose,
thank you very much for sharingthat. All right. Well, you know,
it's been great talking to you.I love you know, just chatting
with you. And I hope we get tomeet in real life one day,
Jose Ramos (57:27):
that will happen we need to make sure that will
happen.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (57:30):
Yeah, let's go. So for people who want
to learn more about you yourstory, your mission as well as
your beautiful photography, whatis the best way to connect with
you?
Jose Ramos (57:44):
Okay, I think the easier way and just like I said
before, it's kind of the, thethe ideal starting point is to
go to my website, which is wwwdot Josie Josie rammos.com I'm
gonna say it in English and notin Portuguese. Or you can go to
my Instagram page, which is JoJo's there Ramos photography or
(58:08):
to Twitter, which is Josieunderscore, Ramos. Okay, so
these are the best places tofind out about my work. And feel
free to reach out if you searchby Tracy, psychiatrist
photographer from Portugal,you'll probably also find me on
Google. So feel free to find mein any way you prefer.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (58:32):
Fantastic. Thanks a lot for sharing that
and don't worry listeners, youwill get the link on the
description. So if you arelistening to this and you're not
sure if it's Jose or Josie, youknow, just go on the link you'll
get you know exactly the exactlink so that you know how to
find him. Well, thank you verymuch for being here. Jose,
(58:54):
that's how you say inPortuguese, isn't it?
Jose Ramos (58:57):
Actually not. It's juicy? Juicy. Okay. It's not
easy to pronounce. So I wastelling you I prefer to give the
the English Americanized versionor people would not probably
translate it properly to theright characters. So it's using
in Portuguese juicy. Is that Isthat right? Yeah, that that's
(59:20):
pretty pretty close. Oh, wow.Yeah.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (59:24):
I used to live in LA right. And
all I have a lot of friends fromMexico and basically Latin
America, but they think there'spronounced Jose. So it's
different between Hispanic andPortuguese. Okay, well, that's
good to know. But yeah, thanks alot for being here. Thanks for
(59:44):
sharing all of your wisdom aswell as your story. And
hopefully, listeners you canfind a lot of wisdom, a lot of
inspiration from not only thejourney but the advice that
juicy Is that?
Jose Ramos (01:00:01):
How almost I can say it's perfect?
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:00:05):
Yeah. All right, well, um, listeners,
if you haven't subscribed yet,subscribe yet, make sure you hit
the subscribe button. We'd loveto hear your feedback. If you do
enjoy this podcast and if youknow other photographer who
you'd love to have in thispodcast, please reach out to me
on my instagram or facebook,which is or Twitter, which is
(01:00:28):
just at the weekend, and let meknow who I should bring to to
the podcast. But thank you verymuch for being here. I know,
your time is important. And youhave shared that time with me
and I very much appreciate that.
Jose Ramos (01:00:44):
Thank you for my absolute pleasure. And thank you
for the opportunity.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:00:49):
All right, well, weekend, as always,
I'll see you again next week.But for now, make sure that you
keep shooting keep creating anddon't forget to stay smiling.
Until next time
summing up the purpose is to ever voice trying
(00:04):
to convey the things that areimportant that I really want to
share with others. We are alltogether in this so I think
every one of us as kind of theduty I would say to try to
enrich the world we are in andphotography seems like a
beautiful way to do it
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (00:29):
Hey, wicked hunters Welcome back to
The Art of Photography podcast,where we share photographers
journey and how photography havegiven us hope, purpose and
happiness. And today, we havesomeone who been very inspiring
to his voice to me, as well ashis photography, he take amazing
sunset sunrise as well asphotography in general. So
(00:52):
today, we have Jose, hey, Jose,how you doing? Hi there, how are
you? It's very good to be here.I'm pretty excited. And thank
you for the invitation.
Jose Ramos (01:03):
And I greatly admire your work. I want to apologise
to everyone because of myEnglish. I'm not a native
English speaker, but I'm doingmy best. And I hope everyone
understands me well. And so I'mpretty excited to be here today.
And to have a conversation withyou.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:21):
Oh, man, you're just too humble.
Your English is perfect.
Jose Ramos (01:26):
Sometimes I struggle with words, I'm very used to my
Portuguese, which has a veryrich vocabulary. And sometimes I
get a little bit lost withEnglish, but I'm doing my best.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:37):
Fair enough. Fair enough. So, you
know, like, I've been followingyou for a while look at your
photography, and they are justincredible. Like, you know, it
really speak to you. Right? Itreally pops. But before we get
into your photography, give us alittle bit background about you
know, who you are and how youcome about photography.
Jose Ramos (02:01):
Okay, sure, I could give you the short version or
the very long one. So I'll justtry to find a balance not to
bother our listeners. But Iusually say that first of all,
long before photography, I waspassionate about nature. I was
born in Portugal, in a smalltown in the south of Portugal.
(02:22):
So we were quite used to go tonature, I used to do a lot of
mountain biking, I always feltthese instinctive needs to be in
quiet places, beautiful places,forests, etc. And right from the
beginning, I've always lived innature. I didn't have any
artistic background in my in myfamily, unfortunately. But I
(02:46):
know that from quite early, Iwanted to express myself and I
wanted to use art in some way. Iused to live literature,
philosophy, spirituality. Butthen I got into music. Actually,
as a rock band still in thissmall own town when I was still
(03:08):
a teenager and heavy metalbands. We are we were kind of
the outcasts in our town. Butalready had this need to, to
express something. And I used touse music to do this. At the
same time, I continued myventures into nature with no
artistic purpose. Then, when Iwas 18 years old, I had to go to
(03:34):
college and I went to medicalschool in Lisbon. And I found
myself all of a sudden,completely overwhelmed with 10s
of things to study, and barelyno time to devote to music. We
used to play electric guitar.And I was really struggling with
that because I needed an outlet.Medicine was extremely demanding
(03:58):
10s of mental work and not thatmuch in terms of expression. And
as if that wasn't enough, I wasin a big town I was in Lisbon
and contact with nature wasgreatly reduced. So it was
absolutely everything. A big bigangle over of both nature and
creation. And my encounter withphotography. It was extremely
(04:21):
spontaneous. Digital Photographyjust became a thing. This was
probably 18 years ago. Yeah, I'mnow 14. This was 18 years ago, I
was in the middle of my of mygraduation. And I asked my
parents to buy me to offer me adigital camera. It was a three
megapixel compact camera, noartistic purpose at all. I just
(04:44):
wanted it to be as small aspossible. I didn't care about
megapixels, anything like that.But the interesting thing is
that when I got the camera,which I just wanted to capture
some snapshots of my daily life,it just made me so starts
looking for things that werespecial things that were
(05:04):
beautiful and inspiring. And assoon as we, as I realised, I was
starting to venture much moreinto nature than before I
started capturing images. Still,I didn't have any artistic
purpose in debt, but the imageswere just kept on my harddrive,
I was starting to feel thepleasure of capturing the beauty
(05:24):
that I was seeing and recordingit with the camera. And that was
until a friend of mine suggestedme. This wasn't so long ago,
1817 years ago, to share some ofmy nature images on online.
There were no there was nosocial media back then we
already had photo communities.So I started posting in a
(05:47):
website, which still existstoday, which is DeviantArt. It
had an absolutely incrediblephoto community back then, every
one was there incredibleartists. So I just accepted to
put one or two terrible photosthere. And I was extremely
surprised with the communityenergy. I got comments, I
(06:08):
commented on other people'sphotos, it was extremely clean
in terms of energy, there wasnot the current vibe, numbers
and everything else. So all of asudden, I was finding the
creative outlets, which joinedboth my my wish to express what
I felt, and also my love fornature. So it was kind of a
(06:31):
perfect combination. It replacedmusic, it became my favourite
form of expression. And so Ijust got absolutely addicted to
it. Then I entered my specialtyin psychiatry, when I officially
finished graduation. And thingsjust kind of exploded from
(06:51):
there. Because I got extremelyeven more fascinated with
photography, when I learnedabout its power, not only for
expression, but also forwellbeing for so many things.
And then publications,exhibitions, photo tours, and
social media and everything elsestarted appearing. So I just
(07:14):
found myself having to kind ofdivide my time between
practising medicine and doingphotography. So I just got fully
addicted. And we are here todaybecause I'm continue. I still
continue to be addicted tophotography.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (07:31):
That's incredible, man. Like, this is
why I love like, you know, thispodcast because like, in just
six minutes, I know you morethan I would have, you know,
following you for all this time.And so yeah, that is so cool.
You used to play in a band. Iused to be a drummer, actually.
So,
Jose Ramos (07:49):
so that's awesome. What musical style may I make?
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (07:54):
I used to like a punk rock. That
was okay. It's like cool. That'sjust like the blink 182 sort of
a thing. But it's reallyinteresting because you you say
you used to like music, and thenyou kind of found photography
and you shift across you stilllike music or kind of what makes
(08:18):
photography take over from beingable to express yourself through
music instead?
Jose Ramos (08:25):
Yeah, that's a very, very interesting question. And I
would give a superficial firstanswer, which would be
convenience. And I'll explainwhy. Because most of the members
of the bands, they actually alsocame to Lisbon to study. We were
all 18 years old, and we triedseveral times to reunite the
(08:48):
band and continue rehearsals.But the thing is that doing
rehearsals in Lisbon is totallydifferent from doing in our
small hometown, where we werethe garage of one of them, we
just anqing we just hang outthere, or virtually all
afternoons. And in Lisbon, allof a sudden, we had to book a
studio, we had to have aschedule, we had to pay, and we
(09:11):
tried multiple times, and itjust did not happen. So the
thing is, all of a suddenphotography gives me something
that I love, which is my ownspace, my own silence my way of
doing things of breathing, oftaking my time. And even though
I lost kind of the teamwork partof it, which is important. I
(09:34):
gained a lot with photography.So firstly, it was convenience.
But then I felt that I wasgaining much more. expressing
myself through photography, andthe potential of sharing,
communicating and discoveringother people's work was
incredibly it was moreamplified. So that's why in a
(09:56):
very smooth way photographyreplaced music in I live.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (10:01):
That is awesome. Thanks for sharing
that. And it's reallyinteresting how you say that,
you know, you can't have thesuperficial reason to start
photography, but you get deeperand I feel like it's a common
occurrence, you know, afterlike, interviewing over 45
(10:24):
people in my podcast, that'skind of what I see, you know,
like most people start just justgo on a holiday take photo, but
they got really into deep on it.And it it seems like photography
habits way to do that. Now, onething that I'm interested in to
hear from you is, you know,expressing your you say this
(10:45):
notion about expressing yourselfto photography, right? So how
does that different betweenexpressing yourself to
photography versus expressingyourself in the music?
Jose Ramos (11:00):
Okay. First of all, I want to just a little
compliment to you, because youmentioned that we've interviewed
a lot, a lot of people, I wasquite terrified when I saw all
the big names you have alreadyinterviewed. So I congratulate
you for that, because it's avery important thing that you
(11:21):
are doing for photographers and,and also because I read your
very interesting manifesto aboutthe emotions that photography
brings to our own lives,including some periods and when
you have struggled, and you areclearly one of those that s
photography need his life toexpress something in to get a
(11:43):
deeper purpose and meaning. So Ijust wanted to congratulate you,
first of all because of that,and it's good, because I
listened to many of yourpodcasts. And yeah, you always
seems to search for these commonthreads, that people are not
doing photography just for thesake of it, which is quite
important. So go into yourquestion about expressing myself
(12:08):
through music and throughphotography. Once again,
photography was so much smootherand elegant for me than music.
In music, you have the craftparts, you need to practice a
lot, you need to be extremelyobsessive. If you want to play
well, you probably felt that wedid drums, I don't know if you
(12:29):
felt that as deep. Because it'sa punk rock. And sometimes punk
bands want to be morespontaneous. Our metal band was
kind of technical. So it gotkind of complex. So you were to
spend hours and hours and hourspractising scales and everything
else. And I just hated it.Because I already had the
(12:49):
discipline for the studies. AndI wanted for the expression in
arts to be something moreeffortless, more spontaneous. So
expressing myself with music, itwas extremely empowering. It
felt extremely good. It wasfantastic when we were playing
(13:09):
together when we were givingconcerts. But there's something
deeper and more profound inartistic expression through
photography for me, okay, soprobably many people, mostly
musicians will feel theopposite. But for me, the whole
process, the slower thoughtprocess and creating process and
(13:34):
the travelling and being in themiddle of nature, and thinking
about what you want to do. Andall the time you have in the
world to look at your images andtry to understand what they're
telling you and write about him.For me. It's a much much richer
experience. So music is morelike in your face. My visual
filling is this one. I'm fillingit right now. Please take hits,
(13:58):
and you can go into the mosh pitright now insert at all. And
photography is kind of a more, Iwould say existential craft.
It's a slower one. And well Ilike it more right now.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (14:13):
Oh, amen. That is That is awesome. I
love hearing that, you know. AndI appreciate what you said
earlier that you know, that'svery kind of you. At the end of
the day i i look for people whowho have inspiring stories and
one of the reason why I want youto be here is because the way
(14:34):
you you tell story not onlythrough your photography, but
also through your words. So, youknow, I don't just speak anyone
who big have a big following.But you know that what you just
said earlier just shows you knowwhy I want you to be here
because you really takemeaningful approach to your
photography right now, it'sreally interesting how you say
(14:59):
that In music, you kind of haveto work hard to get good at it.
And then you become you burnout, right? You hated what
you're doing, because you'rejust practising too hard. Now,
when it comes, I mean, withanything in life, right? If you
want to be good at it, you gottalearn. And then you got to
practice. And I'm sure you'vehad a lot of practice a lot of
(15:21):
trial and error with yourphotography as well. So how, how
is that different with yourexperience in music? And what
sort of advice you could givefor people who are feeling that
way, you know, who are feelinglike, they've been at this
photography for so long theypractice and practice and
(15:43):
practice and they hit a wall,and they just burn out?
Jose Ramos (15:47):
Yeah. It's also a great question. And I love this
kind of interviews, not just thetypical technical questions, I
prefer these ones. Yeah, firstof all, I didn't want to send
out the message that for me,photography is absolutely easy,
because it's not, I have alreadystruggled a lot with
(16:09):
photography, not in terms ofcreative block, because I have
kind of a controversial opinionabout that. I don't think that
there's creative block when oursubject that we capture is
nature, which is something kindof endless, in its beauty and
possibilities. But I think wecan F inner blocks. So
(16:35):
photography, it took me a longtime to get to where I am right
now. But it was not as hard andas tough as it used to be music
because with music with thepractice of the instrument when
I was practising, I didn't feellike I was doing something
inspiring. And when I'm learningphotography, I'm in the middle
(16:58):
of nature, or not closed insidemy room, looking at nothing and
trying for my fingers to move asthey should. I'm in the middle
of a beautiful forest, takingterrible photos, or in a
seascape doing terrible photos,but I'm there. So the act of
doing photography is just asmall part of everything, just a
(17:19):
small part of hiking, of lookingat the sunset of chatting with
friends while you are doing awalk sharing with your partner.
So we just became extremelyspontaneous, because I just
loved everything about theprocess, not just the click of
the button. But all the processwas good right from the
beginning. And just like yousaid, my first images were not
(17:41):
satisfying at all. I'm one ofthe few that still has this
whole portfolio online. If yougo to my Deviantart, you can see
my terrible photos from 18 yearsago. And I think it's kind of a
small legacy that I have just toshow how terrible one can be in
the past, and how one can kindof improve, but I still have a
(18:05):
long way to go. So if someonefeels stuck going to your main
question. I would say andprobably this is kind of related
with my practice in psychiatry,and also with my notions of how
photography can have meaning toyou. I think that if you if you
are genuine, when we're tryingto really express something
(18:27):
that's inside you, you need tohave a purpose, you can just
want to share the beauty ofnature, this is a very deep
purpose. It's not somethingsuperficial. But as long as you
want to do something and reachsomething, I think you will
always channel all your insightinto it. So it will just appear
(18:49):
people that are struggling,usually, they feel blocked,
because there are some outsideexpectations from them. For them
that kind of overwhelmed them.Beat numbers beat many beat
survival beat anything. And allof a sudden, when you start
being absolutely genuine towardsyour goals, your body will react
(19:11):
Your body knows it. There's somesorts of this is controversial
also, scientifically speaking,and I should only say scientific
accurate things. But your bodyjust signals, the stress, it
signals the lack of genuineunity. And some people ever very
natural talents to enter intosome sort of false self state
(19:33):
where they pretend to besomething but most artists, they
just can't do it. So if someonehas a big, big creative block, I
would mostly suggests for themto stop a little bit, turn out
the noise of social media, thenumbers, the competition the
game and just think about whatthey want to bring to the table
(19:55):
what they need to channel fromthe inside. And I think this
makes a huge difference. Okay,it's easier said than done. But
well, I think it's the bestadvice I can give now.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (20:08):
Wow, that is one whole lot of wise
words in just few minutes. Yeah,listeners, if you, you know, you
probably going to have to gothrough this few minutes over
and over again, if you hit aroadblock or a mental block,
because I think what you justsay there really hits in the
(20:28):
nail. And as you were justsaying that I, I was I was, I
was thinking about the time whenI hit a burn out. And actually,
you're right, at that timealways Like, going up with the
expectation to shoot somethingthat is, you know, that is
(20:49):
appealing to the social mediamass, right, not really the
thing that but not not reallyshooting for myself. So that's
really interesting. I'm gladthat you share that, because I
think a lot of people might notrealise that until either, you
know, come across this, severalpodcasts talking, you know, with
(21:11):
someone like you or actuallybeing told. So, thanks for
sharing that. And I'm glad I'mtalking to you today for sure.
Because I'm sure other peopleout there will draw inspiration
from this. Now,
Jose Ramos (21:25):
it's my pleasure. And just sorry for interrupting
you just a little bit because Ijust wanted to add something,
which is probably also quiteimportant to the people that
might be listening to us. It'sthat I've also been there, I
don't want to come across as theguy that knows it all that I'm
the psychiatrist. So I'mprotected for from all kinds of
(21:47):
mental illness. I usually saythis to my patients. In the
middle of all medicalspecialties psychiatry, as the
the most the most increasedprevalence of mental illness
problems, okay. So I just wantto transmit that doctors also
suffer, just like photographersand artists. And I've also been
(22:10):
there I've been in the gamenumber, I felt, I wouldn't say
burnt out but and successful.And I remember plenty of times
of trying to enter what Imentioned as kind of a false
self state, where I wanted toemulate something or someone
(22:31):
when every image at to beabsolutely epic and bombastic.
And it just doesn't work.Because that's not how we were,
how we are wired. And it'sextremely, it's extremely
harmful for everyone. So I wantpeople to know that I've also
endured and struggled quite alot with those kinds of
(22:52):
feelings. Perhaps I had someextra tools to think about it.
So I'm still finding my way,truth be set. I'm currently in
the process of trying toreconceptualize many things that
I've been doing this is mostlyrelated with the controversial
NFT space, which has some verygood things along with it, but
(23:14):
I'm also in the path. So Ihaven't found the solution at
all. I'm just trying to learnhow to protect myself as much as
possible to make this pathgenuine. So that that's the main
message. Sorry for interrupting,you can continue.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (23:30):
No thanks for having that. I think
that's really important to hearthat, you know, even the best of
us gone through all that. I feellike the social media have this
notion that makes people who arein the social media looks
perfect, right? But at the endof it, we are just human. Now,
(23:53):
you say something reallyinteresting, earlier about, you
know, you go into this as well.And, you know, you have this
this issue as well. But youknow, like you say you are
trained, right, you have thetools, but something that I
realised from my own experienceis when when we look at someone
(24:15):
else we could, we could clearlysee it, right? It's like oh,
okay, you're, you're you'reyou're having this struggle,
this challenge and you shouldyou should do this a, b and c
because you should show it fromyou see it from the outside. Now
for ourselves, it's differentbecause we are part of it, we
are emotionally attached to theproblem to whatever it is like
(24:37):
you know, the survival method orsorry, the survival state that
you mentioned, for example. Sowhat is your advice to be able
to take to be able to recogniseyour own state and to be able to
give, take your own advice andactually implement it as if you
(24:58):
are talking to us someone else,
Jose Ramos (25:01):
when once again another extremely challenging,
but interesting question, thekinds of questions that I like.
Because there's a reason why Isaid it's easier said than done.
Because it's all extremely, Iwouldn't say easy, but it's more
comfortable when I'm sitting inthe doctor's chair, and quite
(25:22):
difficult when I'm on the otherside. So that's why I said that
I have some tools to help menavigate it. But that doesn't
always make it easier. It'slike, it's like diagnosing or
treating someone from yourfamily, you just don't do it.
Because you aren't attachedemotionally to this person, you
cannot have lack of biases thatwill kind of contaminate your,
(25:48):
your evaluation. So sometimesit's even harder for a
psychiatrist to be sufferingmentally, because it will start
creating all sorts of theories,it will start triggering lots of
alarms of what's going on withme, am I becoming a patient?
Will I need medication, and thenall the brain process to
(26:09):
approach this sometimes becomesharder when it's related with
ourselves. So the thing is, mostof all, I always try to build
back to what I mentioned before,which is the feeling that on
your inside, you feelcomfortable, you feel pleasure,
while you're trading your art,you feel that there's some sort
(26:33):
of narrative that is relatedwith you, it's aligned with your
goals, it's aligned with who youwant to be in this very short
life. It's aligned with what youwant to transmit to other
people. And it's only when I dothis, and this is completely
unrelated with psychiatryitself, it's only when I do it
(26:55):
is that I probably get a littlebit more grounded, and managed
to look at things from theoutsides. I also have some
further tools, because I've beendoing a lot of research about
using psychedelics for treatmentof psychiatric illness. And I
tried to bring a lot of thatalso for my creative expression
(27:16):
to my photography. And Imentioning this because in the
end, we are all so immersed inour own selves in our rigid ways
of thinking, in our rigid waysof feeling that when we get out
of this huge bubble, and we lookfrom the outside, it's so much
(27:38):
easier to fix things. And thisis achievable through therapy
through medication through othermeans. But we can also do it
ourselves, as long as we are notmentally Hill, as long as it's
not absolutely uncontrollable,we can stop and look at our
insight, we can meditate, we canthink about what we're doing,
(28:00):
once again, the purpose. Sothat's what I had to do with
myself, I could not be my ownpsychiatrist, I had to be used,
they're thinking about why it'sjust they're suffering so much,
and what's wrong? And what kindof external forces are being
toxic? And what did I want it totransmit with my time spent with
(28:25):
art. So this was kind of thepath that I was able to, to
follow.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (28:32):
Fantastic, thanks for sharing that and
explaining that. Now. Youmentioned something very
interesting in the answer thethe you know, you in order to
get away from this, what theycall it the burnout, you are
focusing on your purpose, right?In photography. So share with us
(28:56):
a little bit what is yourpurpose? What is photography to
you, and why do you take them?Now I know in the beginning, you
have an entirely differentreason. But now you are here,
and it gives you a lot offulfilment. How does that do to
you?
Jose Ramos (29:13):
Yeah. Well, photography, just like I told
you before, I think I'm still inthe middle of the path. I
probably will never reach theend of the path because it's all
about the journey. This soundslike a little bit of a cliche,
but it's the absolute truth. Butyeah, the the initial purpose it
(29:35):
was just to capture spontaneousmoments. And then all of a
sudden it became a channel to toexpress things that weren't
inside me. You could ask Whyhave I chosen nature? Why not go
to portrait photography, streetphotography, documentary,
photojournalism, etc. But justlike I said, In the beginning,
(29:56):
I've always been fascinated withnature. I think there's so much
more More to nature than what'simmediately apparent. And for
me, images have a lot of layers.I know that someone that looks
at my portfolio, if someonedoesn't spend more than 30
seconds on my portfolio, likeprobably 99% of people do on
(30:16):
social media, because it'severything is so quick and
accelerated. But if people lookat my portfolio, they'll see
lots of Hi Candy, as I usuallysay, very captivating images,
lots of colour, I'm not afraidat all to work with colour. And
I know this is also a little bitcontroversial. But if people
(30:37):
look at my images, they will seeintense slide long exposure,
immersive compositions, andpeople would think, okay,
there's another guy just doingpretty nature images. And that
said, let's move on, let's lookat something else. But the thing
is, be it with me or with anyother photographer, his images
(31:01):
will always have more layers.And when you stop to look at an
image, when you look at theintent, when you look at the
biography of the person, whenyou look at the purpose, you'll
see that there's the immediateaspect of looking at it and
being captivated. And when yougrab someone's attention, and
that person wants to spend sometime trying to understand what
(31:21):
you're doing, that person willsee that there are more elements
on the image, there arepotential symbolisms in the
image. And if the person theartist wants to write something
about it, you will probably seethat there's a story attached to
it. So my meaning right now, mypurpose is most of all, to grab
(31:45):
those subjects, which areextremely important to me, and
channelled him as well aspossible through nature. I think
photography gives me theprivilege of being able to get
someone's attention in a verybeautiful and spontaneous way.
And channel, something that ismeaningful to me, it can be just
the image, someone might choosenot to read anything at all
(32:09):
about it. And that's perfectlyvalid. Or it can go much further
than that. So my purpose is tocaptivate to show how beautiful
is the ecosystem we live in, andthen try to pass the message
regarding conservation,regarding mental health
regarding purpose, meaning,relationship between mankind
(32:33):
human kinds, and the planet welive in, not taking things for
granted spirituality 10s ofthings that are very, very
important to me. That's why Isay I'm still in the middle of
the path, because I can say thatI have some kind of branding,
and I hate this word branding. Ithink people should not need to
(32:54):
emphasise branding at all,because they are so much more
than a brand. But I'm kind ofall over the place, conceptually
speaking, and I'm trying tochannel this message in a more
effective way. But while this isa spontaneous conversation, and
summing up the purpose, is toever voice trying to convey the
(33:17):
things that are important that Ireally want to share with
others. We are all together inthis. So I think every one of us
has kind of the duty, I wouldsay to try to enrich the world
we are in. And photography seemslike a beautiful way to do it.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (33:35):
What a beautiful word. Word that is
Jose, I think what you say thereon that last sentence, you know,
to enrich the world, you know,whether it's through your
photography, or music, orwhatever it may be, you know, or
simply just expressing yourself,I think that is an absolute
important thing to do. So youknow, what you said is just
(34:00):
incredible about conservationsand mental health. It's all the
things that not always beentalked about, but it's so
important to focus on. Now, onething that I want to ask you is
going back to what you say,right? In order, we don't want
(34:25):
to get caught in this numbersgame about Instagram, or Twitter
or whatever it may be rightsales, whatnot. But at the same
time, they are important,especially for artists who are
doing it full time, right,because they are a way for them
to get seen and to share themessage. So one thing that I'm
(34:47):
interested to hear your thoughton is how do you find that
balance? How can you focus onthe numbers so that it can
support you to do more Have whatyou love, instead of crushing
your true purpose, or yourinitial purpose on why you want
(35:08):
to do photography in the firstplace?
Jose Ramos (35:11):
Yeah, that that's very interesting. And I want to
do another important disclaimer,which is my income also comes
from photography. Unfortunately,in Portugal, doctors wages,
they're not good at all. I know,this happens in a lot of
countries. But we get lots ofinvitations to go work to the
(35:34):
north of Europe and othercountries. And there's
absolutely no comparison interms of income. So right now,
I'm kind of splitting my timebetween photography and
psychiatry, I'm doing privatepractice, only to have time for
art. So it's like I care aboutit. I care about how people view
(35:55):
my work, I care about income, Icare about how to transform this
also into business, and this isa business. So reaching that
balance, once again, it's easiersaid than done. Because when you
are really struggling to pay thebills, when you need to put food
on the table, you just need tohave the numbers, you need to
(36:18):
have the exposure, you need tohave the licencing you need to
have the collaborations, and itcan be extremely challenging.
And the problem is that most ofsocial media of the social media
game, it kind of obeys topreconceived aesthetic notion of
what's good, what's of whatresults, there's this great
(36:40):
example of Instagram, Instagramkind of revolutionised, the way
that photos should look. BeforeInstagram, it used to be the
classical old schoolphotography, landscape
photography, with its strongcolours, like I mentioned
before, and then all of asudden, you had a revolution,
strongly attached to travelphotography, and not to
(37:00):
classical landscape photography,even though there's a strong
overlap in this, but people whowant it to survive, most of them
had to adapt. Now the thing is,can you keep being genuine,
while changing part of youroutputs and your colours and
your countries? And the way youedit your images? I think it's
(37:21):
possible. I think there's alwaysa balance, because as long as
you have some further purpose,they're not just making money
for the sake of it. I think itcomes naturally. So the way I
try to handle all of that isexactly by having something that
I need to transmit to otherpeople, and hoping that this
(37:44):
resonates with enough peoplethat will get me the much needed
income, if that didn't happen.And sometimes I wonder what if I
went full time. The main reasonwhy I don't go full time, is
because not only I love doingpsychiatry, I also feel it's
absolutely essential for thearts, just the way I feel that
(38:07):
art is essential for mypsychiatry. But if I went full
time, and all of a sudden, Icould not pay the bills, I would
not have any problem at all tojump into something that would
be a little more profitable,both in the photography field or
in other areas, as long as I addenough time to continue being
genuine, and creating my arts,because once you stop doing it,
(38:31):
then I think it's kind of arune. So it's probably a matter
of balance. And even though I'magainst the game number, I
understand why it happens. Ithink we need to play it just
don't be too caught up in it.Otherwise, if we all of a sudden
start thinking that our value isfully placed in the numbers.
(38:56):
That just means we lost contactwith our insight, but I
obviously like to have comments.I love to have exposure. I like
to have followers, I like to becontacted by brands because it's
kind of an extension that youare doing work that it's being
noticed. But most of all I wantthe main purpose of being not
(39:18):
just to be because peopleresonate with the message and
the rest is kind of a bonus thatspontaneously comes
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (39:28):
that is really really good way of
putting it and I love how yousay, you know, the most
important thing is about peopleresonate with your message and
then everything else if thatfits then it's good. If not,
then it's okay sort of thing youknow, well as you know, it's
different compared to trying toplease every single person out
(39:50):
there. So I think that is areally good thing to to notice
or to recognise when you are aphotographer or anyone no matter
as a matter of fact, right? It'snever good trying to please
everyone. Now, one thing that Iam, I'd love to hear your
(40:11):
thought on, you touch onphotography community back then
how genuine it was right. And intoday's world, I feel like a lot
of that genuinely, sort ofdisappear. It's more about like
you say, you know, a numbersgame, the exposure. More often
(40:33):
than not, we interact with otheraccounts for the algorithm
instead of for the genuineexpression of our feeling
towards the art. So one thingthat I'm interested in is to
hear your thoughts about how thecommunity was before, and how do
(40:54):
you feel the community is today?And what do you think we can do
to make, you know, whatever wehave today, a better place a
better community a betterinteraction with each other.
Jose Ramos (41:11):
Okay, well, thinking about the community before. And
using the example of sites likeDeviantArt, like I mentioned, I
was in another site, which wasphoto seek, which does not even
exist anymore. It had a veryinteresting rating system where
people had to write proper,thorough comments, detailed
(41:33):
comments on each other's imagesthat then would be voted by the
community. And people whoactually went through the effort
to write meaningful critiques,they were benefited with this,
because then they could postother comments, they could post
their own photos. And the systemkind of Fed itself in a very
(41:54):
healthy way. The same happenedwith DeviantArt. Not with this
ingenious system. But there wasa big, big sense of community
there were journaling there,there was journaling, there were
very detailed comments, peopleestablished very meaningful
relationships. There, there wasalready some kind of a draft of
(42:14):
the numbers game, it existed,but it was not as focused as now
because right now, it's kind ofhectic and frantic, fast machine
of media consumption. So whenyou have more time to look at
things, we're not constantlybeing overwhelmed with stimuli.
(42:35):
And social media sites are fullyengineered to get not only your
attention, but just your shortattention, they don't want your
long spent attention workingbecause that means less viewing
less ads, less profit. Soregarding what we could do, I
have a good example right now,which is a very controversial
(42:58):
example. And you know that I'mgoing to bring this up, because
we we kind of met also throughTwitter, which is the NFT space,
which, in the middle of all, itsbig toxicity, it brought
something very interesting,which is once again, the focus
on the message and the focus onthe relationship between
(43:19):
photographers, as a communitythat needs to support itself and
beyond the same boat to havesuccess as a wall as a whole,
and the relationship withcollectors. Because all of a
sudden, I realised that mostlyregarded with landscape
photography. It's not arespected genre of photography.
(43:39):
In the fine art gallery world,obviously, some people make it,
but the big, big bucks, they aremade with other styles of
photography. And many people arerealising through the democratic
zation of the access to the NFTspace, the collectors already
sent traditional collectors,that landscape photography also
(44:00):
has a place in these big galleryworld in this big museum world.
Where probably we can have agood balance between not being
constantly exploited byMicrostock, photography website,
websites not being exploited bybrands who want everything in
exchange of not that much.Possibly, we have a place in
(44:25):
this whole ecosystem of this alleconomic ecosystem where if we
have a message, if we havesomething different, that we
want to show to the world,perhaps we can have a sense of
community, we can have time tointeract with other
photographers, artistscollectors, and that will have
(44:48):
the added bonus the Editessential bonus of getting an
income from this. So I wouldmostly love to see all the
websites shifting from aperspective Have not just
focused on quick profits andquick visualisation, but on
taking the time to be withpeople and to be with art,
(45:09):
obviously, this is wishfulthinking, this is probably not
going to happen. There's way toomuch money in all social media
websites, probably the voice ofthe people can make itself
heard. It's happening with allthe backlash against reels on
Instagram. And I think that's,it's good that it's happening.
But I don't know how strong of avoice we can have to make that
(45:32):
much of a difference. But atleast we need to try. And I
usually never did podcasts, Ijust love being this behind
behind the camera. And I thinkthat we need to start being a
little bit more activists of ourown craft, and of the place we
deserve. In the globallandscape, no pun intended, in
(45:55):
the global landscape of the artworld. To make things better,
and to make interactions muchbetter and out here, most of
all,
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (46:05):
that was a good point, I must say.
Yeah, that's, thanks for sharingyour thoughts on that, it is
quite interesting how to seeyour perspective on this whole,
how everything kind of fit in,you know, with the NFT with the
landscape photography, and withjust other photography in
(46:29):
general, I think that's, that'squite an interesting take that
you have in there. So one thingthat I want to get into is that,
you know, you kind of dophotography, and psychiatry,
being psychiatrists at the sametime. And I love how you say
(46:50):
that, you each each one of themneed each other, and each one of
them support each other. Right.And I think that's, that's
really interesting, because Ican totally resonate with that
right. Now. One thing that I I'msure the audience would like to
hear, right, a lot of them lovephotography, you know, a lot of
(47:11):
photographer love photography,that's why they got into it.
That's why they buy they buy,spend all their money on these
really expensive things. Now. Ifthere is a chance for them to,
you know, earn back and just geta side income or whatnot, to be
able to fund their next travelor to be able to upgrade their
(47:35):
next camera. How based on yourexperience, how would you
advise? How would you recommendthem to look into being able to
find those side incomes?
Jose Ramos (47:50):
Well, first of all, if I focus mostly on nature,
photography, and landscapephotography, looking at the
overall situation of mostphotographers that I know, and I
will say, unfortunately, onceagain, because I would love that
landscape photography would berecognised as a type of art,
(48:13):
which is worth by itself, in artby other kinds of side gigs. But
most of all, as long as you havea good portfolio, as long as you
are inspiring, as long as youknow your way around editing, as
long as you have good qualityimages to show, you have the
(48:34):
classical photo tour route tofollow, which is extremely
profitable when when done,right. And it has a very
interesting purpose speciallyfor the people who live to
teach. It's an absolutelybeautiful way to practice
photography. I'm more of thesolitary kind of person that
likes to have its own space todo his photography. But for
(48:57):
people want to have a sideincome with their images, as
long as they have goodvisibility. And there we go with
the numbers game. If they havegood visibility, if they
establish meaningful contactswith people, they will probably
start being invited to show themto show them those places to
show them how they capture thoseimages. And in a very
(49:18):
spontaneous way, they will beable to get a good income from
that. And even more importantthan that, even more important
than the numbers, the good oldtechnique of taking people to
your website where you can showmuch more about who you are not
be totally dependent on socialmedia but use it as a way to
channel people into your ownplace. The place that you were
(49:40):
you chose the design you chosehow you present yourself and you
are not just someone else in themiddle of 1 million trade
photographers. And when you dothat, you get the chance for
them to subscribe potentially anewsletter and then all of a
sudden we have this privilegeaccess to show to these people.
What you really like to do, whatare your messages, what you can
(50:06):
offer them, and in a veryspontaneous way, as long as you
put your art into everything,and assuming your artwork
inspires other people, I thinksite income will always appear.
The big question is if it'sstable, and if it can become the
main income, but getting sidegigs, as long as you put some
(50:29):
effort into it, I think it's,it's doable.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (50:33):
Fantastic. That is great advice. And I want
to segue to I know that, youknow, you've your photo have
been published in Nationalgeography in, in Spain, right.
And, you know, first of all,congratulations, that That photo
was incredible. Now, I know thatfor many photographers, that has
(50:53):
been, you know, their dreams,including mine. Now, I'd love to
just hear right while I have youhere. What? How did you What are
your journey to get your photopublished with magazine like,
NatGeo? And how, what advicewould you give for someone who
want to have their photopublished with Nigeria?
Jose Ramos (51:15):
Okay? Before and i Unfortunately, once again, I'm
always regretting things, it'skind of like a pattern, I need
to analyse this as apsychiatrist. But I was going to
say that unfortunately, I lost ahuge opportunity to be noticed
by NatGeo, which was theirwebsite, the your shot
(51:36):
photographer, from NatGeo. And Ididn't used to pay attention at
all to it. And I know plenty ofphotographers that's kind of
noticed by them, and add somesort of special place to not
only publish in magazinesworldwide, but also to be
featured on their huge Instagrampages. So I missed that
(51:59):
opportunity. And the way I gotinto NatGeo, was mostly, it was
locally related. So there werethese big groups. In both
Portugal and Spain where peopleused to share their images,
these groups were kind ofscouted by the editorial team of
Nachteile. And going towards theguidelines of Nachteile. I think
(52:26):
they identified with some of myworks, because NatGeo is still
one of the few who once again, Iknow I'm constantly repeating
myself, but they put lots offocus on the message. It's not
just about 3d images, I wouldactually go as far as saying
that most of my images, they arenot natural or material, because
(52:47):
they are usually I would sayless edited less impactful. They
want to be a little bit moreimmediately related with the
perceived reality. And I usuallylike to give some artistic
expression on my images. Butsome of them they possibly could
(53:12):
potentially fit the magazine.And I think that it was along
with the story along with thefact that I always put great
effort into describing why thatimage was different white at
some meaning, why I captured it,why the viewers can relate with
it, that I got the first contextto publish with them. And as
(53:32):
soon as you get the firstpublication, then it becomes
easier, you have just opened acommunication channel. And right
now I have the privilege that Ican reach out to them when I
think I have something differentand relevant to show them like a
photo of the volcano that I did,like the Milky Way over an
Ancient Bridge in the south ofPortugal, which has never been
(53:54):
photographed before. When I havesomething that I think that
brings value to readers, Icontact them and ask them if
they're interested in publishingit. If I started bombarding them
with every image that I had,probably they would just block
me and shut down our emailcontact. So it's I think it's
mostly related with traffickingand adapting the message to the
(54:18):
medium where we want to bepublished. And I also need to do
another disclaimer, I've beenfeatured on their visions of the
earth section, which is just onesingle image with a small
description. But I've never doneeditorial work for them because
the work with lots of extremelytalented photographers with a
(54:39):
specific photo photographicpurpose to show something and I
didn't follow that path. Butit's also another very valid
pass to be able to be publishedthere. So adapt what you're
doing as long as it's genuine.Anyone identify with it to the
place where you want to getpublished.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (55:01):
fantastic advice, that is really good way
to put you know how people canpursue that path. So thanks a
lot for sharing that andcongratulation to you. Now we
are kind of coming into the lasthour, you know, the one hour
mark. And one thing that Ialways ask my guests in this
(55:22):
podcast is that if there was oneadvice, whether it's photography
or life advice that you wouldgive to your younger self or to
other people in general, whatwould that be?
Jose Ramos (55:36):
Okay, you save the toughest question for for for
the end of the podcast. So letme just put my neuron my brain
neurons firing and thinkingabout what could be potentially
inspirational. But, well, takingfrom some of the things I've
said during this podcast, Iwould tell and recommend people
(55:59):
to first of all, look aftertheir mental health. And I'm not
saying this in that classicalpaternalistic style, of like,
some cliche phrase, but most ofall, feel comfortable when you
are doing art, feel that there'ssomething you are showing of
(56:21):
yourself, which is genuine, andwhich is good towards others
when you are trading your heart,your art, and most of all, don't
get lost in the number game andvalue meaningful connections
with people that will bring youway more satisfaction, if I
could. And I've said before,during the podcast, that it's
(56:44):
easier said than done. And Ifind myself also caught up in
the game of numbers every nowand then the main message, I
would stream to myself and tellmyself to stop looking at the
numbers and establish meaningfulartwork and meaningful
connections. That's the mostimportant and I think that will
always bring something good, beit money being well being. I
(57:07):
think it's the path to go tochoose.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (57:11):
That is a fantastic advice. Jose,
thank you very much for sharingthat. All right. Well, you know,
it's been great talking to you.I love you know, just chatting
with you. And I hope we get tomeet in real life one day,
Jose Ramos (57:27):
that will happen we need to make sure that will
happen.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (57:30):
Yeah, let's go. So for people who want
to learn more about you yourstory, your mission as well as
your beautiful photography, whatis the best way to connect with
you?
Jose Ramos (57:44):
Okay, I think the easier way and just like I said
before, it's kind of the, thethe ideal starting point is to
go to my website, which is wwwdot Josie Josie rammos.com I'm
gonna say it in English and notin Portuguese. Or you can go to
my Instagram page, which is JoJo's there Ramos photography or
(58:08):
to Twitter, which is Josieunderscore, Ramos. Okay, so
these are the best places tofind out about my work. And feel
free to reach out if you searchby Tracy, psychiatrist
photographer from Portugal,you'll probably also find me on
Google. So feel free to find mein any way you prefer.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (58:32):
Fantastic. Thanks a lot for sharing that
and don't worry listeners, youwill get the link on the
description. So if you arelistening to this and you're not
sure if it's Jose or Josie, youknow, just go on the link you'll
get you know exactly the exactlink so that you know how to
find him. Well, thank you verymuch for being here. Jose,
(58:54):
that's how you say inPortuguese, isn't it?
Jose Ramos (58:57):
Actually not. It's juicy? Juicy. Okay. It's not
easy to pronounce. So I wastelling you I prefer to give the
the English Americanized versionor people would not probably
translate it properly to theright characters. So it's using
in Portuguese juicy. Is that Isthat right? Yeah, that that's
(59:20):
pretty pretty close. Oh, wow.Yeah.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (59:24):
I used to live in LA right. And
all I have a lot of friends fromMexico and basically Latin
America, but they think there'spronounced Jose. So it's
different between Hispanic andPortuguese. Okay, well, that's
good to know. But yeah, thanks alot for being here. Thanks for
(59:44):
sharing all of your wisdom aswell as your story. And
hopefully, listeners you canfind a lot of wisdom, a lot of
inspiration from not only thejourney but the advice that
juicy Is that?
Jose Ramos (01:00:01):
How almost I can say it's perfect?
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:00:05):
Yeah. All right, well, um, listeners,
if you haven't subscribed yet,subscribe yet, make sure you hit
the subscribe button. We'd loveto hear your feedback. If you do
enjoy this podcast and if youknow other photographer who
you'd love to have in thispodcast, please reach out to me
on my instagram or facebook,which is or Twitter, which is
(01:00:28):
just at the weekend, and let meknow who I should bring to to
the podcast. But thank you verymuch for being here. I know,
your time is important. And youhave shared that time with me
and I very much appreciate that.
Jose Ramos (01:00:44):
Thank you for my absolute pleasure. And thank you
for the opportunity.
Stanley Aryanto - The Wicked Hunt (01:00:49):
All right, well, weekend, as always,
I'll see you again next week.But for now, make sure that you
keep shooting keep creating anddon't forget to stay smiling.
Until next time
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