A Refreshingly Honest Travel Photography Vlog

Like the most popular Instagram profiles, a lot of Youtube photography vlogs have become incredibly formulaic. This video, by wedding and travel photographer Taylor Jackson, deliberately breaks from the successful formula to give the viewer some much needed honesty.

Many aspiring creatives look up to one or a few of the plethora of YouTube photographers and videographers, and it's easy to see why. From the outside, it looks like a fun lifestyle, especially for a young person, and the idea of being your own boss with the ability to make money while traveling is quite enticing for a lot of people. Now, with the proliferation and the advancement of the digital medium, the playing field has leveled, and anyone with a few hundred bucks and access to the Internet can teach themselves into a profession which was traditionally reserved for the debtladen former art or film student. It's astonishing how far the medium has come in the last 10 years. But, for all the enjoyment that these possibly non-debt-laden YouTube creators seem get from their job, the vlogging lifestyle might not be for everyone. But maybe there's a different way.

After Jackson gives the usual exposition for the start of a vlog, the transition to the trendy intro music and 60 fps slow motion b-roll is jarringly nonexistent. Instead, he follows with an unedited series of clips while opening up about his insecurities as a photographer and video-maker. His honesty is refreshing, and as the video goes on, he lets his dry sense of humor come to the fore, giving his work what so many other vlogs lack: personality. Finally, as he closes out the video, he has some great advice for any aspiring creatives out there.

His words are certainly food for thought, and while I'm thinking about them, I should probably make some cheesy pasta. 

Mike O'Leary's picture

Mike is a landscape and commercial photographer from, Co. Kerry, Ireland. In his photographic work, Mike tries to avoid conveying his sense of existential dread, while at the same time writing about his sense of existential dread. The last time he was in New York he was mugged, and he insists on telling that to every person he meets.

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8 Comments

Pretty awesome video.
Some of us, specially new photgraphers like myself are constantly comparing ourselves with what we see online, Instead of just getting insipiration and moving forward to do our own stuff we get stuck in this ''instagram'' ''youtube'' perfect photography lifestyle. Once you get over it and dig a bit deeper you can actually find awesome professionals that will show that its a job with ups and downs like any other.

Great vlog Taylor! Thank you for sharing, Fstoppers...😎🤙🏼

This is white privilege at its worst. Instead of brooding about being an internet star, why not think about things that matter like voting.

Thank you! I really liked how you characterized the video as, "... white privilege at its worst." Made even better by supplanting another's value metric with your own! I give your post the WRTPA rating; Would Read Troll Post Again.

Evidently your life goal - injecting race into ** everything **. You must be a miserable person.

Whao! Whoa! Slow your roll there my sweet and sensitive, snowflakes. I'm just saying that some people have real problems. I like this guys video but keep it in the context of the world that we live in.

That goes without saying so, no need to say it. ;-)

It's not Venice but Cinque Terra (at least at the beginning). And since the BTS videos of PTW 3 everybody seems to go there....Venice is really overcrowded for years and the residents hate it as more and more people are coming (even cruizing into the city). In the meanwhile Chinese have bought most of the old buildings to build hotels to get even more people there! And most of the shops are cheap chinese souvenir shops. Residents will strike back!