Darkrooms Uncovered - Mike Voss

A peek into a photographer's mental creative darkroom

What does your creative ritual look like? Do you have specific habits or conditions that spark your creativity?

I’m not aware of a ritual. I’m a throw it at the wall and see if it sticks kind of guy. Then I read Rick Rubin’s book, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, and it made sense to me. I have no idea why I was standing in the right place at the right time, with the correct lens when the light changed for the better, but there I was. I believe creativity comes from somewhere and we need to be open to it because it can slip out the back door and be gone. So, I carry a camera all the time which becomes a habit. I think I see the world differently when I have a camera with me. I seldom shoot with my phone.

When you're feeling creatively blocked, what's your go-to method for breaking through?

After forty-eight years in the newspaper business where the motto was, GET THE PHOTO STUPID, I tend to simply soldier on. Most of my images are found images so I just keep looking for photos. The best…