We recently connected with Frank Iannotti and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Frank, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
THE BOLD JOURNEY My fifty-year professional career in photography has been a continuum of change, a journey with many detours and derailments, a belief in a predetermined DESTINY, maybe better described a PURPOSE gave me the resilience and persistence to adapt to life’s challenges and an a profession known for constant change. Looking back on a lifetime of creative endeavors, the studio moves, geographic relocations, relationship changes and losses, I am grateful for possessing the optimism to keep moving towards the next ever-changing and sometimes elusive goal. Goals are incremental achievements along the way that eventually summarized the journey to a lifetime accomplishment. For me the little goals were; a magazine cover, landing an account, a particular assignment, a day rate goal …. looking back I now realize every little goal was just the needed confidence needed to the next goal …. always evolving in to more, more…
The restlessness of never feeling successful or satisfied that “I made it” would drive my commitment to work harder, which on multiple occasions had caused an state of emotional retreat, burnout and eventually renaissance. From “Persistence & Resilience” and smaller accomplishments comes self-confidence, a much needed asset when choosing a lifestyle known for its highs and lows. My journey continues to challenge me in a good way, that provides new challenges and new opportunities to test my resilience, it feels comforting to navigate the challenges with greater confidence… or has it just been luck?
NAVIGATING THE ROAD AHEAD
The overwhelming takeaway message to the next generation of young creatives is to find your purpose and believe in it as your destiny, accept the detours and derailments as learning opportunities to grow and adapt in a culture that embraces change as the tenant of creativity. Maintain discipline and structure even in chaos to stay focused on your work – not the money or ego. My goal is to give back, share my hard learned lessons and collaborate with the next gen of content creators in the media industry. My most recent timeline of past twenty-five years has included both film and digital capture and a reluctance to fully abandon the older slower more deliberate process of shooting film because it keeps my vision honest and true to reality. In the spirit of change, I have transitioned my core service line away from shooting to layout or assignment based services to “Fine Art Print Sales”, I have actually returned to the beginning, where it all started, creating images motivated only by what moves me emotionally. Combining new technologies and traditional analogue photography has expanded my ability to communicate what I feel, in an expanded visual vocabulary.
PERSPECTIVE- A LOOK BACK IN TIME
What does fifty years of change look like? Most of the fashion photography of the early 70’s when I graduated college as a photo major was shot on sheet film, large cameras on rolling stands and hot lights in very large studios. The lights transitioned to electronic flash that gave photographers the ability to animate their models, and improvements in medium format cameras and roll film became the tool of choice, eventually transitioning to small camera “35mm” as a respectable professional tool. I was introduced to Adobe Photoshop 1993, approx 35 years of technological evolution that has transformed the industry and changed the culture of the industry.
To fully appreciate what 50 years of change looks like, consider this….My first job working for a film editor in a Manhattan loft, when I was at the High School of Art & Design in NYC. I worked for Toni Stone later known as “Stone Cutters” then “Stonecutter group” most of my time was spent locating lengths of movie film hanging from strings stretched across the studio. Toni edited these lengths of film and glued them together for a rough cut for the director to critique, today we edit in Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid, Final Cut Pro… on a computer … never handling actual film or using little paper notes taped to lengths of movie film.
After Graduation from State University of NY in 1976 through 1982 I worked for NYC’s most famous photographers and filmmakers. At one point the pay was so low I could not afford rent, I was living out of my car, a rented room, sleeping in the studio on the sly, my destiny was not negotiable. The son of a doctor I could live comfortably if I moved home in exchange for choosing a different career… in medicine, anything but a career in the arts.
Sorry, Not sorry world… you do you and I will do me, and the world will adapt! …. My advice to the next gen of creative content creators… if you don’t quit pursuing your destiny, you will see what happens when an unstoppable force meets a seemingly immovable object. RESILIENCE wins.
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
I am alway looking for the next great collaboration with creatives who work in front or behind the lens, models actors and other creatives are my people and inspiration.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
resilience, courage, … THE WILLINGNESS TO ADAPT
Alright, so before we go we want to ask you to take a moment to reflect and share what you think you would do if you somehow knew you only had a decade of life left?
doing what I am Doing
Contact Info:
- Website: iLsg.com
- Instagram: iLsgcom
Image Credits
Frank Iannotti
