Hello photographer friends!
Free books, photo critiques, and personal growth!
But first, let me introduce myself.
I live on the set of a sitcom with my real-life wife and four kids. Okay, it’s not really a sitcom set, but it’s easier to appreciate my life when I frame it that way.
For example, midway through typing the first sentence my oldest daughter turned her back from cooking breakfast and my 2-year-old girl snuck in to grab an egg. Then she dropped it on the floor.
We live out those sitcom moments in a little writer’s cottage outside town while spending our days learning and being creative together.
I guess that’s another reframe.
Without any spin, we rent a small two-bedroom house. The six of us. Two rooms. And I homeschool our kids.
We were scrimping and saving to buy a home of our own when the real estate market blew up. Now, houses that were already out of reach are selling for half a million dollars.
So we continue to raise four kids in our tiny house. Speaking of small houses, have you seen the tiny living movement? Compared to the tiny living concept our house is a mansion!
It’s all in how you frame it.
I chose to homeschool our kids because I spent 13 years of long boring days in our school system and not one teacher pointed out my potential or gave me encouragement to pursue what I was good at. I won’t let that happen to my kids.
But daydreaming about a carefree homeschool life turned into a living nightmare.
Our house got smaller with each new baby we had. Every time we got ahead with our business the real estate market soared further out of reach.
I began homeschooling our kids in between shooting sessions and editing photos (working alternatively from the bedroom, the couch, the kitchen counter, the top of the washing machine).
Living, working and homeschooling in such close quarters brought out terrible volatility in me.
I guess it was always there, the pressure just brought it to the surface.
But the constraint of a tiny house with no hope of moving up allowed me the option of finding contentment and creativity while dealing with my impatience and emotional volatility.
I was given the choice to grow or die.
So we psychologically transformed our tomb of a home into a sitcom set about a family of six who lives in a two-bedroom writer’s cottage (a writer’s cottage is more mystical than a regular cottage). Every time they start to get ahead the real estate market skyrockets. Whenever Dad digs into a new creative project the toddler drops a carton of eggs - or worse.
When life gives you a lemon, you make lemonade.
When the lemon goes rotten, you plant the seeds and grow an orchard.
This is one of our real-life scripts.
Here is your August photo critique video :)
These are constructive critiques designed to help you appreciate your creativity and help you grow.
Please send me 2-3 of your photos for the September photo critique. I’ll let you know what I love about your photo and some tips to make your photos even better!
Use this link
Enter this email: mat.coker.photographer@gmail.com
Personal Growth
Philosophy
Thanks for interacting with these posts and my videos on YouTube.
I love hearing from you,
Mat
Keep in touch on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube
PS - Free Stuff
Don’t forget to download one of the free ebooks I wrote (more on the way).
Ingredients and Recipes to Make Dramatic Photos
How to Take a Better Picture than Me!
My philosophy is to give away everything I’ve learned for free.
If you’d like to support me financially along the way you can do that by upgrading to a paid subscription (every penny will go to my kids’ braces fund).
But most important, let’s keep growing creatively.
Mat