On Episode 79 of The Edge of Innovation, we’re talking with business owner Dan Frasier, about entrepreneurship & how his company, Cornerstone Commissioning Inc., is more than just a business!
Category: The Edge of Innovation
Building Control Systems: Continuous Commissioning
On Episode 78 of The Edge of Innovation, we’re talking with Dan Frasier, co-founder of Cornerstone Commissioning Inc., about building control systems and continuous commissioning.
What is Construction Commissioning? With Dan Frasier
On Episode 77 of The Edge of Innovation, we’re talking with Dan Frasier, co-founder of Cornerstone Commissioning Inc., about construction commissioning.
Show Notes
The Cornerstone Commissioning Inc. Website
About Dan Frasier
About Cornerstone Commissioning
Find Cornerstone Commissioning on Twitter
Find Cornerstone Commissioning on LinkedIn
Find Dan Frasier on LinkedIn
Cornerstone Commissioning’s Blog
“The Importance of Communication During the Commissioning Process”
“Why The Construction Industry Needs Commissioning?” by Dan Frasier
Link to SaviorLabs Assessment
Sections
Introduction
What is Commissioning in the Construction Industry?
Verifying the Performance of a Building: What A Commissioner Does
Specializing in Biomedical Research and Infectious Disease Research Facilities
Making Sure Systems are Functioning: APV — Annual Performance Verification
Who Needs a Commissioning Service?
Testing and Fixing Commissioning Issues
More Episodes
What is Construction Commissioning? With Dan Frasier
Introduction
Paul: Hello, and welcome to the Edge of Innovation. Today we’re talking with Dan Frasier from Cornerstone Commissioning Services. Right? Is it Cornerstone Commissioning?
Dan: Cornerstone Commissioning, Incorporated.
Paul: Okay. Cornerstone Commissioning, Incorporated.
What is Commissioning in the Construction Industry?
Paul: So, I’ve known you a while, and I have to honest. I don’t know what Cornerstone Commissioning means. What does commissioning mean?
Dan: So commissioning is a process that’s used in the construction industry to verify the performance of buildings. So it’s — mostly for us anyway — it’s mostly related to mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems but also life safety. And we have a special focus on building control systems.
Paul: Okay. So let me think. So most ordinary people have maybe built a house, at the extreme. Do we do commissioning in a house?
Dan: We actually have done a few houses, but that would be a very high-end home.
Paul: So give me an example. You know, no names, nothing. Just what does it actually mean? So, they’re building a new school. Is somebody actually going to be doing the commissioning part of the new school?
Dan: Most schools today, if it’s a significant project, are going to have commissioning related to it. And there will be two primary types of suppliers of commissioning services. We are involved in the MEP, the mechanical, electrical, plumbing, life safety, building control side of things. The other version would be the building envelop, so the building enclosure. There are people that focus on the enclosure of the buildings for energy, for air tightness. And we have subs who do that work on some of our projects. That would be higher-end projects where it’s a net-zero building where it’s a highly energy-efficient building that actually may have some other kind of power generation with it so it never takes anything off the grid.
Paul: Interesting. We’ll get into that.
Dan: But you need a really good envelope to do that.
Paul: So, let’s step back. You’re really close to this. We’re talking to relatively ordinary people, and the local town is going to be building a new high school. And you’re saying there’s aspects to commissioning with that. The envelope, the outside walls and the roof.
Dan: Yes.
Paul: And even the floors?
Dan: Yes.
Paul: Okay. And then there’s also like the plumbing, electrical, mechanicals. The heat pumps and the heaters and furnaces and air conditioning systems. Am I accurate in that?
Dan: Yes, that’s accurate.
Verifying the Performance of a Building: What A Commissioner Does
Paul: Okay. So what do you do? I mean, does the architect sort of say, “We’re going to put all this stuff in”? And then you guys come back and make sure it works? Or do you make sure they put in the right stuff? What happens?
Dan: So, because we’re verifying the performance of a building and we want to make sure that that is verified relative to what the owner of the building really needs, the right way to integrate us into a project is during the design phase. And so the way that happens is typically — I would say over 90% of the time — a building owner is going to hire us directly. They’re going to hire the architects and engineers directly, and they’ll hire the contractors to actually build it. The reason we like to be hired during the design phase is because we get to know buildings so intimately — how well they perform — that during the design phase is the best time to start thinking about how well the building is going to operate to meet the owner’s needs. And so during the design phase, we’ll be reviewing the designs by the architects and engineers. And then some of the more complicated projects, we’re going to be hired to do a program evaluation as well. So we specialize in some pretty unique buildings. And so we’re going to ask questions that perhaps nobody thought to ask because we know how difficult it is to get this buildings to work right if they have mission-critical requirements.
Paul: Okay. So let me rehash that a little bit. So let’s say I’m the owner. Okay? And I say, “Gee, I want to build this private high school.” Or even I’m just going to build a high school. I have to hire an architect, a builder, and I imagine not engineers. The architect would hire the engineers?
Dan: Typically. Yeah, the design engineers work as a sub consultant to architects.
Paul: So I hire a builder; I hire an architect; and I hire a commissioning company like you guys.
Dan: Yes.
Paul: Who else do I have to have at that table? There’s four of us now. Me and those three guys.
Dan: That generally covers everything that you’re going to need. There may be some other unique things that would be permitting people or code-related people. And that usually falls under the architects and engineers.
Paul: Right. That’s what we’ve had an architect on the show before, and he sort of said that we help with that. We can help with that. So I’m trying to think. So I’ve got the architect. I turn to them and I say, “I really want it to look like this kind of building.” And I show them a picture of a building. And they say, “Great.”
And the builder is sitting there thinking about “Can I make that?” And “Can I make it at a reasonable price?”
And I say, “Gee, I want to do these kind of things in the building” to tell the architect. You know, I need a gymnasium. I need a lunchroom. I need science labs. And then you’re sitting there and hearing all of this, and you’re collecting all this list and saying, okay, science labs, heating, cooling, etc. And do you then say, “Well, what else are you going to do in it?” Do you actually get down to the functional use of it?
Dan: Yeah, very much so.
Paul: And say, “Uh, gee, do you want locker rooms?” Do you say, “Gee, do you want a wood shop or a cooking center?”
Dan: Mm-hmm.
Paul: And then, oh, well if you’re going to have a cooking center, you’ve got to have ventilation. So is that sort of your role in conjunction with the architect? Because the architect, I would imagine, if they said, “Oh, here’s the cooking center. Well, we’re going to put an island in. We’re going to put a vent in and all this.” How does that interaction occur?
Specializing in Biomedical Research and Infectious Disease Research Facilities
Dan: Well, the kind of buildings that we’re involved in are…The questions that we ask during the design phase usually elevates the level of attention to some of those things you’re talking about because we specialize in biomedical research facilities and especially in infectious disease research facilities.
Paul: Yeah. We don’t want to have a failure in that.
Dan: No. And so there are a lot of things that we’re going to ask about, systems that are going to support some of the unique requirements, like if they’re going to house animals or they’re going to do research with infectious diseases. And the air flow directions are important. And so there are a lot of things that people just don’t think about that we’re going to ask the lab directors and the environmental health and safety people about some of their testing requirements or performance requirements related to biocontainment, for example.
Paul: So I think your comment of saying there’s just a lot of things that people don’t think about is extremely at the crux of this. It’s very much the focus of… You know, when we’re ordinary people on the street thinking about oh, we’re going to do this, there’s a lot of things. When we talked to our architect friend, Benjamin Nutter in Topsfield, he sort of unmasked a lot of the things that you didn’t think of. And now you’re saying for a commercial building or for something that’s going to have all of these functions, there’s a whole set of layers that we might not understand. It sounds like not only do you call those into, to view, but then you actually validate them once they’re put in. If you were to value the sort of importance of what you do, which one is the most important? They’re both equally important, but, me saying, “Hey, you need good ventilation in here” is one thing. Or a scientist saying, “We need good ventilation,” they’re not going to know the specs. Do you guys know the specs and say, “Oh, we need this kind of ventilator”? And then what happens with that?
Dan: Yeah. So during the design phase, the people who we do repeat business for, they’ve relied on us to ask questions about the type of systems that are going in, some of the components related to it. A lot of it comes back to the performance verification criteria. So we actually have a document that’s call the PVC, the Performance Verification Criteria, and it’s essentially the pass-fail criteria that’s going to be used to measure whether or not a building meets the owners requirements.
So an example of that would be… It’s an infectious disease lab, and they want to know that they don’t have dirty air going out into the public areas.
Paul: Okay. Seems good. A good thing.
Dan: Seems like a really good idea. So, the actual delivery of that means that there are certain redundancies that have to be in place for your ventilation systems, for your power supply to the building. There usually would be an emergency generator. There will be uninterruptible power supplies that help certain things ride through that loss of normal power. And so there are components that we know have to be included in a building that may not even appear during the design phase. And we need to make sure those are there to make a unique requirement like that be met.
Paul: Right.
Making Sure Systems are Functioning: APV — Annual Performance Verification
Paul: So we’re sitting here just a few days after Hawaii announced that there was an incoming missile headed toward their island. And everybody is criticizing that to say how could that mistake could happen so easily. So it sounds like a lot of the things you’re doing — not necessarily in missile avoidance, or missile announcement — is to make sure that the systems that are put in place are actually going to function when they need to function.
Do you test them after they’ve been deployed? I mean, you hand over the keys to the building, are you guys done? Or do you have to retest them?
Dan: Some buildings we’re required to retest. Or I’ll just put it this way. Some buildings are required to be tested by the owners every year. Some owners will hire us to come back on an annual basis to do performance verifications. We call them APV — Annual Performance Verification, especially if it’s related to biocontainment laboratories.
Paul: What are the ones that don’t have you come back and do it? Do they do it themselves or…?
Dan: Some will do it themselves, but some of them just aren’t real critical. I’ve just talked to you quite a bit about biomedical research within infectious disease. That happens to be one of our primary areas of focus. But we do a lot of other kinds of buildings. Some of them are kind of fun buildings. We’ve done a done a passive house where it doesn’t have any power to it.
Paul: Really?
Dan: Because it’s a high performing house in New Hampshire. And we were doing a museum for a car dealer who’s getting all these exotic cars. And so that’s the kind of a thing that’s probably not going to be verified on an annual basis. Museums, a lot of museums as well.
Who Needs a Commissioning Service?
Paul: Are there needs? So we just talked about disease, and we’ve talked about a museum and a house. So there’s three radically different buildings there. I mean, who’s requiring doing this? Is it the owner saying, “I asked for it. I’m paying for it. I want to make sure it works”? Or is it the that the government is saying, “You need to make sure this stuff works”?
Dan: Well in the case of infectious disease research facilities, it’s Center for Disease Control.
Paul: Okay. So do you work with them?
Dan: We don’t work with them, but we work with the owners of these facilities who are going to be inspected by CDC.
Paul: I see. So that’s what’s going to happen. The CDC is going to come in and look at it, and they’re going to probably say, “Show us that this has passed.”
Dan: Yes.
Paul: And then they hand them your documentation.
Dan: Yeah.
Paul: Okay. Cool. Do you ever get involved in talking with them about that? You know, are there questions or is it just more of a paperwork issue?
Dan: It’s more of a paperwork issue. I mean, we’re recognized in the industry. And we’re speaking at the CDC Symposium in a couple of weeks. They have an international symposium on biocontainment, and we’re at that meeting every two years that they have it. So we’re recognized. We’re on the standards committees relative to defining what performance is required out of systems, especially ventilation systems.
Paul: They’d look at the documentation. Oh, Cornerstone did this. They’d be a relative comfort with that as opposed to Joe’s Commissioning. They’d say, “Who’s this? I don’t know Joe.” “What is this?” And they might dig deeper, but you’ve got a good reputation out there.
Dan: Yeah. And they’ll just look to make sure that our documentation shows that we tested the things that are required to a level of scrutiny that it ought to be taken to. Some of it’s prescriptive; some of it’s not. And so they rely on us to ask the right questions and test appropriately.
Testing and Fixing Commissioning Issues
Paul: And now, when you go and test, if you have a thousand tests that you have to perform, I can’t imagine they would all pass. There must be a lot of, “Oh, we’ve got to fix this. We’ve got to fix this. We’ve got to fix this.” I mean, just having had work done around my house, it’s like, “Oh, that’s not right.” Does that happen? Is there some churn in the work?
Dan: Yeah. So I’ll just say you, you’ve talked about three different kinds of buildings from a house to a museum to these high-end biocontainment facilities. I don’t care which one of those you pick, none of them are going to be done on time. I mean, that’s just the nature of construction projects because construction is complicated. But if, as you increase the sophistication and user requirements for a building, it elevates the challenge to get something finished on time.
Finishing it on time is one thing. You know, as a contractor will say, “I just packed up my tools. They’re in my truck. I’m leaving. I’m done.” Okay, that’s not usually defining when an owner of a building says, “Okay, it’s done.” That doesn’t usually coincide with the contractor leaving. There are usually things that still have to be done.
And when it comes to commissioning, making sure that a building actually works right, we find a lot of issues. We call them commissioning issues. And one of the most important aspects of working on the project — and this is a company philosophy that we have to work very closely with the owners, architects, engineers during the design phase. And then during the construction phase, we work with those same people but more even with the contractors.
And because it’s so hard to get some of this buildings to work right, we really have to engage people in a way that’s winsome and not irritate them. We don’t want people looking at us and saying, “Oh no. Here comes Cornerstone. Here comes the commissioning agent. All they want to do is document the living daylights out of any possible thing they find wrong, and then they’re going to get paid for finding all this stuff and making us look like we can’t get this building working.”
No. What we want to do, we go, “We are going to find issues. To the extent that we can resolve issues when we find them, that is part of our focus.” And so our interaction with these contractors is to build relationships, to work on this stuff together so when we find something, we brainstorm it, we document it, we hope to not have to have it addressed again on a repeated basis. But it really it’s a quality control process to get the building to do what the owner really needs it to do. And so when it’s done, we can all feel good that we’ve worked together to deliver an owner a building that really does what it needs to do with great proficiency.
Paul: Well, we’ve been talking with Dan Frasier of Cornerstone Commissioning. And we’re really delighted that you took the time to come in today and look forward to talking to you in the future.
Dan: Thank you, Paul. This has been a pleasure.
More Episodes:
This is Part 1 of our interview with Dan Frasier. Be sure to listen to Part 2 here! We’ll be talking about building control systems and continuous commissioning!
Also published on Medium.
The Business of Birding: How to Make Money as a Bird Photographer
On Episode 76 of The Edge of Innovation, we’re talking with world-renowned nature photographer Arthur Morris, about the business side of photography and how to make money as a bird photographer!
Show Notes
Arthur Morris’ Website: Birds As Art
Arthur Morris’ Blog
Find Arthur Morris on Facebook
Find Arthur Morris on Twitter
Information for the Birds As Art Instructional Photo Tours
About Arthur Morris & Birds As Art
The Birds As Art Online Photography Store
Buy Arthur Morris’ book, The Art of Bird Photography, online here:
Arthur Morris’ Book, Shorebirds: Beautiful Beachcombers
Cannon 1D – The first professional digital camera body
How to Read and Use Histograms
Digital Basics from Arthur Morris
Available to Buy: Books, Videos and Training Instruction by Arthur Morris, as well as books by his friends and colleagues
Fort Desoto Site Guide
Birds: Hudsonian Godwit
Heckscher State Park
The Work of Byron Katie
100-400mm Camera Lens
Link to SaviorLabs Assessment
Sections
Photography’s Decline as a Lucrative Business
Switching From Film To Digital
Selling Photography Guides: Digital Basics
Birds as Art: E-Guides
Birding Guides For Specific Areas
Are you Having Fun?
Advice From Arthur Morris For Young Photographers
Do What You Love
Don’t Just Take Pictures, Write Too!
Blogs Generate Income
Conclusion
More Episodes
The Business of Birding: How to Make Money as a Bird Photographer
Photography’s Decline as a Lucrative Business
Paul: Now let’s move a little bit more towards photography. So, you’ve sort of outlined at a high level, that it’s really a huge decline from it being a lucrative business in 2001, very lucrative, to almost non-existent in 2016. I don’t think there’s anybody out there that could live on $2000 a year, and they’re not going to be all as good a photographer as you. So, what’s your prognosis for the world of photography?
Arthur: Like I say, there are folks making a living. Here’s a good example for nature. My friend Darrell Gulin, who is nowhere near as famous as me, he’s a great photographer. And he has concentrated on stock photography. And he was the one who taught me, hey stock photography is not about how many good pictures you have, it’s learning to photograph to a concept. So, you might photograph a mother and baby bird together. And there is this tenderness concept and caring and caregiving. And photographing to different concepts like power and strength and creativity. And he was great at doing that. And boy, if you go back to 2001 when he was making six, seven figures from a bunch of stock agencies… And the last time I talked to him, he was down about 60% to 70%, and he’s on my list of people to call when I had this latest revelation of down 99% for us. You know, I’m sure he’s still making money, but the trick for me was to realize that if I didn’t come up with some new ideas, I was going to be working in Walmart or working in Burger King.
So, one of the breakthrough things, you mentioned the original, The Art of Bird Photography, that sold 15,000 copies in hardcover and then another 30,000 copies, I believe, in softcover. And one year, when I called Amphoto, and I said I want to order another 20 cases, they said, “We’re sorry. We’re letting that book go out of print.”
Paul: Wow.
Arthur: I said, “You said what?”
They said, “Yeah.”
So, then I came up with this idea of self-publishing the book. To do that, amazingly, I needed to buy the rights to my own book. That cost me a little under $2,000. And I wound up going back to the original printer in Hong Kong, and I remastered the cover and changed one or two pages to update them a bit. And we republished the book, and I printed 10,000 books. And 10,000 books may not seem like a lot of books until a yellow freight truck backs just your driveway and unloads four pallets of books, each one bigger than a Volkswagen. And you have to figure out what to do with them. And now it’s six, seven, eight years later, and we’ve sold about seven of the 10,000. So, who knows? If I live long enough, maybe we’ll have to reprint the reprint.
Paul: Wow. I just, anybody listening, it is one of the best books. Again, I’ve said that. I don’t think I could overstate it. It is a phenomenal book.
Arthur: Well, we’re pretty much the only ones who sell them through the website and the blog.
Switching From Film To Digital
Arthur: But on to more important things… 2002′ or ’04, I come up. I’ve now switched from film to digital, and I love digital so much that I wish I had never heard the word “film.”
Paul: Really? Okay. So, when did you first? You said you first switched to digital when?
Arthur: 2001.
Paul: 2001. So, what was that first camera?
Arthur: Well I was not going to switch to digital. I was going to be shooting film in 2020. Funny, Darrell Gulin said the same thing.
Paul: A lot of people have said that.
Paul: And so in 2001, I bought a Cannon 1D, the first professional digital camera body — I don’t know — something like three or four megapixels. I wasn’t going to switch to digital. I was just going to learn to teach people about histograms. That’s the only reason I got it. I don’t know, but I think it was 2001 or 2002. I went to New Mexico for my usual three or four weeks, and I had seven film camera bodies with me and my one digital body. And I was trying digital just a little bit. And then as fate would have it, near the end of the trip, we had a spectacular morning. The light in the predawn was amazing. And the birds were blasting off, and the colors were purple and red. And then it got to be more red and orange, as it got closer to sunrise. And then, the light changed every 10 minutes for an hour. Spectacular opportunities. And I had decided that morning I was going to do all digital. And when I got the pictures, number one, I didn’t have to wait a month to get them back from the lab. The pictures were right there. Every picture had the shutter speed and the aperture and the ISO. And I remember looking that morning at the pictures and saying, “I never learned so much in such a short time.” And I’d be glad to sell you one of those seven film camera bodies. They each have a partially exposed roll of film in them, and they’ve been sitting on the shelf since that morning. I never took another frame of film.
Arthur: Wow.
Selling Photography Guides: Digital Basics
Paul: Now we go ahead, and I’m seeing digital pictures online. We’re seeing lots of digital photographs being posted to different websites and critiquing sites. And I’m seeing how beautiful the digital reproduces for electronic use. And I’m seeing that a lot of people are ruining their pictures in Photoshop by over-sharpening them and over-saturating them. So, I decide I’m going to do a second Art of Bird Photography book, which went on to be called The Art of Bird Photography II. I started writing it, and I worked on the digital chapter first — just basic instructions of cameras and lenses and how to convert your raw files and why to use raw files and what to do with them in Photoshop.
So, I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. And then after a while, I started writing different chapters. And after four years of writing, I had a 900-page book which no one would have been able to lift. And I didn’t have the money to print it or store the books. So once I got up to 900 pages and more than 900 photographs, I realized that it was not feasible to make this a printed book, and I decided to do it on CD. And that’s what I did. And, boy, the economics were amazing. When the original, The Art of Bird Photography came out in hardcover and Amphoto sold a copy, I made about $1.75. By the time it went to softcover and they were selling it to a bookseller, I’d make like $0.95. Near the end of the run, when they were selling it to Amazon, I’d make $0.45. So, with traditional publishing, the photographer was not doing very well…or the writer.
Paul: Right. Right.
Arthur: So, I decided to publish the CD, but before I got to the publication year — it took four years to write the whole thing — I said, “Wait a second. I have good solid information here in the form of this digital information. And I’m watching all these people ruin their pictures in Photoshop.” So, I grabbed the chapter of digital photography, and I made it into a PDF, and I sold it as Digital Basics. We sold that for years as a standalone offering, Digital Basics, and I updated it — oh! — too many times. And I found that people were willing to pay good money — I think we sold it for $15.00, and then we raised it to $20.00 or maybe $25.00 — that people were willing to pay good money for solid information about photography that would help them become better photographers. So, the end result of the original Digital Basics file was that about six or seven years ago, I built myself a beautiful swimming pool, a lap pool in my backyard for $68,000. When I did the math at the time, it turned out that Digital Basics had paid for it in its entirety.
Paul: Wow.
Birds as Art: E-Guides
Arthur: And then recently we just introduced the Birds as Art current workflow e-guide, which I lovingly call Digital Basics II. So, a few years ago, I switched to Mac from PC, and I went from BreezeBrowser to Photo Mechanic, and I convert all my raw files in Cannon Digital Photo Professional 4, which is DPP4. So of course, I have guides on all of those things, and the new guide is selling fabulously well, and I just introduced another guide, really high-level, high-end stuff on doing micro adjustments, learning to adjust the focus on your expensive cameras and lenses to make most of the pictures as sharp as possible.
Birding Guides For Specific Areas
And then in the same vein, once I got this idea that… Actually, the way it happened is a funny story. A guy in England wrote me, and he said, “Hey, Art. I’m coming over to visit Fort Desoto. I know you’ve been there a lot. Would you please tell me what birds I could expect to photograph there and what’s the best places to go in the park? And what’s the best wind to go to each place, and what’s the best season for each bird? And while you’re at it, tell me a few good places to eat and where to stay in a good motel.”
Paul: Basically gave you a new business idea.
Arthur: Gave me a new business. So, I wrote the guy, and I said, “Hey, it’s going to take me a couple of days to write that up. Would you pay $50?”
He said, “Sure.”
So, I sent him just 10 pages with some pictures. He sent me $50. And then the next day, right after I sent it to him, I get another email, and it says, “Hey, I’m going to Fort Desoto.” And then, that’s how site guides were born. So now you can go to the Birds as Art online store and click on publications by Artie or on site guides. I’m not sure of all the designations. So now we have guides to Bosque in San Diego and Fort Desoto in Southwestern Florida. Came up with a new business plan from that. Hey, I’m getting tired of writing, but I’m a good editor. So, had some friends write different guides. Some of them are site guides. Some of whom are how-to photograph, and they write the guide. Unfortunately, most of them are not very good writers, so I get to edit the work, and then we sell it and split the money because I have the big online presence through the blog, and they have ideas. And basically, it’s worked out to be a great system.
So, yeah, selling information in digital form as PDFs or on CD — we’re actually getting away from CDs and the people overseas love that because they can do it just as a simple download.
So today, I make money by selling information in digital form, selling books and e-guides in digital form, a lesser amount of teaching every year after the insanity of last year where I had my gallbladder taken out on October 6, got on a plane, traveled around South America photographing and teaching for 11 weeks.
Paul: Wow. Yeah, I saw the notes on that, and it was like, wow, that’s a lot of work.
Arthur: That was insanity. So, I’m slowing down a bit, doing less teaching, just taking time to count my blessings.
Are you Having Fun?
Paul: Are you still having fun?
Arthur: Oh, every minute, every day. When this interview is over, I’m going to throw on my lined pants because I’m up on Long Island. It’s cold. And I’ve been trying to find this Hudsonian Godwit that’s been visiting Heckscher State Park, and I’ve been five times and not even gotten to see him.
Paul: Oh boy.
Arthur: Maybe today will be the magic.
Advice From Arthur Morris For Young Photographers
Paul: Well, we’ve been talking with Arthur Morris, world-class bird photographer, just a great inspiration in photography and in birdwatching and just some incredible work. As part of this podcast, we’ll have shownotes, which will have links to all of Arthur’s websites and all of his information as well as the books we’ve mentioned and some of the names and people we’ve mentioned.
So, Arthur, is there anything you’d like to, as we sort of wind up, leave the audience with, sort of as a parting anecdote?
Do What You Love
Arthur: Yes, Paul. Thank you. And thanks for all of your kind words. And the two things are, you asked me before, young photographers today, what are they going to do? So, I know a lot of professionals who will tell a young photographer, “You should be a school teacher or a seamstress or go into some other business. Photography is dying.” And I would never do that. I say to folks, to young kids, “Listen. Do what you love. Learn about your subjects as best you can. Make the best pictures that you can. Learn to think creatively about developing markets for your work or your ideas or teaching. And if you really love it, you’ll find a way to manage.” So, I would never want to discourage anybody by telling them they can’t do it.
Don’t Just Take Pictures, Write Too!
And then the, the last thing I wanted to mention, and I think it’s a great way to end because it sort of ties everything together, the writing and the photography and the teaching and how to generate income. Right now, I have a streak of blog posts. I think today is 94 days in a row with the new education blog posts. And most of them take me between one and three hours to prepare, and I do one every day now for 93 days. At one point, I was up to 480 days in a row with a new blog post, thinking I was going to do one for the rest of my life. And I went to this school for the Work — I mentioned Byron Katie. It’s a self-help, self-realization program. And when I got there, Katie said, “We ask that you turn off your computers for nine days.” So, I did. My original plan was to get up early and do a blog post, but I turned the computer off. That was the end of that streak, and then I’ve started a new one now, and I’m hoping to keep it going. Good health and good internet connections, going it.
So, it’s an educational blog. You go there every day. You’re going to learn something about photographing nature. And if you don’t photograph about birds or photographing in nature or photographing your grandchildren or doing travel photography…the principles are all the same. So, I strive to teach folks about digital photography every day. And people are going like, “Listen. Take a break once in a while. Take a day off. You don’t have to do it. Why are you so obsessed with it.” Yes, women that I date have strong feelings in that area.
Paul: But you enjoy it.
Arthur: But I love it. And a lot of that goes back to stuff with my dad. He was a demanding man. He was a World War II veteran, severely wounded in Okinawa. And I jokingly say the nicest thing my dad ever said to me was, “Take out the damn garbage.” So, I spend a lot of time wanting to get people to say the nice things he never did. I know he loved me in his way.
Blogs Generate Income
But the fact is that the blog generates income in getting people for tours, and the two huge things that are recent changes over the last four or five years, and that is I have a used gear page. You want to buy a camera, you want to buy a used lens, you go to the Birds as Art used gear page through the blog, and there is dozens of folks who have come to trust me for my pricing advice and acumen and just a wonderful community where people are buying and selling lenses, as much as 8—, $10,000, almost on a daily basis, all on trust. You send me the check, and when it clears, I’ll ship you the lens. And we’ve had, out of probably a thousand sales in the last four or five years, we’ve had maybe one and a half unhappy customers. That’s quite remarkable.
Paul: That’s a pretty good percentage.
Arthur: Yeah. And then the second thing that’s been amazing for me is I get a new lens. I get my hands on a new lens like the 100-400 II, my beloved lens, focuses so close. It’s lightweight. We didn’t even get into the fact that all of these birders now want to become photographers with the camera. So now, I advertise this lens, and if I can get you, Paul Parisi, to believe me, that this 100-400 II Canon lens is the greatest thing since baked break, you click on my link, all these active links that take hours to integrate into the blog post, you click on my link, I get 3.5% back from B&H. And I’m upfront about that. We ask people to write for advice, and then we have the Birds as Art store that sells you the tripods and the tripod heads as well as all our books and educational materials. And the two things combined — the used gear sales and the B&H affiliate sales, they combine annually now, the last couple of years, for well more than what I ever made as a teacher.
Paul: Wow.
Arthur: So, you know, I love the blog. I love being the center of attention. I love sharing my work. So even though my pictures don’t have value today as stock, they have tremendous value in education.
Paul: Oh, excellent. I think the value too is in helping, when you’re talking about equipment especially, is helping somebody choose. It’s so hard to know what’s going to work well. And that experience of you and having been on one of your photo tours, I learned so much about what you should do and shouldn’t do and what you said buy and shouldn‘t buy. And it was really helpful for me. So, I’d encourage people to look at the links in the show notes and visit Arthur’s blog as well as his stores.
Conclusion
Arthur: Me too. So, I’ll just close by saying that having lost Elaine to death was, at the time, a brutal blow, and I did find peace through the Work and that lady Byron Katie. But looking back on the last 20, 30 years, it’ll be… I think it will be 34 years this August. I can say that I’ve been just truly blessed to make a living doing what I love to do — teaching others, sharing my stuff. I mean I’ve got plenty of students who have won BBC awards and honored images in the biggest contests. And that’s very gratifying. And I’ve just made so many wonderful friends. It is my life. It is my passion, and I’m very thankful and appreciative and, as I am appreciative to you for asking me on the show.
Paul: Well thank you. And again, we’ve been talking with Arthur Morris. I encourage you to get a hold of his book, The Art of Bird Photography. Phenomenal book. But, Arthur, thank you for your time, and we’ll be talking soon.
Arthur: Cheers, Paul. You have a great one.
More Episodes:
You’ve been listening to Part 3 of our interview with Arthur Morris. If you missed Part 1, you can listen to it here and if you missed part 2, you can find it here!
Living the Dream as a Nature Photographer With Arthur Morris
On Episode 75 of The Edge of Innovation, we’re talking with Arthur Morris who’s living the dream as a world renowned nature photographer! He’s sharing with us the story of how it all began!