I’m a photographer, and have been for the last twenty years, because it is in my soul – it is who and what I am. It is more important to me than what schools I go to, how big my house is, and the neighborhood I live in. It’s certainly more important that the toys I have. I want to leave behind a great body of work, and my bank account (something vastly important to me) runs behind that objective. That difference may explain, in part, why we see this so differently.

I teach workshops, and I’d rather somebody leave a better photographer and hate me, than somebody leave as my friend, but no better at their craft. Ability, to me, counts more than nice, and I’d rather that you think I’m an ass and have you take a second look at where portraiture is headed and what you consider to be the best you can achieve, than to say nothing and be liked. Nice won’t be of much help to either of us if our businesses go south, or if we feel unfulfilled by the work of our lives – I think we’d both rather have had to take a hard look at ourselves earlier on. I did, and I have, which is part of the reason I’m here at all.

Mark Robert Halper is a Los Angeles and Orange county based commercial photographer

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