Always Carry A Camera

bad gastein is simply one of my most favourite places in austria to take photos

here’s a throwback to my first visit in spring 2025
— and the irises of Gesäuse on our way back home 💜

which photo do you like best? drop a number in the comments below ⤵️

i photographed these two at the neusiedlersee as the storm rolled in

i don’t know them

but i know this

they were my age give or take,
they were calm and had a stillness about them,
and they certainly weren’t running for shelter as the storm got closer and closer

they just sat there together at the end of the jetty watching the sky do what it was going to do anyway

there’s something about midlife that teaches you this
you stop running from the storms
you stop pretending the sky isn’t doing what it’s doing
you find your person and you sit with it

mine is my partner Roland
— the other half of

the man who hands me a spare battery when I forget mine (literally every time)
who drove me to zaanse schans half asleep on my breakfast sleeping pills,
who sits at the end of jetties with me when everyone else has run for shelter

reinventing your life in your fifties is not a solo sport

the storm will come — it always does
the only question is who’s sitting next to you when it does?
who has your back?
who’s your end of the jetty person?

tag them ⤵️



—

**alt text:**
a couple sit together at the end of a wooden jetty over the perfectly still neusiedlersee in burgenland austria — the storm reflected in the water below, the sky above dark and closing in — a photograph about the people who stay with you when the weather turns

if i’d needed reminding
why i love photography
the netherlands would have showed me

i took my camera there for just eight days

i didn’t go with a shot list or a plan

i went with a empty memory card and no expectations

and somewhere between the canals at dusk
and a flower nobody else stopped for

the netherlands reminded me what this is actually about

not the gear
not the edit
not whether the light was right
or the timing was perfect

just the looking

just the staying long enough to let something show itself to you

swipe through these and tell me which one makes you stop

because the one that stops you
says something about how you see the world

and i’d genuinely love to know what that is

this is what i was looking at

my favourite nikkor 600mm lens (aka big ass lens) on my camera

just a purple flower
a salvia
by the road

the kind you walk past without stopping

but i didn’t walk past it

that’s the whole thing really
— that’s all this account has ever been about

stopping when everything in you says keep walking
and noticing

then taking your photo

what did you stop for today?

drop a comment below ⬇️ and reminder us all to stop and notice more often

the camera doesn’t take the photo
this does

every photo that ever stopped someone mid-scroll
every image that made someone feel something they couldn’t quite name
every moment caught before it disappeared forever

it started here

not with the gear,
not with the settings,
not with the edit

with a hand that decided to pick up the camera

i’ve been super stupidly ridiculously busy lately
— which is great
— after all, I just started a business

but i’ve missed this
i’ve missed you

so i’m want to catch up — what are you up to right now

what are you shooting, creating, building, growing

tell me in the comments
and i will go to every single account that engages

and if you’ve been putting off picking up your camera
— whether mobile phone, drone, nikon, canon, sony, with or without mirror — consider this your sign

today is a good day to create something

I can’t wait to catch up with y’all

ever noticed how fast the moon rises?

as a photographer, you have a narrow window
between the moon appearing on the horizon
and it disappearing into the sky

— the kind of shot that only happens
when the camera is already in your hand

I had just minutes to capture this shot

the moon came up over the dunes so fast
i didn’t have time to think

just — camera up, breath held, don’t move

there’s a particular kind of panic
when you know that what you’re watching
won’t wait for you to be ready

and a particular kind of quiet afterwards when you realise you got it

I only shot one photo - got it first time

i talk a lot about slowing down and really looking

but sometimes the looking has to happen at full speed
the camera has to already be in your hand

how many moments have you missed
because your hands were empty?

take my advice
always carry a camera

this is what it looks like
when you stop apologising for taking up space

i spent a long time being quieter than i wanted to be

toning things down
being more agreeable
more careful

being less of a lot of things that turned out to be the most important parts of me

and then one day the cost of staying small
got higher than the cost of being seen

so i stopped
and I picked up my camera

this peacock doesn’t care what you think of its noise

it isn’t performing for you

it isn’t asking permission

it isn’t waiting until it feels ready
or until everyone in the room is comfortable

it just — is

fully, loudly, unapologetically itself

i’m taking notes
and all the photographs

what did you stop apologising for this year?

a year ago i was burnt out, questioning everything and wondering if i’d got it all completely wrong

but i always carried my camera

that turned out to matter more than i knew

slowing down changed everything

learning to really look — at the small things, the overlooked things, the things everyone else walks past — gave me back something i didn’t realise i’d lost

confidence in my own eye

i’m jo

photographer, ugly duckling, midlife reinvention in progress, my own boss

this account exists for the people daring to be different

the late bloomers, the second-guessers, the ones who thought the window had closed

it hasn’t

my 52nd year starts today

and i genuinely believe it’s going to be the best one yet

thank you for being here

it means more than you know

if you have been tagged in this post, you are one of the MANY people who have supported me in the last 12 months (and before) and i want you to know how much i appreciate every piece of advice, every photo, every shared laugh (and beer) 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 … it takes a village to raise an ugly ducking ♥️

you don’t need to travel far to find a great shot
— you just need to slow down and notice the details

a flower blooming in a garden
something so ordinary you’d walk past it without thinking

swipe to see what happens when you don’t

this is an anemone
it blooms in my garden every year
but there have been years when i didn’t stop and notice
i was too busy holding on by my fingernails

this year is different
now i stop

and the stopping and noticing is what makes the difference

the crouching down
the staying long enough to let it show me something

the close up on the right is the same flower
same light, same spot, same camera

but it asks a different question

the first shot asks what it is

the second asks who it is
up close and personal
in all its stunning and intricate beauty

that’s the ugly duckling lens
— and it’s not a talent, it’s a habit

you already have everything you need to shoot like this

you just need to slow down enough to use it

what’s growing in your garden,
on your street, on your walk to work
that you haven’t really looked at yet?

going viral is exciting
but it was never the point.

the point was a pine cone on a forest path

something small
something ordinary
something many people would walk straight past

i shared it because it caught my eye

and because photography has taught me that beauty is everywhere when you slow down enough to notice

what happened next was incredible

more than a thousand people replied on threads
tens of thousands of people stopped scrolling
and photographers from all over the world shared what they had noticed too

that is what means the most to me

not the numbers
not the algorithm
not “going viral”

but the reminder that there are so many of us in midlife learning to pay attention again

to the light
to the details
to the quiet moments
to the beauty hiding in plain sight

in a world that constantly tells you to follow trends, copy what works, and chase what everyone else is doing, there is something deeply rewarding about noticing what is genuinely meaningful to you

your photo does not need to be dramatic
it does not need to look like everyone else’s
it only needs to reflect what made you stop and say:

“that matters to me”

that is where your most authentic work begins

and that is where real connection happens.

thank you for reminding me that there is a whole community of people over 40, 50 and beyond who are still curious, still creative, and still finding beauty in the smallest things

keep noticing
keep creating

and always carry a camera