As a young press photographer I was never afforded the chance to say “I can’t think of what to take photographs of” and instead got a shout from the editor….”go get me a photo story” and the hunt to get something would begin.

I would often drive to a village and get out and walk about, drop into the pub (for story finding purposes only of course) and source interesting ideas of what to take photographs of. I would often have the luxury of maybe 3 hours to come up with ideas, take the photographs, get back and develop and print the photographs and have them back with the editor. Three hours, what luxury!

But this morning I got new ideas in about 3 minutes, and had time to make coffee, all thanks to Pinterest. I began with some super colour images by Saul Leiter, and finished with some conceptual portrait ideas, all within 7 clicks, how marvelous and Pinterest was the gatekeeper as its clever algorithm reacted to my clicking, or maybe I was clicking to it’s control…….who knows who is in charge in 2020, us or the machines?

Is it them or is it us who is thinking outside the box?