Photographer/Cinematographer: Joseph Seif
Pianist and Composer

Heidi: You’re a multifaceted creative, synthesizing photography, filmmaking, painting, composing, and creating music. How does each skill inform the other?
Joseph: For me, it all began with the piano. I started playing at a very young age, and at the same time, I was the kid that sat in the back of the classroom sketching everything, with my head in the clouds. As I progressed musically and artistically through many years of classical piano training, I found that being a pianist unlocked a series of other doors in the realm of creativity. I became more attuned to nuance, emotion, atmosphere, and the contrast of light and shadow. This innate understanding, thanks to studying the likes of Satie, Ravel, and Rachmaninoff, as well as diving into the works of Sargent, Bouguereau, Avedon, Lindbergh, Koudelka, and Salgado allowed me to jump right into painting, photography, and cinematography, spending many years honing each skill to the point where I find myself “medium-agnostic.”

I’ve been told many times that I risk being a jack of all trades when I don’t focus on one thing. That never sat well with me. I’m much happier and more productive when I can switch mediums depending on what I want to express. I look at the Renaissance for inspiration, where multi-faceted creativity was celebrated and surpassed the limitations imposed by the expectations of a single and defined profession. When I was training as a cinematographer with the late Vilmos Zsigmond, he taught me to paint a set with light. First with the wide brush strokes of large sources, creating deep contrast that can be felt with eyes closed, then rendering details with smaller sources. Vilmos was widely known for his distinct visual style, often referred to as “poetic realism” and his mastery of cinematography came from a deep understanding of the human condition. A reflection here, a shadow there, making a composition sing with light and shadow, and somehow tapping into the unknown. That felt just like composing for the piano to me, or connecting deeply with a subject matter in photography.

Even as my photography and cinematography careers took off, I never stopped making music, having released two full-length albums of original piano compositions and currently working on my third. I’m deep into painting as well, studying at an atelier in Los Angeles with a focus on realism. I strongly believe my work in other mediums has ultimately made me a better photographer and cinematographer. Being a multi-disciplinary artist has also heightened my sensitivity and empathy substantially, and I find that I can usually connect with my subjects and clients effortlessly when making portraits or photographing commercial campaigns or assignments.

How do you manage your creative resources as you’re wildly prolific?
It’s always a challenge, but with the right amount of time management, anything is possible! When not on set, my days are divided into 4-hour sections where I balance client interactions, admin time for my business, personal creative projects, and most importantly, parenting. I also have “seasons” where I’m focused on one medium over another. For example, a typical week would entail prepping for a shoot, being on set capturing campaigns for major brands, managing post production, and being present and very much focusing on my seven-year old daughter. I’ve also recently joined the board of directors at APA-LA, so that’s been keeping me busy with new opportunities to serve our photo community. So I tend to compose at night, with headphones on, and after many months when I’ve had everything dialed in and written down, I would go to a fantastic studio here in LA and record everything in just a few days. On weekdays when I’m not on a shoot or in pre-pro, I will typically be painting or working on a personal photography project.

For inspiration, I find that the ocean does incredible things. I’ve taken up sailing, and will hop on my friend’s timeshared 36-foot sailboat once or twice a month to cut through water with some dolphins in Santa Monica Bay whenever I feel creatively stuck. It’s also been tough to stay creative with the horrific current state of the world, so lately I’ve been turning my lens onto environmental issues I care deeply about, such as the human impact on the polar regions and ocean conservation. That comes with an inherent sense of purpose, which is even more fuel for creativity. No matter what it is I’m doing, it always feels like a race against the clock as I tend to work in big bursts of energy, which I somehow channel like an antenna in a thunderstorm!

When you are composing music, are you seeing images?
Yes! It’s hard to describe perfectly. Sometimes I’m seeing nostalgic images that have velvet edges and blue, purple and magenta hues. Other times, I feel a heavy weight in my chest that flows through my fingers until it all exists outside of me. I also see light and shadow, or more accurately, I sense contrast. There is a lot of pain and beauty inside and outside of us, it’s everywhere, and I tap into it very deeply. Sometimes that manifests as colors and imagery, other times as a force that propels you or pulls you in like a freight train or a black hole.

Is the inverse also true, that by creating imagery you hear music?
I don’t hear music when making images, though I love to have good music on in a portrait session. Especially something that will influence the direction I want to take the work in. I do often get the same feeling in my chest while on set though, that intuitive push/pull towards the desired outcome of the work, especially when it comes to light and contrast.

Tell me about your upcoming project Midnight Sun, what is it and how did it come about?
I began work on Midnight Sun three years ago. It’s essentially a collection of personal images captured during assignments in Antarctica and the Arctic. In this work, I wanted to not only focus on the epic natural beauty of these remote regions but also the pressing issues of human impact, militarization, over-tourism, mining, and the effects of colonization on indigenous communities. The experience of visiting the Antarctic and the Arctic have been nothing short of life-changing for me. It ignited a sense of purpose and urgency to take my personal work in this direction, despite being a commercial photographer and cinematographer for most of my career with little experience in landscape photography and reportage. So I tried to keep everything authentic to how I see and feel things, which led to shooting this typically more documentary-style subject matter with more of a fine art aesthetic.

Midnight Sun is taking the form of a book and a music record – the images for the most part are devoid of people, a contrast to your commercial work. How did you expand creatively during that project?
Midnight Sun, while (mostly) devoid of people, is really all about humanity! It’s about our relationship to nature, our need to dominate and conquer resources, and our incessant urge to impose our way of life on indigenous communities. But it’s also about the beauty and fragility of our planet, our responsibility as stewards of the Earth, and our spiritual growth as a species going through some tough transitions. I experienced all of those things while in the polar regions and it completely transformed me and how I view my role as an artist in this era. The work is complete and is currently being shopped around with several publishers in proposal form. I am also deep in the process of composing my third record, which will accompany the book as a “soundtrack” of sorts. Unlike my last two albums, which were primarily classical piano records, the Midnight Sun record will have a more orchestral and “cosmic” sound that comes from the use of analog synthesizers along with acoustic pianos. It is influenced by more modern composers such as Vangelis, M83, Yann Tiersen and Max Richter, but infused with my own personal style of classical piano. Like the last two albums, I’m planning on releasing it on vinyl along with the book, as well as a boxed set.

How did the Lecia relationship begin, and what are you working on now?
I’ve been photographing my personal work with a Leica M6 since the mid-2000’s. This led to a book I published in 2019 called “Onward,” which is a collection of black and white images captured while on the road for 12 years as a cinematographer on travel assignments, mostly taken with my M6. Along with several great bookstores such as Hennessey + Ingalls, Skylight Books, and William Stout Architectural Books, Leica LA and Leica NY began to carry the book, which has done really well and almost sold out the first edition. I also had the opportunity to work with the late John Kreidler early on in my photography career, and he became Leica’s director of education well before he passed away last year. He was kind and gracious to me as always, and introduced me to some wonderful people at Leica. Then there’s the amazing Paris Chong! The curator at Leica Gallery LA, who is an absolute gem in our industry. She has been instrumental in guiding the direction of my Midnight Sun project, and I’m very grateful for her insight and encouragement.

On a related note, I use Leica’s SL-series cameras and lenses for all my commercial photo assignments, and all of Midnight Sun was captured with the same cameras and lenses as well. Those cameras and lenses have been incredibly compatible with how I make images, with beautiful color science and deep, rich blacks that make the images feel like you can dive right into them. I also often use Leica cinema lenses in my cinematography work. Essentially, I view Leica as a partner on both the artistic and the technical side to keep my photography evolving into the future.

With commercial work, have you found it necessary to narrow down what you’re known for? 
My commercial photography and cinematography work is also wide-ranging. I’m interested in so many things, especially in authentically capturing images of people doing things. So in a given month, I find myself working on fashion campaigns, editorial portrait assignments, automotive campaigns, advertorial portraiture for healthcare and technology companies, lifestyle image libraries for brands, and even underwater work, such as the two Toyota commercials I shot for the Olympics featuring members of the USA swim team. I’ve always been a hybrid shooter, so while I’ll either come onto a union commercial as cinematographer, or capture an advertising campaign as a photographer, I’m most often doing both and have been developing and building a signature workflow for hybrid campaigns for many years, to the point where it’s what I’ve become known for and what I naturally gravitate to, work-wise.