Ten Thousand Hours Photography

10,000 Hours Deliberate Practice Learning the Art of Photography

Other than Photography – 2025

The purpose of the original page was to let you know a little about me as a person, as at the start of this project, and what I do apart from photography.  This is an update 10,000 hours later …

Lovely wife, dog, no kids = spare time, slightly obsessive personality, bit of a geek, moderately into fitness, occasionally play golf, have a good set of friends with whom I do all the usual social things (apart from watching sport), and like good food & wine.  Which is pretty much unchanged since 2017, with the addition that I am now an obsessive visitor to art museums, galleries and auction houses

To update my inner geek’s view of my life, here are my top 10s as of July 2025 …

Books:

  1. “Capitalist Realism” – Mark Fisher
  2. “The Lives of the Surrealists” – Desmond Morris 
  3. “Mythos” – Stephen Fry
  4. “The Chimp Paradox” – Prof. Steve Peters
  5. “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People” – Stephen Covey
  6. “Tuesdays with Morrie” – Mitch Albom
  7. “Outliers” – Malcolm Gladwell
  8. “Creativity, the psychology of discovery and invention” – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
  9. “Godel, Esher and Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid” – Douglas Hofstadter
  10. (many candidates – no decision)

Films:

  1. Locke
  2. The Social Dilemma
  3. Mulholland Dr
  4. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri
  5. Lee
  6. A Complete Unknown
  7. Pollock
  8. Blade Runner
  9. The Gathering Storm
  10. A Knights Tale

Honourable mentions go to:

  • Dinner for One
  • Pulp Fiction
  • A Fish Called Wanda
  • Parasite

Art:

(For a fuller explanation, see “2025: Top 10 Painters“)

  1. Francis Bacon – Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion
  2. Pablo Picasso – cubist work, e.g., Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, etc.
  3. Edward Hopper – Rooms by the Sea
  4. Dorothea Tanning – Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
  5. Jenny Saville – Odysseus I
  6. Rene Magritte – Memory
  7. Yves Tanguy – The Invisibles
  8. Cecily Brown – Broken Lullaby
  9. Wassily Kandinsky – Composition VIII
  10. Frida Kahlo – The Two Fridas

Classical Music:

  1. JS Bach – Toccata & Fugue in D Minor
  2. Maurice Ravel – Bolero
  3. Sergei Prokofiev – Dance of the Knights from Romeo & Juliet
  4. Antonio Vivaldi – 4 Seasons: Spring
  5. Tchaikovsky – The Death Scene – Swan Lake
  6. Beethoven – Symphony 9 “Ode to Joy” – particularly as performed by the Opera Babes
  7. Carmin Burana/ Carl Orff – O Fortuna
  8. Karl Jenkins – Quirk: Allegretto from Palladio
  9. Sergei Rachmaninov – Piano Concerto No. 3
  10. Max Bruch – Violin Concerto No. 1 in G Minor

(Slightly more) Contemporary Music:

  1. I Faught the Law – UK Dekay
  2. Freed from Desire – Gala
  3. Kiss – Art of Noise, Tom Jones
  4. Rehab (Pharoahe Monche remix) – Ami Winehouse
  5. Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts – Bob Dylan
  6. Victoria’s Secret – Jax
  7. Hallelujah – Leonard Cohen
  8. Fortnight – Taylor Swift
  9. I Wish I Was a Punk Rocker – Sandi Thom
  10. New York – Paloma Faith

As with the list I put together at the time of starting my 10,000 hour art education journey, the above are quickly assembled lists of what I consider to be my favourites.

Fuller explanation of my art choices see “2025: Top 10 Painters“, or books, films & music: “Other Top 10s at 10,000 Hours”

The original list: “Other than Photography – 2017“