Why is it that in an age of cutting edge technology and double digit megapixels, when we can make picture perfect images with minimal effort or expertise, that we’re often left feeling like there’s something essential missing in the process?

“When I started in photography I was using my hands to create images and it seemed like overnight digital came along and all of that came to end. I didn’t know it at the time, but I lost something I loved.” says photographer Ian Ruhter in the above video, a heartfelt account of an incredible journey of discovery that inspired him to convert his van into a camera and set off across America in search of social connection.

“Everyone around me had the same camera, with the same signature,” says Ruhter. “I decided I was going to build a camera that no one has.”

For some, like Ruhter, the creative void that digital technology produced was felt so acutely that they make deep radical changes in their professional and personal paths. Others, like me, are newly awakening to a vague dissatisfaction gently simmering beneath the picturesque surface.

It was enrollment in a Seedlight Photography workshop and the resulting barrage of unflattering emotions – shame, vulnerability, envy– it unleashed, that first got me thinking about transformation, creativity and the courage to change.