Work is what we do by the hour. It begins and, if possible, we do it for money. Welding car bodies on an assembly line is work; washing dishes, computing taxes, walking the rounds in a psychiatric ward, picking asparagus–these are work. Labor, on the other hand, sets its own pace. We may get paid for it, but it’s harder to quantify… Writing a poem, raising a child, developing a new calculus, resolving a neurosis, invention in all forms — these are labors.

Work is an intended activity that is accomplished through the will. A labor can be intended but only to the extent of doing the groundwork, or of not doing things that would clearly prevent the labor. Beyond that, labor has its own schedule.



There is no technology, no time-saving device that can alter the rhythms of creative labor. When the worth of labor is expressed in terms of exchange value, therefore, creativity is automatically devalued every time there is an advance in the technology of work.

In a corporate environment, we creatives often find ourselves in beige boxes—not with nothing “creative” in sight. Fine for work but not a great place for creative labor.

However, we find ourselves needing to do both.

Our work is to push pixels, produce marketing materials, launch websites. But our creative labor is to further the brand we represent—which is much harder to define and requires more.

The former requires communication, skill, accuracy, and speed. The latter takes patience, requires thought, and demands that our creative ‘wells’ are full.

We as commercial artists do both, and they are interdependent. We can’t further our brands without work, and we won’t get future work if our past projects weren’t born of creative labor.

We can’t be methodical when it’s time to work, nor can we rush creative labor.

Fotoshop by Adobé from Jesse Rosten on Vimeo.

Today I found a clever video that makes the perfect companion to this announcement.

Earth | Time Lapse View from Space, Fly Over | NASA, ISS from Michael König on Vimeo.

Thank you for moving the world forward. Thank you for beautiful technology. Thank you for user interfaces that make me smile. Thank you for rescuing me from PCs. Thank you for setting the bar so high. Thank you for literally changing my life.

Jonathan Bregel from Next Level Pictures shoots 8 Hours in Brooklyn using a Phantom Flex slow-mo camera.

…the idea behind this video was to document whatever sort of culture we could find within an 8 hour span with literally no pre-production. A big misconception is that you need a massive crew and massive lights in order to use this camera…false. However, you do need to know how to use natural daylight to your advantage along with having a kick-ass core crew to support you.

Nice job, brethren. It’s indeed a work of art.