A: I love color. I just have a tremendous attraction to color and vibrancy, so all those things that you just said—it just makes me feel good. When I started photography back in the day, it was film. I was in the darkroom doing black and white photography, but I ended up underexposing the pictures and then painting them . . . And I painted them very painterly. . . Color just makes me very happy. I just really love color and how colors are juxtaposed next to each other, and the shapes and the negative space. That’s the other thing a lot of people don’t realize I also pay attention to: the negative space. And I just use filters! It’s all digital, so it’s very easy to saturate things or play with them a little bit more with filters. It's a very easy task today.

A: There’s an expression that the best camera is the one that you have with you. We all have our phones with us. And I have to attribute the smartphone to bringing me back to photography. I’m not technical at all, that’s the other thing. I have a lot of friends who say “go get this camera, go get that camera.” Back in the day I had all the SLRs, all the lenses and whatnot. But for me, if I can have it with me to capture that moment...and it’s actually the same with my filmmaking. People don’t realize that a lot of my films — my indie films, not the ones I was hired for for television — I shot most of them pre-smartphone with little handy cameras. I always say if my two hands are in the video, that means I didn’t shoot it. That means I must have had a professional shoot it. But if my two hands are not, I was able to shoot it myself. I would just hold the camera up, turn the viewfinder and go, “okay, am I in it?” and proceed. And I was doing it all before vlogging.

It depends. I always have my phone with me. Lighting has a big effect on what I want to capture. I really love photographing during the golden hour — when the sun is setting or even in the morning, depending on where I am. The sunlight is like paint. When it passes through surfaces, the colors just change completely. And I only like natural light. I don’t like artificial light. So if I’m in a state of mind where I want to go out and photograph, then I go searching. So it kind of depends. When we were locked down here for COVID and we weren’t supposed to leave, I left everyday on my bicycle with a bandana (because you couldn’t get masks then) and I documented all over. That’s the COVID-19 exhibit that’s online. Everybody’s saying I should go back and photograph what it looks like today, and I might do that so you can see the change.

I was nominated for two Emmys for my first two films, and one won, and I think it is because of my background . . . Because I designed multimedia shows — again, this was pre-computers, this was a long, long time ago — they were these huge extravaganzas with many, many slide projectors going. I’d build the soundtrack and design [the projects] around the soundtrack. The first doc I was awarded — and I never went to film school, I just had to figure it out—I treated it kind of like I would have treated one of my other projects.

I just wanted it to be beautiful. I ended up going to a play and I loved the music, so I asked who did the music. They hooked me up with the guy and I said, “hey, would you like to score this little doc that I just got?” and he said “sure!” Usually they just use stock music, so the music was great. Also, the editor on staff didn’t really know what he was doing. They’re in the same union as engineers, so they’re not really artists. They're just sort of punching the clock so they can go home. So they let me bring in a freelancer, and he was totally into being creative. I always say it was beginner's luck, and it was beginner's luck in one way, but it's also because all of my skills were transferable. A lot of people come to documentaries from journalism, so they’re good at the storytelling but they don't have the visual and the audio aspect. I’m very sensitive to audio. When I make my films, I love building the soundtracks. People don’t realize the impact sound has on your perception of something. Sound is very important.

I didn’t expect to do that. I had spent most of my career early on behind the camera. And then I emerged in front of the camera when I made this film about my dog [A Dog’s Life]. It was going to be a funny pilot, and then it became this movie. I felt totally fine in front of the camera, and actually got a lot of acknowledgement. And then I thought about how my mother always wanted me to have a nose job, so I decided to go to three plastic surgeons with her as long as I could have a crew with me, and she couldn’t care less. So that little film [My Nose] came out, and it was the reaction to that film that led me to realize how many people were in pain and how many people were suffering. That’s when I came out with my steps to finding forgiveness and started doing workshops. I started hearing more and more stories and that's when I went, “oh my god, I need to help people.” I asked my mother if she would be willing to go on camera to work on our relationship. And I knew if she said yes, I had a goldmine, because she had become very funny. She’s kind of the Howard Stern of geryatric people. She’s the queen of the oneliners. So I knew I had this huge archive. And I wasn’t gonna make it a vanity piece. This was about helping people. The whole reason I made [Look at us now, Mother!] was for that intention — to help people. And I’m working on the memoir now. All I want to do is help people. Through my gift, which is storytelling and being an artist . . . I’m responding to what people want. I’m an empath and I knew people were in pain, and I knew that I’m capable of helping them.

A: Filmmaking taps all the senses. I love visuals, I love storytelling, I love everything. I do love photography very much, but I love to tell stories. And you could do that with pictures, but you can get a greater emotional impact on people with a film, at least in my experience. With film, the great thing is that it is collaborative, even though I do quite a bit of it myself. But it’s more difficult in the sense that you really need to raise your money there. Photography is easier and it’s a quicker fix. I can create things that I enjoy and others enjoy faster. So there is something satisfying about that, too.

A: We forgive for only one person, and that is ourself. We don’t forgive for anybody else. The other person — it doesn’t matter. So many people tell me that [they’re] waiting for whoever their person is — I’ll call them their abuser — to acknowledge that they did something wrong, or to say they're sorry. And I say it’s like trying to get Stevie Wonder to drive a racecar. And if, like in the case that you mentioned, they’re aware and they don’t care, it doesn’t matter. Because anybody who hurts another person is a wounded person. When you hurt and you’re unkind to other people, that’s because [you’re] not feeling the love. Think about yourself. When you’re out wanting to help and give love to others, that’s because you’re feeling it inside of you. And when we’re feeling less-than, that’s when we can be snappy, that’s when we can have a short temper, that’s when we’re not giving the love. So you know when somebody is there being abusive and unkind to you, you better believe that they’re in pain themselves. But we’re getting wounded and hurt so we don’t really care. So the point is if we want to be healthy and have our power, and we don’t want to walk around as a victim—because as my line says, be the hero of your story, not the victim — we need to reframe how we look at that person. As I said in my Ted Talk, once you realize that person is really a wounded child, you change your expectations. So it’s about us. Do you want someone to have power over you, and make you feel little? We have to render that source powerless over us. That’s what I teach. And we’re not condoning the behavior, and we’re not forgetting it. We’re forgiving to set ourselves free of the emotional baggage, because we all have trauma in our lives. It’s how we handle the trauma [that matters]. That’s where our growth shows. We can turn around and use it as an opportunity to grow.

A: It’s about seeing. It’s about keeping your eyes open and observing. I’m a huge observer. I see and I hear everything . . . Go to some area at different times of day and look at how the lighting changes. You would be amazed at how the same scene looks completely different at different times of day. . . And just shoot. We’re not in the film era where photography was costly. It’s not costly. . . Everybody’s got a smartphone nowadays, so you’ve got the vehicle to capture moments. And just don’t worry. Just shoot, shoot, shoot. Pay attention to colors and shapes and perspectives and negative spaces. But definitely don’t worry. Never worry. Creating is about expressing yourself. That’s where we’re letting go. It’s our vehicle to let our stress out. It’s our vehicle to relax. Stop judging yourself. . . And have fun. That’s the most important thing. Have fun, laugh, and enjoy life. If pictures bring you joy, keep shooting. Just shoot. Don’t worry about it.